Marubeni Corporation set up Marubeni Power Trading, with Corporate Number registration completed on August 15, 2025, National Tax Agency records show. Bloomberg reported on September 30, 2025, that the unit is a 50:50 joint venture with UK-based energy trader SmartestEnergy.
According to the report, which cited people familiar with the matter, the JV will trade physical power and power and fuel futures, aiming to leverage Marubeni’s market presence and SmartestEnergy’s trading experience from other markets. Bloomberg said Marubeni Power Trading is considering offering fixed-price products outside the Tokyo and Kansai TSO areas.
The Japanese trading house entered into power retail in 2000, when extra high-voltage power retail was liberalized, and expanded into the high-voltage market when restrictions were further lifted in 2004 and 2005. In 2011, it launched Marubeni Power Supply to support the business, rebranding it to Marubeni Power Retail in November 2015. Once liberalization was completed in April 2016, the company also began serving low-voltage customers.
Marubeni Power Retail was the third largest new retailer by overall supplied volume in May 2025, METI’s latest available data shows, only trailing Tokyo Gas and Ennet. It also held the third place in the extra high-voltage segment and was the second largest high-voltage power supplier. Ranking 62nd, its presence in the low-voltage market is limited.
SmartestEnergy was launched in 2000 to aggregate generation assets and expanded into the UK commercial and industrial power retail market in 2008. In 2019, it opened its first international office in the United States and the following year it expanded to Australia. The company follows several other foreign companies that recently established physical power trading capabilities in Japan, including Goldman Sachs, Axpo, Vitol, and MFT Energy.
Demand for power trading services in Japan is growing due to renewable generation’s ongoing shift away from the fixed-price feed-in-tariff scheme to a market-based model, a growing number of grid-scale battery storage projects, and retailers’ increasing interest in hedging tools as demonstrated by a surge in futures trading.
The partnership between Marubeni and SmartestEnergy highlights an opportunity for companies with experience in the more advanced European markets to capitalize on the Japanese market by partnering with well-established local players to skip the need to independently develop the full set of required local capabilities including origination.
