Monex, Inc, a Japanese online trading subsidiary of Monex Group, Inc. (TYO:8698), announces that it is improving the trading conditions for buying odd-lot shares (stock units below the minimum lot shares) of Japanese stocks.

The change, effective Monday, July 5, 2021, will see brokerage commissions for buying odd-lot share of Japanese stocks be made free of charge.

Monex sees odd-lot trading, which allows investors to start investing with even small amounts of money, as a particularly important service for increasing the range of choices for individual investors in all generation. Shortly after establishment, Monex began offering its odd-lot trading service that enable customers to trade one-tenth of the minimum trading lot, which evolved into One-Share Service where a minimum trading size became a single share in 2010.

In 2019, Monex launched ferci, an easy-to-use smartphone investing app where users can exchange information with other investors using SNS-type word-of-mouth feature and trade stocks in units as small as one share. Approximately 80% of transactions using ferci are odd-lot trades, indicating the growing need for services that allow small-sum asset management.

To respond to this, Monex decided to make purchasing commissions for odd-lot trades free of charge in the hopes to facilitate stock trading, especially among people considering asset management for the first time.

Odd-lot trading is a service that enables the trading of almost all Japanese shares from one share. Conventionally, a minimum purchase of 100 shares was required to trade Japanese company shares. This required a large amount of capital, but with odd-lot trading, investors can begin investing with as little as 1/100th the capital.

All odd-lot trades will be handled and executed as market orders, in principle. Just as with conventional round-lot share purchases, investors are eligible to receive dividends and shareholder benefits in accordance with the number of shares they own. Odd-lot trading is available for NISA account holders as well, and commissions are also free of charge.