Kathy Matsui is the chief Japan equity strategist and co-head of Asia investment research at Goldman Sachs Japan. What sets Matsui apart, however, is her work helping to boost female participation in the workforce.
Her research is contributing to Japan’s efforts to shake off decades of economic stagnation.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe name-checked Matsui when he called Womenomics a “vital component” of his package of economic stimulus policies, commonly known as Abenomics. With Japan’s male-dominated workforce shrinking, his goal is for women to hold 30% of leadership positions in all areas of society by 2020.
By closing the gender employment gap, Japan could boost its economy by nearly 13%, according to Matsui’s research. The mother of two first published research on female participation in the workforce in 1999.
The proportion of Japanese working-age women with jobs was about 56% in 1999, since then it has risen to close to 70% according to the Statistics Bureau.
“I was thrilled that this government was the first to elevate the topic of female labor participation as part of a national growth strategy,” she told FinanceAsia. “Frankly I’ve seen more progress in the past 18 to 24 months than in the rest of my 25-year career covering the Japanese stock market.”
Matsui has also led by example, having broken through the glass ceiling herself by becoming Goldman Sachs’s first female partner in Asia and gaining a fearsome reputation. She ditched her early copy-cat research to investigate areas such as underfunded defined benefit pension plans in the 1990s and had the courage to publish the results in a society that avoids controversy and criticism of management. As a result foreign fund managers grew keen on her research, which offered unique insights into the workings of Japan’s financial system.
Despite being a role model for many Japanese women, Matsui’s career is hardly an easy-to-follow template. As an American passport-holder it is easier for her and her husband, Jesper Koll, to employ a full-time nanny and maintain their busy work schedules. For Japanese nationals it is illegal to do the same.
But she hopes the next generation won’t have to put in the same kind of hours and has helped many women progress through her work as a board member of the Asian University for Women Support Foundation and her membership of the firm-wide diversity committee.
Matsui has battled breast cancer and serves on the advisory council for the Japan Society Fund Against Breast Cancer. She joined Goldman Sachs in 1994 and was named a partner in 2000. She is a member of the bank's Partnership Committee and the Asia Management Committee.
FinanceAsia’s 2015 honour roll of the most influential women across the Asia Pacific region spans investment and commercial bankers.
Published as a feature in the July / August 2015 print edition of FinanceAsia, the series also presents leading women in new areas of finance such as fintech where Asian companies are among the fastest-growing in the world.
We also canvassed corporate financiers for exceptional women working in deal advisory including lawyers and accountants. In the process of researching the series, we found evidence of progress in creating more diverse workplaces in the region.
