Monex Group, a Japan-based financial services company, announced its new margin account services offering for US-based equities on Tuesday. According to the press release, the new trading instruments will be available from 23 January 2023.

Monex to Launch Margin Accounts for US Shares

Under a partnership with its US-based group company, TradeStation, Monex is already offering Wall Street stock trading services which are rare among Japanese investment firms. For example, customers may trade trading during extended session hours, use trailing stop orders, and free real-time stock price quotes.

Wanting to develop its services further and meet the expectations of retail investors, Monex recently announced its intention to offer US equity margin account services. Although the introduction of the service has encountered some delays due to system problems, the new offering will be finally implemented next week.

"With US equity margin trading, investors can trade twice the amount of their original capital (margin deposit) and buy and sell the same stock as many times as they wish on the same day," the company commented in the press release.

In 2022, Monex supplemented its US stock market product line with the Earnings Report Flash feature, which visually displays information about companies' financial results soon after they are made available.

Customers interested in trading using the new service must make a minimum deposit of $2,900. However, additional funds are necessary to place an order to cover commissions and interests.

"At the start of the service, only the PC version will be available for purchase, but in the future, we plan to expand the service in various ways to make margin trading of US stocks more convenient, such as enabling trading via the "TradeStation U.S. Stock Smartphone" and adding time periods to order types," Monex added.

In July 2022, Rakuten, a major Japanese foreign exchange broker, introduced similar US stock margin trading. However, in order to execute traders, the broker's clients must open a separate foreign stock margin trading account.

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AEON Bank and Monex Partnership on Asset Management

Late last year, Monex partnered with AEON Bank in the financial instruments intermediary business. The concluded agreement is awaiting confirmation from state authorities, and the launch of jointly prepared services is scheduled for January 2024.

As part of the agreement, Monex will provide AEON Bank customers access to asset management services. The Tokyo-based lender also wants to create new products and diversify its current offerings using the services offered by Monex. The total number of instruments provided is expected to increase from 300 to 1,200.

"After the Partnership takes effect, AEON Bank will continue to sell mutual funds as a financial products brokerage agent commissioned by Monex, and Monex will execute customer transactions and manage customer accounts," the announcement stated.

In the future, the two companies will look to expand the terms of their cooperation and work to implement new asset management products. The goal is to reduce the entry barrier for retail customers in this market.