Finance Minister Hikaru Matsunaga took punitive action Monday against 112 ministry officials, including Securities Bureau head Atsushi Nagano, for being excessively entertained by financial sector firms.
Nagano, the bureau's director general, resigned after being slapped with a six-month, 20 percent pay cut, as did Takashi Sugii, deputy director general of the Banking Bureau, who received a four-month suspension.
Nagano, 54, and Sugii, 51, have been repeatedly mentioned in media reports on the financial sector's excessive wining and dining of ministry officials. Both were elite career bureaucrats, and Sugii was viewed by many as a future contender for vice minister.