Tokushichi Nomura II

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Tokushichi Nomura II (野村徳七, 1878 - 1945) is the founder of the Nomura Zaibatsu who formed Nomura Securites in 1925. He was known in childhood as Shinnosuke. In 1928, he was appointed to the House of Peers in Japan.

[edit] First fortune

Shinnosuke made his first fortune in 1905, investing in a textile company Fukushima Boseki which was widely believed to be headed for bankruptcy. Shinnosuke knew better. He was a friend of the firm's founder Yutaro Yasuhiro. One day, after a hefty sell-off of the firm's shares, Shinnosuke moved quickly, pestering the management to show him their books. The firm showed bulging order books, the factory was running at full capacity and the profits had never been better.

After seeing the books, he went to the floor of the Osaka exchange and began quietly buying Fukushima Boseki's shares at twenty Yen. He kept buying until the price rose to thirty Yen. A number of other traders had sold the stock short and began to panic. Shinnosuke had bought up most of the available shares. Thus the panic began to drive up the price. Nomura sat back and watched the price rise continually from thirty five, then forty, forty five, fifty. By the end of 1905 the shares had risen to one hundred Yen, quadrupling Nomura's investment.