EquiLend signs Japan's SuMi Trust

SuMi Trust went live on the platform through its agent on 30th March 2012 and EquiLend expects several other leading domestic participants to join in the near future. During the last 12 months EquiLend has seen a 15% increase in volumes year on year in Japan.

Brian Lamb, CEO of EquiLend, said "Having a bank of SuMi Trust's stature join the platform is a strong endorsement of EquiLend's suite of trading services and represents an important move for the business in the Japanese marketplace." He continued, "We currently work with a number of international trustee banks and custodians in the country. However, SuMi Trust represents a major pinnacle for EquiLend with the domestic Japanese trust banks."

Nobuyoshi Fujii, Senior Manager of SuMi Trust London Branch, commented, "SuMi Trust is a leading provider of one-stop global trust services including pension plan advisory, investment management and custody. With $770 billion AUM, our group is Japan's largest asset manager and one of the country's dominant custodians managing and administering significant public and corporate pension funds. We believe the integration of EquiLend's services into our securities lending operations will result in significantly improved efficiencies to the benefit of our customer base. Furthermore, the adoption of EquiLend will help improve the efficiency and liquidity of the Japanese equity market."