Nissan is Ghosn, Ghosn, Ghosn

Carlos Ghosn has been arrested in Japan and will likely spend a year in jail there, awaiting trial. And he will not be allowed access to a lawyer during that time. The problem is simple: Japanese companies don’t like to pay competitive, global incomes to top managers. For the most part this means that they must settle for third-rate performers overseas. And live with the miserable market shares in the 7X markets (GDP of EU+US = 7X Japan) that result. When, for every dollar they sell in Japan, they should sell $7 in the 7X, they usually reach 25-30¢. All because they won’t pay enough to get the share that their products usually deserve. And they stay uninformed about the Information Age and why they have no FAANGs and can’t create them. Along comes Ghosn. Rescues Nissan. Demands real money. And gets it. Big resentment. But Nissan, like all Japanese companies, has a board made up of company executives, not outsiders with a fiduciary responsibility for oversight. So the Board is sloppy. Doesn’t do its work. Likely is not fully informed about Ghosn’t arrangements. As this case unfurls, Nissan looks worse with every new charge. Japan doesn’t look much better for pressing charges that may prove Nissan’s sloppyness over Ghosn’s culpability. And if Ghosn gets off so much as one charge and a single cent went through a US bank, Nissan’s liability will be eye-watering Francis McInerney Managing Director FutureCreators