What you need ranges from a little over 20,000 yen to nearly 400,000 yen depending on the listing. With 50,000 to 100,000 yen you can take part in a good proportion of them.
And at brokers that require no deposit, you can apply with a balance of zero. The money is only needed once you have won.
The belief that IPOs require serious capital is common and mostly wrong.
The cash you need is the offer price per share multiplied by 100. Japanese shares trade in units of 100, and IPO applications follow the same unit.
An offer price of 500 yen means 50,000 yen. A thousand yen means 100,000. Two and a half thousand means 250,000.
You cannot apply for a single share. The differences between listings come entirely from the share price.
Across the 22 listings tracked here at the time of writing, the cheapest required about 23,000 yen and the most expensive about 390,000. The median was around 108,000.
Ten of those 22 — close to half — could be applied for with 100,000 yen or less. The cheapest few were around 23,000, 43,000 and 60,000 yen.
So if you can only put aside a few tens of thousands of yen, listings you can afford come along most months.
Use a broker that requires no deposit. This is by far the most effective. Most brokers want the purchase money in the account when you apply; a few let you apply with nothing and pay only after winning. That removes the need to set aside 100,000 yen against a draw you will probably lose. If you lose, not a yen moves.
Only a minority of brokers work this way, and the comparison page on this site marks which ones do.
Check what the listings currently open would each require.
Nothing here is investment advice. Shares can and do open below their offer price.
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