Employees Gain the Most When Share Price Rises

Former Daiwa Securities banker Yoshitaka Yonemura explains the structural reasons Japanese traditional companies (JTCs) fail to raise their share price — and why employees are the biggest beneficiaries when they do.

• Share price = earnings × P/E ratio. It reflects current profits plus expectations of future growth — it is corporate value itself, not short-term noise.
• JTCs structurally fail on four dimensions — efficiency, waste elimination, risk appetite, and growth — keeping price-to-book ratios low by design.
• Hitachi restructured by unwinding 22 listed subsidiaries and narrowing its business focus, becoming the model case for breaking out of the JTC mold.
• Shiseido pursued the right strategy — China expansion, divesting personal care — but margin pressure from intensifying competition drove the stock from ¥8,000 to ¥2,500.
• TBS shares quadrupled from ¥1,500 at end-2022 to over ¥6,000 as investors rewarded non-broadcasting revenue, real estate, and IP investments.
• US tech companies grant roughly 1% of market cap annually to employees as equity compensation, making employees shareholders who drive their own growth.
• At companies where the stock rises, employees capture four compounding benefits: higher wages, gains on company stock, stronger pension returns, and access to new challenges through M&A and new ventures.

2026-04-13 · Watch on YouTube

Japanese page: 株価が上がると最も得するのは社員