Japan is ready to provide some of its ample cash for any International Monetary Fund bailouts for struggling nations to help stabilize the growing global financial crisis, the finance minister said Friday.
Japan will make that offer along with proposals about accounting standards and other regulatory adjustments to fix the growing economic woes at a world summit in Washington Nov. 15, Finance Minister Shoichi Nakagawa said.
Nakagawa did not say the acceptance of its proposals would be needed to get any of the money but he said Japan expects to play a greater leadership role on the global stage.
He said the IMF has about $210 billion but that may not be enough. "Japan is ready if that proves insufficient," he said, noting Japan has $1 trillion in possible funding from its foreign currency reserves. "We see lending to the IMF basically as risk-free."
He did not specify Japan's proposals, stressing that Prime Minister Taro Aso was still hammering out details.