Salary · Tokyo in-house
General Counsel Salary in Tokyo 2026: how many seats ¥100 million funds.
A dated cash figure in yen and dollars first, then who pays it. The measurable 2026 series is the ¥100 million individual-disclosure gate and the public attorney grades that actually print a number. Listed-company general-counsel cash usually does not.
¥100 million of 2026 cash is a seat count, not a headline.
A company asking what a 2026 general counsel salary Tokyo figure actually buys is asking how many seats ¥100 million of officer remuneration funds, in yen and in dollars, at the Bank of Japan central rate of 10 September 2026.
Yuho individual-disclosure floor: ¥100 million of consolidated officer remuneration ($650,800 at ¥153.66 per dollar on 10 September 2026). That sum funds 1.00 seats at the statutory floor. A contractual executive officer never enters the table. FSA Access FSA No. 84 ↗
Pick a dated instrument. The number is how many of those seats ¥100 million funds, at the Bank of Japan central rate of 10 September 2026. The US median is a contrast, not a Tokyo offer. The full dated table sits below.
Sartori maps 5,000 lawyers in Hong Kong. That file records title and employer. It does not record cash.
- ¥153.66
- Yen per dollar, Bank of Japan central rate, 10 September 2026. Every dollar column on this page uses it.
- Bank of Japan foreign-exchange market
- 24,382
- Attorneys on the three Tokyo bars as of 1 September 2026. Not a count of people titled General Counsel.
- Japan Federation of Bar Associations membership PDF
- 17
- Closed in-house searches over three years on the Hong Kong line that covers Tokyo seats.
- Sartori & Partners Hong Kong in-house mandate telemetry
- 16 days
- Median working days from offer to signature on that same Hong Kong in-house line.
- Sartori & Partners Hong Kong in-house mandate telemetry
What a 2026 general counsel salary Tokyo cash figure actually funds
The table is the page. Local currency first, dollars at the 10 September 2026 central rate, then how many such seats ¥100 million buys. Each row is a named instrument, not a survey average.
There is no published 2026 average general counsel salary for Tokyo that survives a source check. Recruiter salary guides that print one were opened in research and are not used here. What can be dated, converted and divided is the cash a public instrument actually prints, and the statutory floor at which a named officer must appear in a securities report.
The Bank of Japan’s foreign-exchange market report for 10 September 2026 puts the US dollar central rate at ¥153.66. The 9:00 JST spot that morning was 153.54–153.57 and the 17:00 JST spot was 153.40–153.42, inside a day range of 153.72–153.30. Every dollar column below uses the central rate only. ¥100 million at that rate is $650,800. A New York compensation committee and a Tokyo board are reading the same arithmetic.
The Financial Services Agency’s Access FSA No. 84, published in April 2010, is the disclosure rule still in force. For fiscal years ending on or after 31 March 2010, a listed company may limit individual officer disclosure to people whose consolidated remuneration is ¥100 million or more. The report then names the person, the officer category, the total, and the breakdown. “Officers” in that rule are directors, statutory auditors and statutory executive officers (執行役) of a company with three committees. Remuneration is the property benefit received for performing the office, including amounts whose receipt became fixed during the year. ¥100 million of that total funds exactly 1.00 seats at the floor. It does not fund a general counsel who never becomes one of those officers.
| Seat | Cash (JPY) | USD | Seats / ¥100m | What the number measures | Dated |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| JFTC subsection-chief grade, floor | ¥7.7 million | $50,100 | 12.99 | Approximate annual including allowances; bottom of the 係長級 band | Guide deadline 3 Apr 2026 |
| JFTC subsection-chief grade, cap | ¥9.8 million | $63,800 | 10.20 | Approximate annual including allowances; top of the 係長級 band | Guide deadline 3 Apr 2026 |
| JICA Legal Affairs attorney, about | ¥10 million | $65,100 | 10.00 | Employer annual figure, not 12 times the ¥555,630 monthly base; bonus inside | Printed employer spec |
| JFTC assistant-director grade | ¥10.6 million | $69,000 | 9.43 | Approximate annual including allowances; 課長補佐級 | Guide deadline 3 Apr 2026 |
| JFBA median receipts, contrast | ¥15.00 million | $97,600 | 6.67 | National mixed-sample receipts, calendar 2022; not Tokyo GC cash | 2023 survey |
| Yuho individual-disclosure floor | ¥100 million | $650,800 | 1.00 | Total officer remuneration. A contractual executive officer never enters | FY ending on/after 31 Mar 2010 |
Arithmetic is ¥100,000,000 divided by the stated cash. The Japan Fair Trade Commission figures are approximate annual amounts including allowances. JICA’s about ¥10 million is the employer’s annual figure, not twelve times ¥555,630. The JFBA row is receipts, not salary. See the sources.
JFTC subsection-chief floor
About ¥7.7 million including allowances. Guide deadline 3 April 2026. Not a general-counsel title.
JFTC fixed-term attorney guide ↗Two instruments next to that table are easy to misread. Tokyo Shoko Research, on 30 July 2026, looked at FY2025 filings (April 2025 through March 2026) and found 606 listed companies disclosing 1,345 officers at or above ¥100 million, both records on its series. The median of those officers’ basic pay plus bonus, excluding retirement, stock and options, was ¥93 million. The average on the same definition was ¥118 million. At ¥153.66 per dollar those cash slices are $605,200 and $767,900. They sit under or near the gate because stock and retirement were left out. A person can clear ¥100 million of total remuneration and still print a basic-plus-bonus median of ¥93 million. Dividing ¥100 million by ¥93 million and calling the result a general-counsel seat count would mix two definitions. This page does not.
The Japan Federation of Bar Associations’ 2023 attorney-activity survey, reporting calendar-2022 results, put national median receipts at ¥15.00 million and median net income at ¥8.00 million. At the 10 September 2026 central rate, ¥15.00 million is $97,600, and ¥100 million funds 6.67 seats of that receipts median. It is a national mixed sample of tax-return filers, not a Tokyo general-counsel payroll. The Japan lawyer-salary page owns that ladder. It is in the table so a board does not paste it into a general-counsel requisition.
A 2026 general counsel salary Tokyo figure is a seat count against the ¥100 million disclosure gate, not a published median.
| Instrument | On the officer table? | Bonus inside the number? | Stock or retirement inside? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Yuho ¥100 million floor | Only if the person is a director, statutory auditor or 執行役 | Yes — the total is all remuneration | Yes — stock, options and retirement count toward the gate |
| TSR median ¥93 million | Yes — these officers already cleared the gate | Yes — basic pay plus bonus | No — retirement, stock and options are excluded |
| JFTC subsection-chief grade | No — a fixed-term national public officer | Allowances are inside the approximate annual | No corporate stock plan |
| JFTC assistant-director grade | No | Allowances are inside the approximate annual | No corporate stock plan |
| JICA about ¥10 million | No — a public-corporation specialist | Yes — the employer’s annual includes bonus | No retirement allowance on that spec |
| JFBA median receipts | No — a tax-return sample, mostly self-employed | Not a salary | Not a salary |
A 2026 general counsel salary Tokyo figure is a seat count against the ¥100 million disclosure gate, not a published median.
The employer is a company, a bank, a trading house or a public body.
The 2026 Tokyo general-counsel seat is an in-house job. Law firms sit on the other side of the table, on panels and as deal counsel. They do not employ this general counsel.
TSE Prime listed companies
The general counsel is usually a contractual executive officer or a head of legal. That title enters the individual yuho table only if the person is also a director, a statutory auditor or a statutory executive officer, and only if consolidated remuneration clears ¥100 million.
Trading houses and megabanks
These desks are large enough to show up in the in-house bengoshi count. The count is headcount. It is not a general-counsel cash band, and it does not say which of those lawyers holds the title.
Regulators and public corporations
This is where 2026 Tokyo lawyer cash is actually printed: a fixed-term attorney grade at the Japan Fair Trade Commission, and a JICA specialist seat. The title on the page is not General Counsel.
The foreign-qualified seat
Registered foreign lawyers on the three Tokyo bars are a thin register next to the bengoshi in-house stock. A Japanese issuer’s general counsel is almost never hired off that register to sign Japanese-law filings.
On 1 September 2026 the Japan Federation of Bar Associations counted 24,382 attorneys and 534 registered foreign lawyers on the three Tokyo bars, inside a national roll of 48,057 attorneys and 583 gaiben. The Japan In-house Lawyers Association, for its count as of 30 June 2026, recorded 3,756 in-house bengoshi at 1,552 employers, of whom 3,130 sat on the three Tokyo bars. Those two dates are a month apart and use different documents. They are not collapsed into one stock. Neither document counts people whose title is General Counsel, and neither prints their cash.
The buyer who does print cash is the public employer. The Japan Fair Trade Commission’s fixed-term attorney guide, with an application deadline of 3 April 2026, offers 53 posts at headquarters in Toranomon and at regional offices. Approximate annual pay including allowances is ¥7.7 million to ¥9.8 million at subsection-chief grade and about ¥10.6 million at assistant-director grade. JICA’s Legal Affairs specialist (attorney) prints a grade-7 monthly base of ¥555,630 and about ¥10 million a year, with bonus twice yearly and no housing, family or retirement allowance. Twelve times the monthly base is not ¥10 million. The annual figure is the employer’s own. Both are employed-lawyer cells. Neither is a listed-company general counsel.
The listed-company general counsel is usually next to the board and missing from the table that prices officers. The seat is held as a contractual executive officer or as head of legal. Access FSA No. 84 does not require that person’s name in the individual remuneration table unless the person is also a director, a statutory auditor or a statutory executive officer, and unless the consolidated total clears ¥100 million. A company can pay well above ¥100 million and still publish nothing against the general-counsel name. The absence is the rule working as written. It is not a missing survey cell.
Across 250 structured interviews with Hong Kong in-house counsel and general counsel, 54 of 88 general counsel and heads of legal, over a 24-month window, said their own cash was not in the yuho individual table. The remuneration committee opened on a US chief legal officer survey. The seat is a contractual executive officer, not a director, so the individual yen table never opened. That is the pricing error this page is written to prevent.
Cash is printedCash is withheld
- Public attorney grade A recruitment guide prints an approximate annual next to a grade. The company paying can read the number. So can the lawyer earning it. The title is not General Counsel.
- Companies Act officer over the gate Directors, statutory auditors and statutory executive officers at or above the individual threshold are named, with a total and a breakdown. A general counsel enters this stop only by taking one of those offices.
- Contractual executive officer The usual Tokyo general counsel. On the executive committee, often also head of legal, and outside the individual table at any cash level. The missing number is not a median waiting to be inferred.
Your first offer is a seat count. If you have budgeted ¥100 million of cash for the legal chief, you have funded 1.00 seats at the disclosure floor, 9.43 Japan Fair Trade Commission assistant-director seats, or 10.00 JICA seats — and you have not funded a US Fortune 1000 median.
- Name the instrument before the number. A yuho total, a basic-plus-bonus slice that excludes stock, and a public-grade annual with allowances are not interchangeable. Tokyo Shoko Research’s ¥93 million median is the second of those, and only for officers already over the line.
- Do not import the US chief legal officer survey. Above the Law’s 1 August 2025 read of Corporate Counsel put the Fortune 1000 median at $2.95 million, which is ¥453.3 million at the 10 September 2026 central rate. Most Tokyo general counsel are not in that table, because they are not statutory officers.
- Budget the deputies separately. ¥100 million at the floor funds one statutory seat. It does not staff the 3,130 in-house bengoshi already on the three Tokyo bars, and it does not staff one company’s legal department.
- Decide the officer question before the brief. A director-level general counsel who will clear ¥100 million is a different job, a different disclosure and a different first offer from a contractual executive officer at the same cash.
Your title is not a published band. Unless you are a Companies Act officer over ¥100 million, or you are leaving a public grade that prints its annual, the number you earn will not be in next year’s securities report.
- Ask which yen instrument you are being priced on. Base, bonus, retirement, stock, and whether any of it counts toward the ¥100 million gate. Four of those lines may be zero. The public grades tell you which zeros are normal for a printed Tokyo lawyer seat. They do not tell you your general-counsel number.
- The gate is not a pay cap. Cash above ¥100 million stays unpublished for as long as you are not a director, a statutory auditor or a statutory executive officer. Taking the office to “get onto the table” changes the job.
- Read the tax line as taxable income, not as the offer. On taxable income of exactly ¥100 million, the National Tax Agency quick table current as of 1 April 2026 produces income tax of ¥40,204,000. The reconstruction special income tax, at 2.1 percent of that income tax, is ¥844,284. Together, ¥41,048,284. Deductions, inhabitant tax and the special additional tax that applies only above ¥330 million of base income are not in that sum. The same page prints a different reconstruction rate from 1 January 2027. A 2026 package uses 2.1 percent.
- Social insurance is not charged on the whole yen. For Reiwa 8, the Japan Health Insurance Association’s Tokyo health-insurance rate is 9.85 percent, long-term care insurance is 1.62 percent for ages 40 to 64, and the child-rearing support contribution is 0.23 percent. The employer pays half of each. All three are assessed on capped standard monthly remuneration. A ¥100 million package does not bear those rates on the whole yen.
The listed-company general counsel is usually next to the board and missing from the table that prices officers.
The in-house bengoshi count is not the general-counsel layer.
¥100 million of general-counsel cash does not staff the legal department. The deputies sit under a line that the securities report does not print.
The Japan In-house Lawyers Association’s 30 June 2026 count is the stock of bengoshi employed by companies: 3,756 lawyers, 1,552 employers, 3,130 of them registered with the three Tokyo bars. A trading house, a megabank or a platform can hold dozens of those seats and still have one general counsel whose cash is unpublished. Treating 3,756 as 3,756 general counsel, or dividing ¥100 million by 3,756 and calling the result a salary, misreads a membership table as a payroll.
The published layer under a Tokyo general counsel is the public grade, and it is a poor costume for the deputy title. Subsection-chief cash of ¥7.7 million to ¥9.8 million and assistant-director cash of about ¥10.6 million are what the Japan Fair Trade Commission will pay a fixed-term attorney in 2026, including allowances, across 53 posts. JICA’s about ¥10 million is the other printed employed-lawyer annual. A deputy general counsel at a TSE Prime company is not on either page. Companies that have only those two numbers, and a US survey, are missing the instrument their own deputy will actually sign.
Registered foreign lawyers do not fill the gap. Of 583 gaiben on the national roll as of 1 September 2026, 534 are on the three Tokyo bars. That register can advise on home-country law. It does not sign Japanese-law filings. A general counsel spec that asks for a bilingual bengoshi who can also hold a foreign-law seat is asking for two admissions the shortlist usually does not combine. The Tokyo market page records how those briefs stall and how they get recast. This page does not reprice that miss as a salary problem.
Occupation, receipts and the associate-line clock for Japan sit on the lawyer salary Japan 2026 page. Who is hiring, and which gaiben versus bengoshi seats stay empty, sits on the Tokyo legal market 2026 page. The same seat-count method in sterling, for a city that does print some general-counsel cash, is the London general counsel salary 2026 page. This page owns the Tokyo general-counsel title and the ¥100 million gate.
The seat is being paid to carry a dated stack of rules, not a hiring boom.
Disclosure, tender offers, takeover guidelines and a tax line each change what the 2026 Tokyo general counsel is being paid to do. None of them publishes a headcount of open seats.
Every listed issuerNamed file only
- The disclosure gate Every listed issuer still applies the individual-remuneration rule. The general counsel either is inside it, as an officer, or is outside it, as a contractual executive officer. The rule does not create a new title.
- The tender-offer line Listed M&A general counsel carry the rewritten mandatory-offer threshold. The file is Japanese-law agency. It is not a reason to price the seat off a US survey.
- Special-committee work Takeover-guideline notes keep the board process on the general counsel’s desk. Guidance changed. The 2023 text of the guidelines did not.
- What the yen actually remits National income tax on the top slice, a reconstruction surtax on that tax, and association contributions inside a wage cap. The cap is why a ¥100 million offer is not a percent of itself.
The tender-offer rewrite is already in force. Financial Services Agency materials on the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act amendments set the mandatory-offer threshold at 30 percent from 1 May 2026. A general counsel running a listed bid, or defending one, is carrying that threshold this year. On 30 July 2026 the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry published Points, a Q&A and an interpretation note on the 2023 takeover guidelines, after a public comment, and did not amend the guidelines. Special-committee process for 2026 and 2027 cites that note. Neither document prints a general-counsel salary, and neither is a census of open Tokyo seats.
The payer’s other 2026 number is tax, and it is easy to overstate. The National Tax Agency’s income-tax table, current as of 1 April 2026, has seven brackets from 5 percent to 45 percent. On the band over ¥40 million the quick calculation is 45 percent minus a deduction of ¥4,796,000. Applied to taxable income of exactly ¥100 million, that is income tax of ¥40,204,000. The reconstruction special income tax is 2.1 percent of the income tax, ¥844,284, for a combined ¥41,048,284. Label it as the quick table on taxable income. It is not a percent of cash compensation, it ignores deductions, and it ignores inhabitant tax. A further special additional tax can apply when base income exceeds ¥330 million. A ¥100 million example does not reach it. The same agency page prints a different reconstruction rate from 1 January 2027, with a defense special income tax added. Do not use the 2027 rate on a 2026 package.
Employment on-cost is real and capped. For Reiwa 8 the Japan Health Insurance Association posts a Tokyo health-insurance rate of 9.85 percent, a long-term care rate of 1.62 percent for insured people ages 40 to 64, and a child-rearing support contribution of 0.23 percent. The employer bears half. Each rate applies to standard monthly remuneration up to a statutory cap, not to a ¥100 million package as if the whole yen were pensionable or insurable. This page does not multiply those rates by ¥100 million. A board that does will invent an on-cost the statute does not charge.
Price the seat on a named instrument, then run the search on the clock that covers Tokyo.
Two clocks are in use, and they measure different books. The city line is the Hong Kong in-house desk that takes Tokyo-coverage briefs. The firm-wide GC and CLO median is a separate record.
The Hong Kong in-house line that covers Tokyo seats has been in this market for 8 years. On that line: 17 closed searches over three years, a 30 percent counter-offer incidence, a median of 16 working days from offer to signature, 93 percent completion, and a typical timeline of 4 to 7 months. The 30 percent is 5 of those 17 files. It is one book, not a second series.
Of those 17 files, 9 were Asia-regional general-counsel or deputy seats whose Tokyo coverage was a stated brief requirement. 4 of those 9 ran past the typical band because the specification asked for a bilingual Japanese-qualified lawyer who could also hold a foreign-law seat, and were then recast as bengoshi-only. That recast is a credential miss. The Tokyo market page records how those files were rewritten as bengoshi-only. The cash on the brief was not why they ran long.
One of those 9 files was a TSE Prime trading company in Tokyo. It hired its bilingual, Japanese-qualified general counsel in 19 weeks, inside the 4 to 7 month band. The person was not asked to hold a foreign-law seat as well. No company and no lawyer is named.
The other clock is the firm-wide GC and CLO record. Across Sartori’s general counsel and chief legal officer searches since 2017, the median from brief to accepted offer is 11 weeks and the median to a shortlist is 24 days, on 52 such placements inside 400+ placements (230+ in-house). Acceptance on those GC and CLO searches is 96 percent. The Hong Kong in-house completion rate is the marked figure on its own 17 files. A Tokyo-coverage brief runs on that city line. The file above closed in 19 weeks, inside the 4 to 7 month band the covering line keeps.
BriefSignature
- Name the instrument Yuho total, basic pay plus bonus with stock excluded, a public grade, or a remuneration-committee number that will never be printed. If the brief cannot name the instrument, it is not a brief.
- Name the office Contractual executive officer, head of legal, or a director who will clear the individual gate. Those three jobs do not share a disclosure outcome, even at the same yen.
- Name the admission Bengoshi only, or a dual ticket that also holds a foreign-law seat. The dual ticket is the brief that stalls. The market page has the recast. Pay does not repair it.
The company that wants this hire to close inside the 4 to 7 month band has three decisions to take before a shortlist is circulated. First, whether the seat is a contractual general counsel, a director-level general counsel who will be named in the yuho, or a combined legal-and-compliance office: those three jobs do not share a cash instrument. Second, whether the first offer will be shown as base, as base plus bonus, or as a total that includes stock the candidate cannot see valued. Third, whether the ticket is Japanese-qualified only. A brief that cannot answer those three will spend the first months discovering them, and the counter-offer, at a median of 16 working days after the offer, will then be a conversation about a number that was never the number.
Quarterly surveys of this market have run since 2019. Sartori maps 1,480,000+ lawyers globally. What that map does not give Tokyo is a listed-company general-counsel cash distribution. When a board asks for one, the honest answer is the dated table in section 02, the disclosure rule in section 03, and a search on the Hong Kong in-house clock. A first offer set to a US median converted at last week’s spot does not close on that clock.
Retained search only. The fee is 25 to 30 percent of first-year total compensation. The retainer is 30 percent of that fee. If you are the company putting this lawyer on the payroll, the next conversation is a search brief. Sartori’s in-house and general counsel recruiting desk runs that brief. A company hiring its first general counsel, rather than replacing one, starts from hiring your first general counsel. The research method is on the methodology page.
Tokyo general counsel salary: common questions
What is a general counsel salary Tokyo figure in 2026?
A general counsel salary Tokyo figure in 2026 is how many seats ¥100 million funds, not a published median. The Financial Services Agency’s individual-disclosure rule, in force for fiscal years ending on or after 31 March 2010, requires a named officer only when consolidated remuneration is ¥100 million or more. At the Bank of Japan central rate of 10 September 2026, ¥153.66 per dollar, that floor is $650,800 and it funds 1.00 seats. The Japan Fair Trade Commission’s fixed-term attorney guide, deadline 3 April 2026, prints about ¥10.6 million at assistant-director grade. Listed-company general-counsel cash is omitted here rather than estimated. Sartori closed 17 in-house searches on the Hong Kong line that covers Tokyo seats. A TSE Prime trading company in Tokyo hired its bilingual, Japanese-qualified general counsel in 19 weeks.
How many seats does ¥100 million fund in Tokyo?
¥100 million funds 1.00 seats at the yuho individual-disclosure floor, 9.43 seats at the Japan Fair Trade Commission assistant-director grade of about ¥10.6 million, 10.20 seats at the subsection-chief cap of ¥9.8 million, 12.99 seats at the subsection-chief floor of ¥7.7 million, and 10.00 seats at JICA’s about ¥10 million annual. Converted at ¥153.66 per dollar on 10 September 2026, the floor is $650,800 and the assistant-director grade is $69,000. The same ¥100 million funds 0.22 of one US Fortune 1000 general-counsel median of $2.95 million, reported by Above the Law on 1 August 2025 from Corporate Counsel’s 2025 survey of 544 legal chiefs. That US median is ¥453.3 million. It is not a Tokyo band.
Why is listed-company general counsel pay missing from the yuho?
Individual disclosure applies to officers whose consolidated remuneration is ¥100 million or more: directors, statutory auditors and statutory executive officers (執行役) of a company with three committees. A contractual executive officer (執行役員), and a head of legal who is not one of those officers, never enters the individual table, at any cash level. Tokyo Shoko Research, on 30 July 2026, counted 1,345 officers at 606 listed companies already over that line in FY2025 filings. Their median basic pay plus bonus, excluding retirement, stock and options, was ¥93 million. That is the cash slice of people who cleared the gate. It is not a general-counsel average.
What does a Tokyo head of legal earn next to the general counsel?
No 2026 Tokyo table prints a head-of-legal band next to a general-counsel band. The published employed-lawyer cells are public: Japan Fair Trade Commission subsection-chief grade about ¥7.7 million to ¥9.8 million, assistant-director grade about ¥10.6 million, and JICA’s Legal Affairs attorney at about ¥10 million a year on a monthly base of ¥555,630. Those seats are the layer a company can actually read. They are not a census of deputy general counsel. The in-house bengoshi stock, 3,756 people at 1,552 employers as of 30 June 2026, is a headcount, not a salary.
How long does a Tokyo-covering general-counsel search take?
On the Hong Kong in-house line that covers Tokyo seats, the typical timeline is 4 to 7 months, with a median of 16 working days from offer to signature. Of 17 closed in-house searches over three years, 9 were Asia-regional general-counsel or deputy seats whose Tokyo coverage was in the brief. Completion on the 17 is 93 percent. Counter-offer incidence is 30 percent. That clock is not the firm-wide GC and CLO median of 11 weeks from brief to accepted offer, measured on 52 GC and CLO searches since 2017, and it is not the 24-day median to a shortlist on that same firm-wide set. A TSE Prime trading company in Tokyo hired its bilingual, Japanese-qualified general counsel in 19 weeks, inside the city line’s band.
How is in-house counsel salary in Tokyo different from general counsel salary?
In-house counsel salary in Tokyo, on the dated public prints, is a JICA annual of about ¥10 million or a Japan Fair Trade Commission grade of about ¥7.7 million to ¥10.6 million. General counsel salary is the title that usually sits outside the ¥100 million individual table. The in-house bengoshi stock is a different document: the Japan In-house Lawyers Association counted 3,756 in-house bengoshi as of 30 June 2026, of whom 3,130 were on the three Tokyo bars. Occupation and receipts for the wider bar are on the Japan lawyer-salary page. This page owns the general-counsel title and the disclosure gate.
The disclosure rule, the public grades, and the Hong Kong research record.
The gate is a Financial Services Agency rule. The yen grades are recruitment documents. Bar stock is the Japan Federation of Bar Associations. In-house headcount is the Japan In-house Lawyers Association. Seat-count arithmetic uses the Bank of Japan central rate of 10 September 2026.
Disclosures, statutes and the research record
15 references- Sartori & Partners — Hong Kong Legal Talent Research Programme sartoriglobal.com ↗
- Sartori & Partners — Hong Kong lawyer mapping sartoriglobal.com ↗
- Bank of Japan foreign-exchange market, 10 September 2026 boj.or.jp ↗
- Access FSA No. 84 — officer remuneration disclosure fsa.go.jp ↗
- JFTC fixed-term attorney recruitment guide jftc.go.jp ↗
- JICA — Legal Affairs specialist (attorney) partner.jica.go.jp ↗
- JFBA membership, as of 1 September 2026 nichibenren.or.jp ↗
- Japan In-house Lawyers Association, statistics as of 30 June 2026 jila.jp ↗
- TSR Data Insight, 30 July 2026 tsr-net.co.jp ↗
- JFBA White Paper, attorney-activity survey 2023 nichibenren.or.jp ↗
- Stat(s) Of The Week: Tech Tops The Charts abovethelaw.com ↗
- NTA No. 2260 — income-tax brackets nta.go.jp ↗
- Kyokaikenpo, Reiwa 8 prefectural rates kyoukaikenpo.or.jp ↗
- FSA — tender-offer rule amendments fsa.go.jp ↗
- METI — takeover guidelines, Points and Q&A, 30 July 2026 meti.go.jp ↗
Each figure measures a named instrument: a disclosure floor, an approximate public annual, a tax-return median, an officer cash slice that excludes stock, or a headcount. Public grades are not a TSE Prime general-counsel distribution. The US Fortune 1000 median is labeled as US. Recruiter salary guides are not used.
Keep reading
The Japan occupation table, the Tokyo hiring map, and the desk that runs the search.
Lawyer salary in Japan 2026
National receipts, the public employed-lawyer cell, and the associate-line clock. Not a Tokyo general-counsel median.
Read the Japan lawyer tableLegal market Tokyo 2026
Who is hiring, which gaiben versus bengoshi seats stay empty, and why a dual-ticket brief stalls. Pay cells are on this page.
Read the Tokyo market mapIn-house and general counsel recruiting
How a Tokyo-covering brief is run: a named yen instrument, a named admission, and a first offer that is not a converted US median.
Brief a Tokyo GC searchBrief a Tokyo GC search
Price the seat before you post it.
Whether you are hiring a Tokyo general counsel or replacing a contractual executive officer, the first offer is priced on a named yen instrument. The search runs on the Hong Kong in-house clock that covers these seats, not on a converted US median.