Once again the time has come for the mass-release of Japan Inc.'s annual earnings reports. While the stock market is showing signs of rumbling back to life after nearly a decade of dormancy, significant changes to Japan's financial landscape are forcing players to make rapid transitions just to keep up.
A myriad of market-opening deregulatory measures, coupled with the reduced dependence on indirect financing through banks, are reshaping Tokyo's market into one more closely resembling its overseas counterparts.
Just as other aspects of the financial world have changed, so has securities analysis, a profession that has attracted wider attention as the need for direct financing rises in Japan.