Japanese bank chief Jun Ohta dies aged 65

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Jun Ohta, the chief executive of Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group and the driving force behind the bank’s recent wave of expansion in the US and south-east Asia, has died at the age of 65.

Ohta’s death last week, which was announced by the company on Monday, followed a four-year stint at the top of SMFG, Japan’s second-biggest bank by market capitalisation, after a career rising through its ranks.

As well as building its recent reputation for aggressive foreign expansion, Ohta steered the financial group through one of its most painful recent episodes: a scandal at its brokerage unit, SMBC Nikko over alleged market manipulation.

The scandal, which led to multiple arrests and an ongoing trial of several executives and traders, centred on block trades and the way in which information was inappropriately passed between the main banking division of SMFG and its brokerage unit.

In November 2022 Ohta joined the president of SMBC Nikko in making a formal apology at a news conference after the Financial Services Agency issued a business improvement order.

As with many bankers of his generation, much of Ohta’s career was spent navigating Japan’s long period of economic stagnation and deflation, when many companies learned to rely less on bank loans. Japan’s population also began to contract, forcing banks to look overseas for growth.

Ohta, who spent part of his career in Singapore after joining the bank in 1982, was part of the senior leadership in SMFG that pushed for expansion into India, Indonesia and other south-east Asian economies.

His move to expand SMFG’s footprint on Wall Street centred on an alliance with Jefferies Financial Group in 2021, with SMFG agreeing to take a 4.9 per cent stake in the US group.

This year SMFG said it planned to triple the size of its stake by buying Jefferies shares on the open market.

SMFG’s alliance with Jefferies is part of a wider effort by Japan’s largest banks to capture more of the lucrative business available in the US. During the 2008 financial crisis, Japan’s largest banking group, Mitsubishi UFJ, formed an alliance with Morgan Stanley that has flourished into one of the country’s most formidable forces in investment banking.

This year Mizuho, the third-biggest of the Japanese banks, announced the purchase of the Wall Street M&A advisory boutique Greenhill in an effort to keep up with its two rivals.

SMFG said it would decide on a successor to Ohta in a timely manner and that deputy president Toru Nakashima would meanwhile become acting chief executive.