Nomura Holdings Inc will be acquiring the Taiwanese investment unit of ING Groep NV, Bloomberg reported. The report said that the purchase will make the company the first Japanese asset manager to do business in the market.

Nomura Holdings is a holding firm that manages financial operations for its subsidiaries. As a group, Nomura Holdings gives financial services that include dealing, brokerage, underwriting and asset management, information from Bloomberg showed.

In a statement, Japan's largest brokerage said Nomura Asset Management will be buying ING Securities Investment & Trust Co together with a group headed by Ashwin Mehta, the former Chief Executive Officer of the Taiwanese company. Financial details of the acquisition were not disclosed. Nomura spokesman Kenji Yamashita said that as of October 31, the unit managed $7 billion of assets, Bloomberg reported.

Nomura Holdings Inc Chief Executive Officer Koji Nagai has promised to focus the overseas business of the company in Asia after it finished its $1 billion cost-cutting program. Meanwhile, ING is selling insurance and investment businesses as it seeks to pay back a bailout from the government. ING is the largest financial services company in the Netherlands.

UBS AG Analyst based in Tokyo Shinichi Ina told Bloomberg, "The asset management business isn't so vulnerable to market swings. That's the area where brokerages would like to expand."

Yamashita told Bloomberg in a phone interview that the transaction between Nomura and ING would be completed sometime in April after it had passed regulatory approval. In a statement, the Amsterdam-based firm said the deal will not materially affect the results of ING.

Nomura Asset Management Chief Executive Officer Toshihiro Iwasaki said in a statement, "We aim to enhance our presence in the local market while continuing to build out our investment management business in Asia."

Information from its website said that the Nomura Asset Management Co was founded in 1959 and has a solid record as one of the leading asset management companies in Japan.