<h3><strong>Monex&#8217;s &#8220;New NISA&#8221; account was essential for the growth of the &#8220;docomo Economic Bloc</strong></h3>
<p><strong> The capital and business alliance between NTT DOCOMO and Monex Group announced on October 4 was a last-minute choice with the &#8220;New NISA&#8221; in mind. This is because the new NISA will be a decisive factor in the competition not only in the financial industry, but also in the &#8220;economic sphere&#8221; centered on major carriers. Let us explain the reasons for this and predict the services of the DOCOMO-Monex alliance to be announced in the future.</strong></p>
<figure id="attachment_337155" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-337155" style="width: 4589px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="f536212f"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2023/10/7fb9e47c267e37de38e2a70c6ca86c9c.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-337155" class="wp-caption-text"> NTT DOCOMO has lagged behind in the financial business. What we should pay attention to is the trend of &#8220;d-card&#8221; members, who number 96 million (PHOTO: AFRO)</figcaption></figure>
<p> The background of NTT DOCOMO&#8217;s acquisition of Monex, Inc. was, as has been widely said, DOCOMO&#8217;s lagging financial business. However, what finally pushed DOCOMO to acquire Monex at a higher price than the original corporate value was probably the &#8220;New NISA,&#8221; which will start in January 2012. The <strong>new NISA account will be indispensable for the growth of the &#8220;docomo economic zone</strong>.</p>
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<p> As the name implies, NISA (small amount investment tax exemption) is a government program that reduces taxes (tax rate of approximately 20%) on investment income to zero. The new NISA, which will start in January 2012, will offer much more favorable tax treatment than the current NISA. The new NISA has two investment limits: a &#8220;growth investment limit&#8221; for investing in stocks and investment trusts, and a &#8220;savings investment limit&#8221; for accumulating investments in investment trusts, which can be used together to invest up to 3.6 million yen per year. The annual limit of the current NISA was 1.2 million yen for the &#8220;general NISA&#8221; and 400,000 yen for the &#8220;savings NISA&#8221; (they cannot be combined).</p>
<p> This investment limit is set at 18 million yen, which can be reused if a portion is sold. For example, if one sold shares worth 1 million yen invested after reaching 18 million yen, the investment limit would be reduced to 17 million yen and a new investment of 1 million yen could be made. <strong>Most ordinary households,</strong> except perhaps for a few wealthy individuals, <strong>should be able to manage their assets with the new NISA alone. This means that, in the future, money invested by individuals will not &#8220;flow&#8221; to any account other than the New NISA.</strong></p>
<h3><strong> The &#8220;New NISA&#8221; will accelerate the &#8220;shift from savings to investment&#8221;&#8230; Individual asset management will be completed only with the &#8220;New NISA&#8221;.</strong><strong> </strong></h3>
<p> The &#8220;Asset Income Doubling Plan&#8221; formulated by the government in November 2010 calls for doubling the total number of NISA accounts from 17 million to 34 million and doubling NISA purchases from 28 trillion yen to 56 trillion yen in five years. This is not a typical national desk calculation, and in the <strong>six months since</strong> the announcement, the <strong>total</strong> number of accounts has already <strong>reached 19.4 million and the purchase amount 32.8 trillion yen</strong>. Considering the upcoming launch of the new NISA, it is even possible that the goal will be achieved ahead of schedule.</p>
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<p> Furthermore, <strong>as of the end of June 2011, personal financial assets totaled ¥211.5 trillion, with cash and deposits still accounting for more than 50%. There is still room for growth.</strong> The <strong>new NISA account will be a powerful long-term attractor of individual money</strong>.</p>
<div data-friday-nextpage-lead=" New NISA accounts will become a growth engine for the economic sphere."></div>
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<h3><strong>The &#8220;New NISA&#8221; account will be the growth engine of the economic sphere.</strong></h3>
<p> However, simply acquiring accounts and keeping the funds in place will not bring any real benefits. <strong>Each online brokerage firm offers services that are almost redundant in the short term, such as &#8220;Kureka Savings,&#8221; which allows customers to accumulate mutual funds using credit card payments</strong>. In addition, there are <strong>no commissions on the purchase of mutual funds, and SBI Securities and Rakuten Securities as well as NISA offer no commissions on the purchase and sale of domestic stocks</strong>. <strong>There is no &#8220;earning power.</strong></p>
<p> However, the <strong>immediate income from commissions is not important</strong>. The new NISA will make the system permanent, and the tax exemption period will be indefinite. As a result, the new NISA will be able to handle not only retirement funds, but also education funds, home ownership funds, and various other life event expenses. Specifically, it is envisioned that the individual will be able to use the savings account to fund retirement and the growth account to fund life events.</p>
<p> For example, suppose an individual sells stocks or mutual funds purchased in the growth investment line. If the proceeds from the sale of such funds are made available to the economic sphere, it would greatly contribute to the growth of the economic sphere. Since the investment quota can be reused, the transaction can be repeated as many times as necessary. Hopefully, each time this happens, individual money will be supplied to the economic zone.</p>
<p> In other words, the <strong>new NISA account will function as a terminal to deposit the inflows and outflows of individual money. This is the background that this is an indispensable element for gaining supremacy in the race for the economic sphere.</strong><strong> </strong></p>
<figure id="attachment_337156" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-337156" style="width: 4000px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="67e3cfba"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2023/10/5c65df0ccc29cba3378dce750ffe7d42.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-337156" class="wp-caption-text"> The photo shows the press conference held on October 4, &#8220;Investment Day,&#8221; to announce the capital and business alliance with NTT DOCOMO and Monex G.</figcaption></figure>
<h3><strong> What will happen to the services of the &#8220;New Monex, Inc.</strong></h3>
<p><strong>Docomo Monex Holdings</strong>, which will be established through the capital alliance, is scheduled to be officially launched on January 4, &#8217;24. However, the announcement of specific services will likely be made before that date. This is because applications for opening new NISA accounts have already begun this past October. If they take too much time, they will flow to other companies.</p>
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<h3><strong> Was Monex&#8217;s &#8220;campaign&#8221; a sign of a capital tie-up?</strong></h3>
<p> In the meantime, emergency measures have been taken. A week before the capital tie-up was announced, Monex announced a campaign for the new NISA, which was to increase the point reward rate for credit card savings in the NISA account. The campaign offers <strong>2.2% of the amount saved for those who open a new account, and 1.5% for those who already have a NISA account, a significant increase from the previous 1.1%</strong>. However, both rates of return are limited to the end of September 2012.</p>
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<p> When I saw this campaign, I honestly thought it was a bit half-hearted. I thought that if it was until the end of September 2012, some people would use the New NISA with Monex until then and change their accounts to other companies in October. The amount of savings invested in the new NISA can be transferred to other companies.</p>
<p> However, at least at this point, the capital tie-up with DoCoMo had probably been officially decided internally. It was a perfect &#8220;stopgap&#8221; campaign. If they had been a bit more clever, they might have ended up forming a tie-up with Docomo (a missed opportunity to make a profit. &#8230;&#8230;).</p>
<div data-friday-nextpage-lead=" The &quot;Credit Card Accumulation&quot; of &quot;d Card GOLD&quot; is the focus of attention."></div>
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<h3><strong>The point of interest is the point redemption rate of the &#8220;credit card reserve&#8221; of the &#8220;d Card GOLD&#8221;.</strong></h3>
<p> Aside from that, this &#8220;bridging campaign&#8221; by Monex, Inc. is only a campaign using &#8220;Monex Card&#8221;. While it may have the effect of preventing the cancellation of existing Monex NISA accounts, it does not take advantage of DOCOMO&#8217;s user base. In order to take advantage of <strong>docomo&#8217;s 96 million members, the only way to do so would be to reward points by accumulating credit cards with the &#8220;d-card&#8221; in terms of immediate effect and ease of understanding</strong>.</p>
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<p> And as for the all-important redemption rate, we <strong>expect a 1% redemption rate for the regular d-card and 1.5% for the gold card, &#8220;d-card GOLD</strong>. If this is realized, it will have a considerable impact.</p>
<p> If the regular card is set at 0.5%, which is on par with other companies, it will be inferior to the 1.1% that Monex card offers in normal times. The key will be d-card GOLD&#8217;s ability to offer 1.5%, which could be a major incentive for users to open accounts with Monex. <strong>Monex will be the most likely candidate for residents in the docomo economic zone.</strong> After all, the number of d-card GOLD cards issued exceeds 10 million, which may rewrite the industry map.</p>
<figure id="attachment_337157" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-337157" style="width: 1280px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="34ca77eb"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2023/10/6a8d7913b8122eaf181fc84dbe2b3167.png" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-337157" class="wp-caption-text"> The first product you trade after opening an account has largely shifted from Japanese stocks to mutual funds over the past decade. The majority of the products traded for the first time are now mutual funds (based on a survey of 6,735 Monex account holders. (From Monex, Inc. press release)</figcaption></figure>
<h3><strong> Importance of &#8220;Point Redemption&#8221; in Asset Management</strong></h3>
<p><strong> There are many who argue that it is wrong to invest for the sake of points. However, I do not agree. It takes time to achieve results through investment in mutual fund accumulation. Long-term investment is a prerequisite, and continuity is more important than anything else. While investing, it is normal for losses to occur due to market declines. Even in such a case, the company may be motivated to keep investing, saying, &#8220;Well, it&#8217;s OK because I&#8217;m getting points.</strong></p>
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<p> Another point of interest besides the credit card savings is the <strong>points for the balance of mutual fund holdings</strong>. Monex is weak in this area. In fact, Matsui <strong>Securities is planning to launch an outrageous point service in November, which is likely to draw attention to the investment trust balance points</strong> (just to mention one thing, Matsui Securities will continue to lose money on investment trusts as long as this service is continued).</p>
<p> (In a nutshell, Matsui Securities will continue to lose money on mutual funds as long as this service continues.</p>


 After working as a money writer, financial planner, and market analyst for a securities company, Matsuoka became independent in 1996. He writes articles on finance and asset management mainly for business and economic magazines. Author of "A Textbook for the First Year of Robo-Advisor Investing" and "Understanding with Rich Illustrations! Cashless Payments: The Book You Can Definitely Benefit from".

 Kenji Matsuoka

 Afro

 The capital and business alliance announced on October 4 between NTT DOCOMO and Monex Group was a last-minute choice in anticipation of the "New NISA. We explain the reasons for the alliance and forecast the services to be offered by the DOCOMO-Monex alliance.

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