Ryohei Yanagi

About this Speaker

Dr. Ryohei Yanagi is Visiting Professor with Waseda University Graduate School of Accountancy, thereby teaching and researching Corporate Governance, Financial Strategy and Investor Relations.

As for his academic career, Dr. Yanagi was granted a Ph.D. in economics from Kyoto University, Japan.

He also obtained an MBA with distinction from Thunderbird Graduate School of Global Management, Arizona, USA.

In connection with corporate value enhancement activities in Japan, he has been acting as one of the drafting members of METI’s “Ito Review” (the Japanese version of Kay Review), writing himself about the famous “ROE 8% guideline” with evidence and advising TSE on corporate disclosure and governance, thus involved in the improvement of the earnings guidance system and IFRS adoption and disclosure.

In addition, he has been conducting approximately 200 meeting per year with global investors for the last 15 years (about 3000 meetings in total) throughout his career with UBS as Executive Director (a specialist in corporate governance in Japan) and Eisai as CFO (his current full-time occupation).

According to Institutional Investor, he was selected as the BEST CFO in Japan’s healthcare sector by buy-side voting 2020 (4th time). He has authored and published many books and theses on Corporate Governance, Corporate Finance, and Investor Relations in Japan as well.

His major published books are below;

“Corporate Governance and Value Creation in Japan”, Springer 2018. (English)

“CFO Policy: financial & non-financial strategies for value creation”, Chuo Keizai January, 2020.

“ROE management and Intangibles (ESG)”, Chuo Keizai March, 2017.

“ROE Revolution and Financial Strategies in Japan”, Chuo-Keizai 2015.