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Strategies & Market Trends : JAPAN-Nikkei-Time to go back up? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ramsey Su who wrote (1724)	2/16/1999 2:03:00 PM
From: Peter Singleton	Respond to of 3902

Rams, Thanks for your summary thoughts. Well worth the two cents! Please put it on my account. May I suggest we plan on re-scheduling the debt until inflation corrodes the value, or a deflationary contraction forces you to write it off as uncollectable? <g> Looking forward to your continued take on this. Peter

To: Ramsey Su who wrote (1724)	2/17/1999 11:14:00 PM
From: chirodoc	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3902

Asia-Pacific February 18 1999 TOKYO: Aspirants for governor Two of Japan's most active figures internationally are fighting each other, reports Michiyo Nakamoto Expertise in international diplomacy is not a skill that wins many votes in Japanese domestic politics. But a messy political battle over who should run for governor of Tokyo from the ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP) has pitted two of Japan's most active figures on the international stage against one another. Until recently, Yasuo Akashi, 68, was undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs at the United Nations, involved in UN peacekeeping activities in Cambodia and the former Yugoslavia. Koji Kakizawa, 65, is a former foreign minister of Japan who has led a long personal campaign to promote relations with foreign countries ranging from France to Libya. In a curious twist of fate, the race to become the LDP's candidate in April's Tokyo gubernatorial race has brought the two close friends face to face in a showdown that has wreaked havoc in the ruling party. It is a huge embarrassment for the LDP, which had settled on fielding Mr Akashi, after an earlier bungle involving an opposition candidate. Initially, the LDP had wanted to back Kunio Hatoyama, deputy secretary general of the opposition Democratic party (DPJ), who is running as an independent. Mr Hatoyama used to be a member of the LDP and comes from a prominent political family with impeccable conservative credentials. But firm opposition against LDP support from the DPJ scuppered that plan, leaving the ruling party looking confused, disorganised and desperate to find a suitable candidate. Although the LDP does not face national elections until the autumn of next year, the stakes are high for the ruling party. The Tokyo gubernatorial election is a key indicator of trends among urban voters, points out John Neuffer, political analyst at Mitsui Marine Research Institute. "Symbolically, it is of crucial importance to the LDP," he says. Young LDP parliamentarians, many of whom are from urban constituencies, are seriously worried about the ruling party's declining support in urban areas. However, as long as Mr Kakizawa insists on running there is little the LDP can do except to threaten to expel him from the party. Mr Kakizawa is unacceptable as a candidate to the LDP because of opposition from the Komei party, whose co-operation the LDP needs to make up for its lack of a majority in the upper house of the Diet. The Komei, backed by the Soka Gakkai religious organisation, has not forgotten that Mr Kakizawa led a campaign to enforce transparency in accounts of the tax-exempt religious organisations. In the furore that has developed over the issue, the plight of Tokyo residents has been left on the sidelines. With outstanding debts of ¥6,651bn (£35bn) and a budget deficit of ¥100bn (£531m) this year, Tokyo faces serious financial problems. Projects undertaken in the years of plenty, such as the redevelopment of the waterfront area, are still costing the city dearly, while revenues have fallen sharply. The Tokyo metropolitan government's towering headquarters alone, built eight years ago at a cost of ¥160bn, costs the city ¥5.4bn a year in maintenance. Whoever becomes governor will also face mounting problems related to the recession. Yet Mr Kakizawa, whose candidacy the LDP adamantly refuses to allow, is the only one who can claim to have taken any concrete action in this regard. As head of an LDP urban revitalisation committee, Mr Kakizawa, known affectionately by his supporters as the "Kennedy" of downtown Tokyo, has been actively studying measures for the city's redevelopment. Tokyo's liberal voters may be disillusioned with non-establishment types, given the failure of the incumbent governor, Yukio Aoshima, to live up to expectations. But Tokyoites are notoriously unpredictable - and well educated and well informed. Amid continuing economic slump, the LDP may again find to its dismay that it is still policy, rather than political support, that sways the city's electorate.

To: Ramsey Su who wrote (1724)	2/20/1999 12:24:00 AM
From: chirodoc	Respond to of 3902

transparency is coming, bring on the attorneys Asia-Pacific February 20 1999 JAPAN: Insurers may sue ministry By Naoko Nakamae and Gillian Tett in Tokyo Some of Japan's largest life assurance companies are considering suing the ministry of finance, accusing it of concealing the scale of bad loans at Nippon Credit Bank, the insolvent Japanese bank, when it put pressure on the life assurance companies to inject around ¥97bn ($836m) of funds into the company in 1997. The companies say the ministry also breached written pledges that NCB would not collapse. NCB was nationalised last year, and shareholders have effectively lost all their investment. Nippon Life, Japan's largest life assurer, which made the largest investment, yesterday refused to say whether it had received such written pledges. However, it said it was "carefully considering" whether to take legal action against the ministry. Another life assurer said: "We were forced to invest in NCB at the time according to a formula drawn up by the authorities." The dispute is unusual for Japan, since financial companies are traditionally extremely reluctant to challenge the ministry in public. It highlights the degree to which some traditional loyalties are crumbling in Japan, under the pressure of growing competition and the vast losses in the financial sector. And the issue threatens to trigger fresh criticism of the ministry's past management of the financial sector, particularly since the treatment of NCB will be discussed in parliament next week. Yoshito Sengoku, of the opposition Democratic party said: "This is a very serious issue - we are going to demand that the ministry produces the documents." NCB was the first bank to face a financial crisis since Japan embarked on deregulation. At the time, the ministry of finance and Bank of Japan tried to solve the problems by injecting ¥290bn into the bank, of which ¥80bn was provided by the Bank of Japan and the rest by private financial companies. Ministry officials insist that a recapitalisation was the only option in 1997 because parliament had not approved the use of public money to bail out ailing banks at that time. The life assurance companies were initially very reluctant to take part. However, the ministry encouraged them to inject the funds, and allegedly provided written pledges to some companies that they would not let NCB fail. The ministry also promised on the basis of its own inspection that NCB's bad loans were relatively small. The ministry has refused to comment on whether it provided guarantees in 1997. However, it has since emerged that the scale of bad loans was considerably larger than revealed at the time. Some government officials claim that the discrepancy emerged because NCB was effectively using elaborate forms of "window dressing" to flatter its accounts. The Tokyo prosecutor's office is considering action against the management of both NCB and Long Term Credit Bank of Japan, another failed bank, over this.