Credit Suisse may hire hundreds of employees for its Japanese private banking business as it seeks to carve out a market from the $14.8 trillion in assets held by the nation’s households, according to Bloomberg.

“I’d like to boost our staff to several hundred,” said Junya Tani, head of Credit Suisse private banking in the nation yesterday, discussing the bank’s business plan for the next five years and beyond.

The Swiss bank, which started its private banking business in Japan in December, currently has 40 staff and is targeting wealthy individuals with more than 1 billion yen ($10 million) in financial assets, he was quoted by the news service as saying.

Regulatory changes allowing banks and brokerages to more easily share customer information are spurring overseas and Japanese banks to bolster their wealth management operations in the world’s second-biggest economy. Credit Suisse follows UBS and HSBC among European banks in setting up private banking businesses in Japan.

Japan has not, however, been an easy market for Western banks to penetrate; Citigroup, for example, was forced to stop providing private banking in the world’s second largest economy in 2004 for alleged irregularities. Japanese high net worth individuals still tend to use domestic rather than international banks.

Mr Tani was quoted as saying that Credit Suisse has attracted “a few” clients in Japan worth more than $1 billion.

The Swiss bank aims to harness its existing investment banking business in Japan to find clients, and will offer its private banking customers who are business owners investment banking services, Mr Tani said.