KOBE -- A now 88-year-old man who narrowly survived the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake that devastated this west Japan city still trades stocks daily, earning him the nickname "Japan's Warren Buffett" in reference to the prominent U.S. investor.

Shigeru Fujimoto, a resident of Kobe's Higashinada Ward with assets of roughly 2 billion yen (approx. $12.84 million), recently vowed, "I'll retire from stock trading when I die."

Underlying his life as an investor are his experiences in the quake 30 years ago which gave him a sense of impermanence, such as by losing an acquaintance he used to see every day to the disaster.

Originally from a farming family in Takasago, Hyogo Prefecture, Fujimoto started trading stocks at age 19, when he was a high school graduate working at a pet shop in Kobe. A securities company executive who was a customer of the shop advised him to do so.

Fujimoto subsequently operated a mahjong parlor and other establishments, and became a dedicated investor in 1986 with a fund of 65 million yen (approx. $417,000 at the current rate) that he gained by selling off those establishments.

Japan was on track to an economic bubble, and Fujimoto's assets swelled to 1 billion yen (approx. $6.42 million at the current rate). With the bursting of the bubble in the early 1990s, however, his assets shrank to 200 million yen (about $1.28 million at the current rate).

"That's life," he thought, and cut back on the time spent trading. Instead, he got more into his hobbies, such as playing golf and mahjong and traveling abroad.

After a mahjong all-nighter

Fujimoto was back home after playing mahjong all through the night, and had just got into bed when his body was thrust upward as violent shaking ensued. It was at 5:46 a.m. on Jan. 17, 1995. The ceiling of his first-floor condominium fell down, stopping shortly before he could be buried. Along with his wife, he crawled through a narrow gap about knee high and escaped from the balcony window, with its glass shattered.

Looking at his bare feet bleeding from shards of glass stuck in them, a neighbor gave him a pair of slippers. The area was severely damaged, and more than 50 residents died in the neighborhood.

The couple arrived at an elementary school serving as an evacuation shelter, only to find it too crowded to let them in. At a loss, he bumped into a man who used to work part-time at his mahjong parlor. The man owned a housing facility nearby, and invited the couple to stay there.

The condominium where Fujimoto lived was completely destroyed in the quake, and was later dismantled. The only household item he could retrieve was an alarm clock. Notebooks he was using to log his trading since 19, which were indispensable for his daily transactions, were lost to the disaster, and this hurt him more than anything else.

He attended the funeral of a securities house employee in his 40s he had known for many years after learning the acquaintance was killed in the disaster. Prior to the disaster, Fujimoto had seen him almost every day at the company's office in Kobe's Motomachi area.

Fujimoto's passion for trading was dashed by a sense of emptiness, which he harbored after seeing the lives and family assets that he had taken for granted being deprived in an instant.

His condominium was rebuilt three years later, and he moved back there from the housing facility where he was staying. The reconstruction cost him more than 30 million yen (approx. $192,000 at the current rate).

Stoic life as an investor

In 2002, he purchased a computer to start online trading at the recommendation of a securities firm, and this rekindled his passion for stock trading. Fascinated by the fact he could buy and sell efficiently from home, he amassed profits through heavy day trading.

Every morning, he's up at 2 a.m. to check U.S. market trends. At 9 a.m. he starts trading in the domestic market, buying and selling 60 to 70 issues a day on his three PCs. After the market closes at 3:30 p.m., he logs the day's trading in his notebook and reflects on how he fared that day. He goes to bed by 8 p.m.

"You can try it regardless of your age, and you get what you've learned, without relying on luck. Nothing beats stocks, and that's why I keep trading," Fujimoto said.

Despite his assets, he says he has no materialistic desire. He's been using the same hat for over 15 years by repairing it, and still counts on the alarm clock that survived the quake disaster. With no mobile phone or car because they are not necessary, his living standards have remained virtually unchanged since he began online trading.

In 2023, his stoic life as an investor was introduced on a securities company's video-sharing site and elsewhere. It trended and won him the nickname "Japan's Warren Buffett" after the 94-year-old American investor.

The same year, Fujimoto published a book titled "87-sai geneki trader Shigeru-san no oshie" (Teachings of Shigeru, an 87-year-old active trader) from Diamond Inc., and it became a bestseller with over 120,000 copies sold.

In his book, Fujimoto shares tips such as "Don't aim for ceiling or bottom prices" and "Check the news extensively."

'You never know when your life will come to an end'

Although Japanese stock prices remained sluggish after the bubble economy burst, in what is known as "the lost 30 years," the Nikkei stock index hit its highest mark in 34 years in 2024, when the new NISA (Nippon Individual Savings Account) small investment tax exemption system kicked off, reviving an investment boom in Japan.

Uninterested in a life of leisure and comfort relying on stock dividends, he aspires to stay on as an active trader for the rest of his life.

"You never know when your life will come to an end. You should enjoy your life doing what you want to do, so you won't regret," Fujimoto advises. That's the lesson he drew from the sorrow of seeing so many lives being lost to the quake disaster 30 years ago.

(Japanese original by Shinya Yamamoto, Kobe Bureau)