Over the last 20 years, Ares’ success has been driven by our people and our culture. Today, our team is guided by our core values – Collaborative, Responsible, Entrepreneurial, Self-Aware, Trustworthy – and our purpose to be a catalyst for shared prosperity and a better future. Through our recruitment, career development and employee-focused programming, we are committed to fostering a welcoming and inclusive work environment where high-performance talent of diverse backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives can build careers within this exciting and growing industry.

Job Description

Reporting relationships

Reports to: Vice President, Corporate Accounting in Tokyo, with local relationship reporting to Associate Vice President, Corporate Accounting in Mumbai (if applicable).

Primary functions & responsibilities

Specific responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

• Ensure accurate and timely reporting of financial information for both US GAAP and local JGAAP reporting for entities within Japan. Such entities include but are not limited to two asset management companies, 35 master lease SPCs and 10 dormant SPCs.
• Being a point of contact of questions and elevations of issues, including working with the respective business and support teams in the Japan (Tokyo), United States (California and New York),  and India (Mumbai).
• Journal entry preparation and review.  Monthly balance sheet reconciliation responsibilities.
• Preparation and review of quarterly, and annual financial reports, including board reporting presentations.
• Communicate with Japanese employees outside of Corporate Accounting team (Treasury, third-party tax advisors, outsourcing companies, and local business team, etc) to gather information to summarize and investigate accounting and tax implication for both USGAAP and JGAAP purpose.
• Support indirect tax compliance, including but not limited to VAT reporting and reconciliation and payment requests working closely with Japan-based tax advisors through communication in Japanese

• Assist with direct tax compliance and transfer pricing analyses via providing financial information and responding to queries.  Recording of transfer pricing journal entries and responsible for related intercompany reconciliations.
• Coordinate with external accounting firms and tax advisors by providing data and tracking deliverables
• Facilitate and oversee completion of financial and tax audits.
• Actively participate in global and regional projects to enhance controls, processes and/or system efficiency.
• Collaboration with Accounts Payable, Treasury and other finance teams in different offices globally.
• Review and recommend processes to enhance efficiency.
• The role requires ongoing communication with Japan-based team members and stakeholders, with a strong reliance on Japanese language for daily operations.

Qualifications

Language Requirements:

•      Japanese: Native or near-native proficiency (equivalent to JLPT N1) is required. Strong capabilities in reading, writing, and speaking are all mandatory. The role requires the ability to accurately understand and handle accounting, tax, and legal-related documents in Japanese, as well as communicate effectively with Japanese stakeholders. • English: Working proficiency required for communication with internal stakeholders and global teams.

Education:

•  Chartered Accountant with post-qualification experience of 6+ years.

Experience Required:  

• Strong technical accounting and financial reporting knowledge of US GAAP, JGAAP and financial regulations. 
• Strong project management skills across numerous activities and teams.
• Financial services/asset management organization experience preferred.
• Familiarity with Japan financial regulatory requirements and tax requirements.

• Preferred experience with Fusion/Oracle/OneStream.
• Proficient in Word, Excel, Outlook.
• Experience with Power BI or other business intelligence tools, and ChatGPT, CoPilot, or other AI tools a plus.

General Requirements:

• Excellent verbal and written communication skills both in Japanese and English.  Ability to effectively communicate with team members around the globe (Japan, India, United States).
• Great attitude; highly motivated team player.
• A self-directed individual with a can-do attitude, willing to work in an energetic, collaborative, and fast-paced environment, proactive in nature, and a proven ability to learn quickly, display flexibility and adaptability while resolving issues with minimal supervision.
• Ability to successfully manage multiple priorities and competing demands, strong time management and prioritization skills.
• Ability to navigate in a global organization with various departmental responsibilities.
• High accuracy and detail orientation.
• Ability to extract meaningful information from extensive research and analysis to effectively present facts and findings in a digestible format, a keen eye for attention to detail.
• Good judgment in terms of escalating issues vs. solving problems independently.
• An analytical mind and a passion/interest in bringing new ideas to increase efficiency of existing processes.
• Ability to be flexible in terms of hours to coordinate with team members across various time zones.
• Ability to identify and analyze problems and to develop an effective course of action.
• Hands-on, independent contributor that is comfortable directing activities of others.

Reporting Relationships

There is no set deadline to apply for this job opportunity. Applications will be accepted on an ongoing basis until the search is no longer active.