Property developer Morimoto Co. filed for bankruptcy protection Friday with ¥162 billion in debt, bringing the number of bankruptcies among publicly traded companies in Japan to a postwar record.
Morimoto's failure, the second-largest this year after Urban Corp.'s filing on Aug. 13, pushed total bankruptcies in 2008 to 30, the most since the war, based on information from Teikoku Databank Ltd.
Twenty-three of the companies that went under are in the real estate and construction industries, according to the corporate research firm.
Difficulty in obtaining financing amid the credit crisis forced the bankruptcy, Morimoto said in a statement to the Tokyo Stock Exchange.
The Tokyo-based company, established in 1983, will be delisted from the exchange on Dec. 29. It first sold shares to the public in February.