Institutional Investor today released the results of its All-Japan Best Sales Force Rankings for 2007. Of 17 firms ranked, Nomura Securities maintains its first place position for the fourth straight year as UBS improves in rank to second place. Citigroup gains to earn a fifth place position and Deutsche Bank also makes a noticeable leap to seventh place.

The Japan Sales Team rankings are derived from the annual All-Japan Research Team survey. The sales portion of the survey also provides rankings across ten sales performance attributes as well as Most-Improved Firm.

The winners are as follows:

2007 All-Japan Equity Sales Rankings
Best Overall Generalist Sales Force
Rank Firm
1

 Nomura Securities Co.
2

 UBS
3

 Daiwa Securities SMBC
4

 Goldman Sachs (Japan)
5

 Nikko Citigroup
6

 Merrill Lynch Japan Securities Co.
7

 Deutsche Securities
8

 Credit Suisse
9

 Morgan Stanley Japan
10

 JPMorgan Securities Japan
11

 Mitsubishi UFJ Securities Co.
12

 Mizuho Securities
13

 CLSA Asia Pacific Markets
14

 Macquarie Securities (Japan)
15

 Lehman Brothers Japan
16

 Shinko Securities Co.
17

 KBC Securities Japan
To determine the Best Generalist Sales Force, Institutional Investor surveyed Portfolio Managers, Buy-Side Analysts, Directors of Research, Chief Investment Officers and other investment management individuals at firms that manage Japanese equities. This year’s survey is based on the opinions of individuals at 134 firms both in Japan and abroad.

For more information regarding other regional surveys, industry sectors, country category rankings and the detailed reports we can provide, please contact:

Todd Giamportone

Director

Global Sales & Trading

tgiamportone@iiresearchgroup.com

212.224.3353