Nissan CEO oversees worst stock performance in five decades

Mr Makoto Uchida's five-year anniversary as president and chief executive of Nissan Motor is little cause for celebration among shareholders.

The carmaker's stock has performed worse during his time at the helm than under any other leader in at least five decades, data compiled by Bloomberg shows.

Shares have also lagged those of the company's global peers.

Nissan's stock has fallen 47 percent since Mr Uchida became CEO on Dec 1, 2019, underperforming Japan's Topix by more than 100 percentage points.

By this measure, he is the company's worst-performing president since at least 1974, from when Bloomberg data is available.

Mr Uchida has had to steer the company through huge challenges in the past five years.

When he took charge, Nissan was still reeling from the arrest and escape from Japan of former chairman Carlos Ghosn. Now, it is confronted with the rise of China's electric vehicle makers, which have shaken up the auto industry worldwide.

Nissan shares have lagged the MSCI World Automobiles Index by more than 170 points under Mr Uchida - the worst relative performance by any CEO since the global benchmark launched in 1999.