Bank of Japan Gov. Masaru Hayami said Thursday that he is opposed to postponing the launch of a "payoff" system in which the government will limit guaranteed deposit refunds to 10 million yen per depositor at banks that go bankrupt.
Hayami told a regular news conference that postponement of the planned refund limit is "inappropriate," saying it will delay the resolution of Japanese banks' bad-debt problems.
Some members of the Liberal Democratic Party have called for putting off implementation of the limit, scheduled for April 1, 2001, in accordance with an amendment to the 1996 Deposit Insurance Law, on grounds that depositors with more than 10 million yen in savings may scramble to withdraw their money out of fear of further bankruptcies.