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JAPAN
Oct 29, 1998

Buyers scarce for former JNR plots

Japan Railway Construction Public Corp. has taken over 1,273 hectares of land that remained unsold when JNR Settlements Corp. ended its 11-year history last week.The public corporation hopes to sell off the property by fiscal 2003 to help reduce 28.3 trillion yen in debts left behind by the defunct...
JAPAN
Oct 28, 1998

Amway says it will change distribution system

Amway Japan Ltd., a direct marketer of household goods and food, will introduce a new distribution system next month to increase the transparency of its business, Amway officials said Wednesday.The head of the Japan Consumer Information Center told a Diet committee last year that the center had received...
JAPAN
Oct 27, 1998

10 trillion yen emergency stimulus due Nov. 16

The government will draw up an emergency economic stimulus package worth more than 10 trillion yen by Nov. 16 as the major pillar of the third supplementary budget for fiscal 1998, the Cabinet agreed Tuesday.The third extra budget for the current business year will be submitted to an extraordinary Diet...
JAPAN
Oct 27, 1998

Hino Motors posts 21 billion yen first-half loss

Leading truck maker Hino Motors Ltd. plunged into red ink in the first half of the current fiscal year, with sales decreasing mainly due to the Asian economic crisis and the prolonged recession in Japan, the company said on Tuesday.Unconsolidated net losses for the April-September period were reported...
JAPAN
Oct 23, 1998

Matsushita opens R&D site in Apple's neighborhood

OSAKA -- Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. has opened a digital technology research and development center in Cupertino, Calif., the company said.The Panasonic Digital Concept Center aims to develop technologies for computerized consumer electric products that also feature information equipment functions,...
JAPAN
Oct 23, 1998

Miyazawa sanguine on Long-Term credit debacle

Following the government's decision to temporarily place the Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan under state control, Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa said Friday that the bank's depositors and clients do not have to worry about its imminent takeover.Speaking at a news conference, he said all depositors'...
JAPAN
Oct 23, 1998

NEC posts first midterm loss in five years

Struggling with the domestic economic slump and falling prices in the semiconductor market, NEC Corp. suffered a consolidated net mid-term earnings loss for the first time in five years, company officials said Friday.The net loss for the April-September period was 19.7 billion yen, with the operating...
JAPAN
Oct 22, 1998

Land acquisitions take steep first-half drop

Reflecting worsening business conditions and thinning incentives for real-estate investment, an unprecedentedly small number of firms purchased land for industrial use in the first half of this year, according to a preliminary report released by the trade ministry Thursday.Acquisitions of land greater...
JAPAN
Oct 19, 1998

Small firms get tips on coping with credit crunch

Managers from about 250 small and medium-size companies based in Tokyo gathered Monday for advice on coping with the worsening credit crunch.The Tokyo Chamber of Commerce hosted the seminar as many smaller firms are finding it difficult to obtain loans from Japanese financial institutions. Participants...
JAPAN
Oct 16, 1998

Not-so-sweet potato vendor torches truck at Obuchi house

A sweet potato vendor was arrested Friday after setting fire to his truck in front of Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi's private residence in Tokyo's Kita Ward, police said.Yasushi Maeda, 47, reportedly told police that he wanted to take out his stress from bad business on Obuchi. "I tried to create confusion,"...
JAPAN
Oct 16, 1998

Transport minister now seeks JR firms' 'understanding'

Transport Minister Jiro Kawasaki said Friday he intends to meet with the presidents of the seven Japan Railway group companies to seek their "understanding" on the just-enacted laws requiring them to shoulder part of the burden for repaying the 27.8 trillion yen in debts left behind by the now-defunct...
JAPAN
Oct 15, 1998

Quick recovery unlikely, BOJ reports

A speedy economic recovery will be difficult to achieve despite the government's economic stimulus measures and the Bank of Japan's easier monetary policy, the central bank said in a report released Thursday.According to the BOJ's monthly report on recent economic and financial developments for October,...
JAPAN
Oct 15, 1998

Nonaka scolds Kishi's resistance to bank bill

Banks should expedite their restructuring efforts and get a better understanding of their responsibility in the nation's financial system, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiromu Nonaka said Thursday.Nonaka's remarks were directed at a comment made earlier in the day by Satoru Kishi, chairman of the Federation...
JAPAN
Oct 15, 1998

Tight lending takes toll on record number of firms

A record number of small and medium-size firms are suffering from banks' tight grip on lending, according to a report released Thursday by the Ministry of International Trade and Industry.The financial institutions are reluctant to lend because they are struggling to sustain their capital-adequacy ratios...
JAPAN
Oct 14, 1998

Push banks to accept public funds, council urges

The government should take the initiative to quickly inject tens of trillions of yen in public money into the nation's major banks to boost their capital bases and ease the credit crunch, a special advisory panel to Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi proposed Wednesday.The Strategic Economic Council, headed...
JAPAN
Oct 14, 1998

Daiei reports first-half net loss of 983 million yen

Suffering from weak consumer spending and restructuring costs to close poorly performing shops, supermarket giant Daiei Inc. reported a net loss of 983 million yen Wednesday for the March-August period on a nonconsolidated basis.This is the first time the company has posted an after-tax loss in an interim...
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1998

BOJ board maintains money policy, considers new moves

The Bank of Japan's Policy Board agreed Tuesday by a majority vote to keep its monetary policy unchanged, the central bank said.It is believed that the decision reflects a view shared by most financial experts that there is little room for another interest rate cut to spur the crippled economy.At a...
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1998

Bank bill clears Lower House; enactment seen Friday

The new bank recapitalization bill designed to keep capital-short banks afloat cleared the Lower House Tuesday and was immediately sent to the Upper House, which is expected to enact the measure Friday.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1998

Tax evasion, bribes earn Izui two years in prison

The Tokyo District Court sentenced oil dealer Junichi Izui to two years in prison Tuesday for tax evasion and bribery, and acquitted him on a fraud charge over a series of oil deals involving Mitsui Mining Co. and other firms.Presiding Judge Kohei Ikeda also levied 80 million yen in fines against the...
JAPAN
Oct 8, 1998

Japan, South Korea ink new tax pact

Japan and South Korea signed a new taxation convention Thursday that will treat South Korea as a developed country by removing preferential measures and effectively increase Japan's tax revenue.The agreement, to be applied from 2000 subject to parliamentary approval, promotes business activity taxation...
JAPAN
Oct 8, 1998

Guilty bureaucrat fined, freed over Big Four bribes

A former Finance Ministry official received a two-year suspended sentence and was fined more than 5 million yen by the Tokyo District Court Thursday for accepting bribes from four securities companies.Toshio Miyano, 51, a former senior official at the ministry's Securities Bureau, was found guilty of...
JAPAN
Oct 6, 1998

Daihatsu unveils new minicar lineup

Daihatsu Motor Co. announced the launch of its fully redesigned Mira, Move, and Terios Kid minicar models Tuesday in line with new Japanese regulations for minicars implemented at the beginning of the month.Daihatsu, a major minicar manufacturer based in Osaka, hopes to raise its current 25 percent...
JAPAN
Oct 5, 1998

EU to present deregulation package next week

The European Union will present new deregulation proposals to Japan when the two sides hold ministerial-level meetings in Tokyo next Monday, a senior officials of the European Commission said Monday.Speaking to reporters in Tokyo, Ove Juul Joergensen, head of the Delegation of the European Commission...
JAPAN
Oct 5, 1998

Mitsubishi unveils next generation of minicars

Mitsubishi Motors Corp. announced Monday the launch of three fully redesigned minicars it hopes will energize the stagnant economy.The announcement is the first of a flurry of minicar announcements expected due to new regulations imposed Oct. 1 on the Japanese minicar industry.This week, major minicar...
JAPAN
Oct 5, 1998

Investment firm puts trust in disclosure

18th in an occasional series on financial deregulationStaff writerAlliance Capital Investment Trust Management Inc. of Tokyo is attempting to calm anxious customers by fully explaining how their funds have been hurt amid global financial instability, company President Takahiro Fujino said.The severe...
JAPAN
Oct 1, 1998

'Tankan' survey helps TSE sink to 13-year low

Tokyo share prices fell broadly Thursday amid concerns over the ailing banking industry and bleak economic prospects.The 225-issue Nikkei average, a 415.04-point loser the previous day, ended 209.27 points, or 1.6 percent, down at 13,197.12, its lowest closing level in nearly 13 years.The Tokyo stock...
JAPAN
Sep 29, 1998

Foreign firms cool to hot Japanese real estate

Staff writer
JAPAN
Sep 29, 1998

Japan, U.S. support Y2K contingency plans

Japan and the United States should draw up contingency and backup plans to secure critical services in case some computer systems do not correctly identify 2000, a senior U.S. government official in charge of millennium bug crisis management said Tuesday.
JAPAN
Sep 28, 1998

Japan, U.S. vow to cooperate on Y2K problem

Japan and the United States agreed Monday to deal more closely together with problems related to the millennium bug, as small and medium-size firms on both sides of the Pacific struggle to overcome the financial hurdle to remedy their computer systems by the turn of the century.
JAPAN
Sep 25, 1998

Daylight-saving forum rekindles debate

In a move to promote energy saving and leisure activities in summer, the government convened on Friday an open forum in Tokyo to discuss introducing daylight-saving time.

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Totopa in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward was picked by consultants TTNE as the best sauna of the year.
Japan’s sauna movement: Relax, refresh, repeat