Mizuho partners with Golub Capital and invests in Rakuten Card

Recently, Mizuho made two announcements, with the firm entering a strategic agreement with Golub Capital to purchase a passive, non-voting minority stake in the latter’s management companies. As part of their alliance, Mizuho is set to serve as a strategic distribution partner for Golub Capital in Japan, including being the exclusive distributor of Golub Capital’s investment products to retail and high-net-worth investors in the region. Also, Mizuho and Golub Capital plan to explore working on future business opportunities to augment how they serve their respective stakeholders.

Moreover, Golub Capital intends to leverage the proceeds from Mizuho’s investment to further optimise its ability to provide reliable financing solutions to private equity sponsors. Additionally, as per the information detailed in the press release, all proceeds from the transaction are set to remain invested in Golub Capital.

The current news follows Rakuten Securities and Mizuho Securities’ collaboration in which the two firms worked on developing a new consumer business model that merged both online and offline aspects of asset formation and asset management. To further support the expansion of Rakuten Card, which is the core business of Rakuten’s fintech operations, the firm intends to optimise its alliance with Mizuho FG. Through this, Rakuten is set to pursue growth opportunities in the consumer and corporate sectors, with the latter being expected to scale in the future.

In addition, by deepening the collaboration with Mizuho FG, which currently has a broad customer base, Rakuten aims to scale the business domain and achieve a sustainable expansion for Rakuten Card and to further develop the whole Rakuten FinTech Ecosystem centred around Rakuten Card. The press release also mentions that Rakuten Insurance, a subsidiary of Rakuten Card, would not be included in the partnership, with the firm continuing to be wholly owned by Rakuten.

At the time of the announcement, specific information on the collaboration has not been finalised, with Rakuten planning to promptly disclose any matters that need to be made public in the upcoming period.