Message
SBI Financial and Economic Research Institute is a think tank to study and research for future generation digital finance from various viewpoints, which was established as a member of the SBI group in April 2021.
We sincerely appreciate your support for the company establishment.
New technologies such as DLT (Distributed Ledger Technology) and blockchain, which emerged in 2008, have entered the era of maturity. Those technologies come into practical use in various parts of our society, especially in the financial industry.
Since its establishment in 1999, the SBI Group has focused on the future business potential of online financial services and has been the pioneer of new business by establishing SBI SECURITIES and SBI Sumishin Net Bank. In the field of so-called digital assets trading business, SBI Group company launched STO (Security Token Offering) for the first time in Japan in 2020 and is starting NFT(Non-fungible token) business in 2021. SBI Group has been challenging to create new business services while following rapid progress of the technology.
SBI Financial and Economic Research Institute is aiming to deepen the collaboration between various academic experts and practical knowledge and experience acquired across group companies.
Through these activities, we will conduct research for the issues that should be addressed for making more further development of future generation digital finance and the method of fostering the so-called digital space trading market, with various point of views such as finance, economics, legal systems, and technologies. In addition, we will actively make policy proposals and share the findings. We also continue to transmit high quality information of future generation digital finance and improve social Fintech literacy.
The Institute will contribute to build a better society by our outputs and policy proposals aiming for the realization of future generation digital finance.
We would appreciate your continued support and encouragement.
SBI Financial and Economic Research Institute
Chairperson
Takako Masai
Leadership
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Honorary Chairperson
Heizo Takenaka
Born in 1951. He graduated from Hitotsubashi University and is a Ph.D. (economics). He is a visiting associate professor at Harvard University, professor at the Faculty of Economics, Keio University, and an honorary professor at Keio University. He has served as Minister of State for Economic and Fiscal Policies, State Minister in Charge of Financial Affairs, and Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications of the Koizumi Cabinet. He also serves as a director of the World Economic Forum (Davos Conference). -
Chairperson
Takako Masai
Born in 1965. She promotes financial market-related operations at Toronto-Dominion Bank, Credit Agricole Bank, Shinsei Bank, etc. She becomes Shinsei Bank's first female executive officer, and she is appointed as a Member of Policy Board of Bank of Japan. -
Director
Tatsuo Yamasaki
Born in 1957. He is a graduate of the University of Tokyo Faculty of Law. He joined the Ministry of Finance. He has served as a counselor of the Financial Services Agency and a finance minister. After he retired in 2015, he analyzed the international financial situation as a specially appointed professor at the International University of Health and Welfare and a professor at SBI Graduate School. -
Director
Takero Doi
Born in 1970. He graduated from Osaka University in 1993 and completed the doctoral course at the Graduate School of Economics, the University of Tokyo in 1999. He is a Ph.D. (Economics). He is an assistant at the Institute of Social Science, the University of Tokyo, a visiting researcher at the University of California, San Diego, and a professor at the Faculty of Economics, Keio University. He is also a member of the Government Tax Commission, the Administrative Reform Promotion Council, the All-Generation Social Security Construction Council, and the Financial System Council. A recent book, "How was Heisei's Economic Policy Determined?"
Reasearcher
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Principal Research Fellow
Yutaka Soejima
Born in 1966, graduated from Kyoto University and joined Bank of Japan in 1990. He has worked in the Research, Markets, Payment and Settlement system, macro prudence, Quantitative and International Departments, and has also served as head of the Fintech Centre and the Director General of the Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies in Bank of Japan. He has introduced various advanced methods into central bank research since the 1990s, including AI, big data and network analytics. He is the founder of the Financial System Report and other leading reports, and an expert member of BIS and Global Central Banking Activities, participating in international conferences on financial regulation development, market monitoring, CBDC, etc. -
Principal Research Fellow / Chief Economist
Minoru Masujima
Born in 1964. B.A. in Economics from the University of Tokyo, M.A. from Northwestern University, Ph.D. in Economics from Saitama University. He joined the Economic Planning Agency (currently the Cabinet Office) in 1986 and served as Deputy Director-General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (in charge of the Economic Affairs Bureau and the International Cooperation Bureau), Director-General of the Economic and Fiscal Analysis Bureau in the Cabinet Office, and Director of the Economic and Social Research Institute in the same position before retiring in 2023. During his tenure, he was engaged in planning of economic and fiscal policies, and research and studies for such policies. He specializes in macroeconomics, economic policy, and fiscal and social security theory. His publications include "The True Value of Abenomics" (Chuokeizai-sha, co-edited) and an article "The Impact of Recent Economic Structural Changes on Business Fluctuations" (Economic Analysis, No. 208). He is a visiting professor at the Graduate School of Saitama University. -
Specially Appointed Research Fellow
Yoshikazu Yamaoki
Born in 1958. Graduated from Keio University and joined the Ministry of Finance in 1982. After working for the Financial Services Agency, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Deposit Insurance Corporation of Japan, and Embassy of Japan in Italy, he was appointed as Professor of Social Sciences at Shinshu University from 2009 to 2012 and from 2015 to 2024. He was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences and the Faculty of Economics and Law (and Dean of the Graduate School of Economics and Social Policy Sciences) from 2017 to 2022, and Dean of the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences from 2020 to 2022. He has also served as Senior Visiting Fellow at the Policy Research Institute, Ministry of Finance since 2009 and as an advisor to the SBI Financial and Economics Research Institute since 2022. His research interests include regional bank’s account banking systems and digital financial assets, including crypto assets, etc. Since 2023, he has served as the chairman of the "Study Group on the Construction of Next-generation Financial Infrastructure" organized by SBIFERI. -
Senior Research Fellow
Yasushi Nakayama
Born in 1964. Master of Industrial Engineering from Tokyo Institute of Technology (graduate school) and joined the Bank of Japan in 1988. He is mainly involved in information security and e-payment related practices and research, and also researched and developed the pioneering 'BOJ-NTT method' e-currency in 1996, which pioneered CBDC research at the Bank of Japan. He served as Associate Professor at the University of Tokyo's Research Centre for Advanced Economic Engineering (now absorbed into the Research Centre for Advanced Science and Technology) and as Director of Research at the FISC. He then organised and chaired the 'WS on financial sophistication using IT (AI)' (10 sessions) at the Bank of Japan's Center for Advanced Financial Technology. Patents: 'Issuing Institution Separate Number Registration Type Electronic Cash Method and User Device', etc. -
Senior Research Fellow
Ken Muramatsu
Born in 1973. Graduated from Keio University, Faculty of Law, Department of Law, and joined The Industrial Bank of Japan (currently Mizuho Bank, Ltd.) in 1996. For about 15 years, he has been engaged in securities-related business, particularly in research on securities-related systems, and has been involved in research on corporate bond markets, securities settlement systems, taxation systems, and the development of Asian bond markets. He is the author of "Banking Practice in Detail: Securities" (Kinzai Institute for Financial Affairs, 2011), "Textbook of "Unloseable Investment" Starting with NISA" (Toyo Keizai Shinposha, 2014), "Practicalities of Chinese Bond Trading" (Kinzai Institute for Financial Affairs, 2017). (all co-authored).
Research groups
We regularly hold Fintech Study Group, Global Financial Market Study Group and Future Generation Finance Study Group in collaboration with leading academia researchers and young researchers.
Global Financial Markets Study Group
- Research Director
- Tatsuo Yamazaki(Professor, SBI Graduate School, Former Vice Minister of Finance for International Affairs)
Fintech Study Group
- Research Director
- Mamoru Fujimoto(Executive Officer of SBI Holdings, General Manager of Blockchain Promotion Office, and CEO of SBI R3 Japan)
Future Generation Finance Study Group
- Chairman
- Takero Doi(professor, Faculty of Economics, Keio University)