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Goldman Sachs has named Hidehiro Imatsu as the new president of its Japan operations, after a five-month effort to fill one of the most powerful positions in Tokyo’s financial industry.
The appointment of Imatsu, a Goldman Sachs veteran currently based in Hong Kong, follows the abrupt departure in November of Masanori Mochida, the near 70-year old banker who had led the group for more than 20 years.
By naming Imatsu now, Goldman ends a period of uncertainty during which its Japan operations have been led by a quintet of its most senior bankers — five partners who, according to multiple sources at the bank, were eliminated from the search for a new president at a relatively early stage.
Mochida, who had worked at Goldman Sachs for 38 years and ran its Japan operations since 2001, used to tell anyone who asked about his retirement plans that he intended to “die at my desk”.
As president, Mochida elevated Goldman’s Japanese office to a unique position within its global network and created a formidable competitor for both domestic and foreign investment banks.
However, his extraordinary longevity in the post stored up problems for the bank, current and former staff told the Financial Times.
Mochida failed to groom a cohort of potential successors, they said, while a number of senior figures left the bank after becoming frustrated with the lack of opportunity to progress.
Mochida’s dominance of the business secured the Japanese operations significant autonomy over the years. But bankers in Asia and at Goldman’s global headquarters in New York said the Japan operations had become too siloed under Mochida.
One consequence of that, according to three bankers, was that Goldman Japan had fallen back in some key areas. In 2023, Goldman finished eighth in the rankings of deal advisory work involving Japanese companies.
Mochida did not respond to requests for comment.
Goldman’s chief executive David Solomon said Imatsu “brings extensive leadership experience and a deep knowledge of Goldman Sachs’ franchise and our clients in Japan to his new responsibilities, having led several of our key businesses over the course of his more than two decades at the firm”.
Imatsu is currently co-head of global interest rate trading and co-head of the Asia Pacific fixed income, currency and commodities franchise.
People familiar with the recruitment process said a central and immediate task of Imatsu would be to more effectively plug the Tokyo business into the global network.
That need has become more pressing over the past year as global investment interest in China has fallen off, while Japan’s real estate and mergers and acquisitions markets have rebounded strongly, and Tokyo’s equity markets have surged back to their 1980s bubble peak.
Goldman sounded out multiple alumni for the role before settling on Imatsu, according to insiders.
Those approached include Eiji Ueda, now the chief investment officer of Japan’s $1.45tn Government Pension Investment Fund, Takashi Murata, the former co-head of Goldman’s Asia Pacific Private Investing who has since moved to Warburg Pincus, and Katsunori Sago, the ex-Goldman partner once identified as a possible successor to Masayoshi Son at SoftBank, the people said.
Ueda, Murata and Sago declined to comment.
