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Hiromi Yamaji, chief executive officer of Japan Exchange Group, says the yen is too weak and its benefits for Japanese stocks are diminishing.
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 24, 2023

Yen’s too weak and benefits are waning, Japan bourse chief says

The yen has slipped below the levels where Japanese officials intervened last September to rein in the weakness in the currency.
Yuko Seimei was promoted to president of Monex Group in June, after serving as president of affiliate Monex.
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 24, 2023

More brokerages name female leadership amid pressure for change

The government wants women to account for at least 30% of board members at firms listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange's top-tier Prime section by 2030.
People visit Semicon China, a trade fair for semiconductor technology, in Shanghai in 2021
BUSINESS
Aug 24, 2023

China quietly hires overseas chip talent as U.S. tightens curbs

The revamped recruitment drive is said to offer perks including home-purchase subsidies and typical signing bonuses of $420,000 to $700,000.
Staff from All Nippon Airways and a travel agency escort a Chinese tour group from Beijing upon their arrival at Haneda Airport in Tokyo on Wednesday.
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 24, 2023

Will 'explosive spending' return to Japan with China group tours?

Hopes the tours will herald big returns clash with a struggling Chinese economy and Japan's controversial release of treated wastewater into the sea.
A promotional poster for the film "Barbie" in Tokyo on Aug. 3
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 23, 2023

Why is the ‘Barbie’ movie bombing in Japanese theaters?

The fact that the movie's female empowerment theme won’t have a positive, lasting impact in Japan is a shame.
Foreign visitors in Kyoto. Local governments are rushing to use big data on spending by foreign visitors to analyze trends.
JAPAN
Aug 24, 2023

Local governments tap big data on spending by foreign visitors

Such data allows authorities to analyze consumption trends in detail, "visualize" markets and place targeted advertisements.
People wave Indian national flags as they celebrate the successful lunar landing of Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft on the south pole of the moon, in New Delhi on Wednesday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Science & Health / ANALYSIS
Aug 24, 2023

Moon landing hailed as major breakthrough for India’s space program

The achievement is only the next step in the budding program, which aims to place India among the world's space superpowers.
Donald Trump speaks to reporters before boarding his private plane at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta on Thursday, where he turned himself in at the Fulton County Jail earlier in the evening.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Aug 25, 2023

Trump booked at Georgia jail on election charges

Authorities said they took Trump's mug shot at Fulton County Jail — a first for the former U.S. president.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, chief of Russian private mercenary group Wagner, speaks in an unknown location, in this still image taken from video published on Monday.
WORLD / Politics / ANALYSIS
Aug 25, 2023

Prigozhin's presumed death may create new problems for Putin

A full investigation of the cause of the crash is unlikely to shake the belief that he was killed as an act of vengeance for staging a mutiny.
Wagner mercenaries guard the president and other high-ranking attendees at an event in Bangui, capital of the Central African Republic, in May 2019.
WORLD / Politics
Aug 25, 2023

Wagner’s empire in Africa will live on after Prigozhin

Prigozhin built a business empire on the continent over the past five years, becoming an iconoclastic celebrity in places like Mali.
The Tokyo core consumer price index rose 2.8% in August from a year earlier, slowing for the second straight month but remaining well above the central bank's 2% target.
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 25, 2023

Inflation in Tokyo slowed in August but stayed above BOJ target

The Tokyo core consumer price index, which excludes volatile fresh food but includes fuel costs, rose 2.8% in August from a year earlier.
People attend a job fair in China's southwestern city of Chongqing on April 11. China on Aug. 15 said it would suspend the release of youth unemployment data, fueling data transparency concerns and heightening worries about the country’s economic slowdown.
BUSINESS / Economy / ANALYSIS
Aug 25, 2023

China braces for wider youth unemployment problems

Last week, Beijing decided to halt the release of urban youth unemployment data, which has been soaring in recent years.
Eiko Higuchi at her microphone production station at Sony Taiyo
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 25, 2023

A tiny factory is handcrafting mics for Justin Bieber and Dr. Dre

Sony Taiyo, a Sony Group subsidiary, is designed to give people with disabilities a fair chance in the workplace.
A reader for My Number cards doubling as health insurance cards is set up at a clinic in Kamakura, Kanagawa Prefecture, this month.
JAPAN / Society
Aug 25, 2023

Linkage of My Number and insurance cards faces delays

A survey found that the linkage work was incomplete for 770,000 people across the country for whom the process was underway.
Guy Perryman hosts the Tokyo-based "Guy Perryman Show" on InterFM on Friday mornings.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / 20 QUESTIONS
Aug 26, 2023

Guy Perryman: ‘Sound and rhythm are ingrained in our DNA’

Radio personality Guy Perryman says around 99% of his audience consists of Japanese people who want to listen to English content.
The Black unemployment rate fell to 5% in March, the lowest level ever recorded in the monthly data, but then rose to 6% in June, showing how erratic it can be.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 25, 2023

The mysterious fall and rise of Black unemployment

After a roller-coaster move this spring, it’s now essentially back to where it was in February. How much is statistical noise?
Vendors carry lobster at a seafood market in Shanghai, China, on Friday.
BUSINESS
Aug 25, 2023

Japan fishing industry reels after China’s seafood embargo

The average price of fresh Aomori tuna at the Toyosu market in Tokyo fell 24% on Aug. 25 from the previous day to ¥9,383 per kilogram.
The Bank of Japan's headquarters in Tokyo
BUSINESS
Aug 25, 2023

Financial expert warns against delay in BOJ policy shift

Izuru Kato predicted that the BOJ will likely raise its short-term policy rate from below zero in "January or April next year."
A statue of Pokemon character Pikachu is seen during the E3 Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles.
BUSINESS / Tech
Aug 26, 2023

Pokemon game that’s all about sleep hits 10 million downloads

Pokemon Go made billions of dollars getting people to roam the great outdoors. Now the company is trying to get people to go to bed.
Investors stand in front of an electronic board showing stock information on the first trading day after the weeklong Lunar New Year holiday at a brokerage house in Shanghai.
BUSINESS / Economy / FOCUS
Aug 26, 2023

China’s market rescue is failing as Xi holds back on stimulus

China’s regulators face a losing battle convincing global funds to invest in the nation’s stocks without stronger stimulus packages.
T-shirts and hats with an image depicting the mug shot of former President Donald Trump are pictured at the Y-Que printing store in Los Angeles on Friday.
WORLD / Politics / FOCUS
Aug 26, 2023

Owning it: Trump embraces historic mug shot

T-shirts, mugs and stickers bearing the first mug shot of a serving or former U.S. president were put out within hours of the photo's release.
U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell attends the Jackson Hole economic symposium in Moran, Wyoming, on Friday.
BUSINESS / ANALYSIS
Aug 26, 2023

Fed chief's 'higher for longer' mantra fans investor caution

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has left open the possibility of further rate increases and stressed the U.S. economy’s surprising strength.
Christine Lagarde (left), president of the European Central Bank, Kazuo Ueda, governor of the Bank of Japan (center) and Jerome Powell, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, at the Jackson Hole economic symposium in Moran, Wyoming, on Friday
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 27, 2023

BOJ chief says strategy backed by below-target inflation

Gov. Kazuo Ueda said price growth remains slower than the central bank’s goal, explaining why officials are continuing with their current strategy.
Seawater sampling operations near the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant after treated water was discharged into the ocean on Friday
JAPAN / Science & Health
Aug 27, 2023

More tests show radiation levels of Fukushima seawater remain below limits

Tokyo hopes what it says is a transparent release of data will serve as a strong rebuttal to claims by Beijing that the discharge is dangerous.
A man rests at a fresh food market in Shanghai, China, in early August. The world's second largest economy was meant to drive a third of global growth this year, so its dramatic slowdown in recent months is sounding alarm bells across the world.
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 28, 2023

China’s economic slowdown is rippling across the globe

Policymakers are bracing for a hit to their economies as China’s imports of everything from construction materials to electronics slide.
Aichi Prefectural Police investigators raid a car dealership in Komaki in August last year.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Aug 28, 2023

Car thefts on the rise in Japan as vehicle prices remain high

Cases of car theft increased last year for the first time in almost a decade, with Aichi the most affected prefecture, and are still rising rapidly.
Jerome Powell, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, from left, Kazuo Ueda, governor of the Bank of Japan (BOJ), and Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank (ECB), walk the grounds at the Jackson Hole economic symposium in Moran, Wyoming, on Friday.
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 28, 2023

At Jackson Hole, post-inflation challenges vex central bankers

The bankers stressed the need to keep interest rates high until inflation is contained, and wrestled with deep shifts that will make their jobs harder.
A 2023 Toyota Prius. Hybrids have accounted for less than 10% of total U.S. sales, with Toyota’s long-running Prius among the most popular models.
BUSINESS
Aug 28, 2023

Gas-electric hybrids get boost in the U.S. from Ford and others

Ford is the latest of several top automakers planning to build and sell hundreds of thousands of hybrid vehicles in the U.S. over the next five years.
The Sasso 2 Geothermical power plant in Italy
ENVIRONMENT / Energy
Aug 28, 2023

Dante’s inferno may have the answer for Europe’s energy bind

One geothermal site in Italy generates more than 5% of the nation’s clean power production.
Japan's exports have been "picking up recently," the government said in its latest monthly economic assessment, its first upward revision since May,
BUSINESS
Aug 28, 2023

Japan improves view on exports for first time in three months

The Cabinet Office report cited the boost to auto shipments from easing supply issues and the bottoming out of demand for semiconductor-related goods.

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?