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To: stanley new who wrote (5076)	1/1/1998 8:46:00 PM
From: goldsnow	Respond to of 116753

Cheerleading non-withstanding.. Japan's ''Year of the Secrets'' ends on gloomy note 12:08 p.m. Dec 31, 1997 Eastern By Brian Williams TOKYO (Reuters) - It was the year when the secrets came out, spreading an ugly stain across Japan's once proud business reputation. And as 1997 drew to a close no one doubted that more, possibly even bigger, skeletons were waiting to emerge from Japan's financial closet in the New Year. From the collapse of Yamaichi Securities in Japan's biggest financial failure since World War II, to the seedy exploits of a corporate racketeer who brought shame to some of the country's most prestigious firms, it was a year when what had always been whispered, became public. It was disclosed that corporate racketeers were paid not to disrupt annual meetings with embarrassing questions and the staggering size of reckless bank lending was also revealed. Weeping company presidents owned up to years of abuse and hiding of the bad loans as their firms went bankrupt and they went before the public to confess their wrongdoings. Along with the financial failures -- nine listed firms went bust during the year -- died Japan's dreams for the moment of becoming a regional leader in Asia, let alone the world. Nothing summed up Japan's plight more than Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto bluntly telling Asian Pacific leaders during their November summit meeting in Vancouver that Japan could not be the ''locomotive'' to pull Asia's other ailing economies out of their mess. And nothing summed up how serious the plight could yet become in 1998 than Hashimoto announcing in December that a U-turn he was making on fiscal policy was for the world's benefit as much as Japan's. ''This is what our country must do and reflects our resolution to prevent a world recession touched off by Japan,'' Hashimoto said in announcing measures that included billions of dollars in cuts in income tax to get domestic demand moving. The end of 1997 was a gloomy re-run of the start of the year when the stock market sagged and the yen sank on fears -- later realized -- that a fiscal austerity regime aimed at curbing the budget deficit would scuttle Japan's recovery.