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Daihatsu's plant in Oyamazaki, Kyoto Prefecture, on Monday
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 25, 2023

Daihatsu halts three assembly plants over testing fraud scandal

It is unclear when the company will resume production, which is expected to be suspended until at least the end of next month.
An electronic board displays various companies' share prices at a business district in Tokyo in October.
BUSINESS / Economy
Dec 26, 2023

Japan’s labor demand holds steady in positive sign for wages

The job-to-applicants ratio eased a tad to 1.28, meaning there were 128 jobs offered for every 100 applicants, the labor ministry reported.
Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities sold Additional Tier 1 notes from Credit Suisse more aggressively than any other firm in Japan, with its sales making up about two-thirds of the notes taken up, which totaled ¥140 billion in value.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 26, 2023

MUFJ securities unit sued again over Credit Suisse AT1 bond losses

Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities sold more than two-thirds of the Additional Tier 1 notes taken up in Japan.
Demonstrators rally against COVID-19 vaccine mandates in Buffalo, New York, in February 2022.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 26, 2023

It’s past time scientists admitted their COVID-19 mistakes

In 2019, 13% of Americans were distrustful enough to say they weren’t confident in scientists to act in the public’s best interest. Now it is 27%.
Pudong's Lujiazui Financial District in Shanghai. Chinese stocks fell more than 15% in 2023, while many emerging markets did just fine.
BUSINESS / Markets
Dec 26, 2023

Goldman rethinks emerging market strategy after China lesson

Chinese stocks, expected to rally in 2023, fell more than 15%, while many emerging markets did just fine.
A group of 19 host club owners in Kabukicho who own most of the host clubs in the area have pledged to ban the pay-later system by April and prohibit entry to those under 20 years old from January.
JAPAN / Society
Dec 26, 2023

How Japan's host clubs trap young women under mountains of debt

False promises of love — and even marriage — lead to huge bills for some as young as 18, who are often then coaxed into sex work to make repayments.
Bank of Japan Gov. Kazuo Ueda addresses a council meeting at business lobby Keidanren in Tokyo on Monday.
BUSINESS / Economy
Dec 27, 2023

BOJ summary suggests Ueda can wait for wage results before hike

Bank of Japan board members discussed the potential timing of ending the negative rate policy during their meeting last week.
Toyota's global production jumped 11% in November to a record level, bouncing back from last year's supply chain disruptions and benefiting from robust demand both in Japan and overseas.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 27, 2023

Toyota saw record November sales on demand from U.S. and Europe

Global sales — including that of subsidiaries Hino and Daihatsu — rose 12% from a year earlier to 986,262 units.
As president of Japan's largest opposition party, the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, Kenta Izumi has the unenviable task of mounting a challenge against the ruling coalition led by the Liberal Democratic Party.
JAPAN / Politics
Dec 28, 2023

Amid LDP woes, a familiar question reappears: Is the opposition ready?

Faced with a divided opposition and voter skepticism, CDP President Kenta Izumi says he is looking to adopt a stronger tone.
The New York Times headquarters in New York. The New York Times has sued Microsoft and OpenAI for using its content to help develop artificial intelligence services, in a sign of the increasingly fraught relationship between the media and a technology that could upend the news industry.
BUSINESS
Dec 28, 2023

NYT sues Microsoft and OpenAI for copyright infringement

While OpenAI has been sued by prominent authors, the suit is the first challenge to its practices by a major media organization.
A woman points at a Glock handgun during the annual National Rifle Association convention in Dallas in 2018.
WORLD / Society
Dec 28, 2023

Gaston Glock, inventor of cult guns, dies at 94

His gun, wielded by police and outlaws alike, certainly made its mark worldwide, matched by few other weapons.
Japan's industrial production fell 0.9% in November from the previous month, weighed down by a decline in auto production.
BUSINESS / Economy
Dec 28, 2023

Japan's November factory output falls on weaker autos

Industrial production fell 0.9% in November from the previous month, data from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) showed on Thursday.
U.S. President Joe Biden with IBM’s System One quantum computer during a tour of a facility in Poughkeepsie, New York in 2022. Chinese spies are challenging the C.I.A. by deploying artificial intelligence and other advanced technology as the two nations try to pilfer each other’s trade secrets.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Dec 28, 2023

Chinese spy agency rising to challenge the CIA

In recent years, China's Ministry of State Security has sharpened itself through better training, a bigger budget and the use of advanced technologies.
FC Barcelona's Martina Fernandez scores during a Women's Champions League group match against FC Rosengard in Barcelona on Dec. 21. A share of 83% of respondents from a recent corporate survey said they planned to increase their investment in women's sports in 2024.
SPORTS
Dec 29, 2023

After landmark World Cup, more sponsors keen on women's sports

A share of 83% of respondents from a recent corporate survey said they planned to increase their investment in women's sports in 2024.
Vishnu Dabad, a Gau Rakshak, or cow protector, and a politician with the regional political party Jannayak Janta Party (JJP), in Chamdhera village, Haryana, India.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Dec 29, 2023

India's far-right cow vigilantes mobilize before high-stakes elections

Some say cow vigilantism has become a way for young men to use popularity built through taking on alleged cattle smugglers to catapult into politics.
After being whipsawed by false starts calling for the end of the Fed’s rate hiking regime, a Bloomberg gauge of the greenback is down nearly 3% since January in the steepest annual drop for the U.S. currency since 2020.
BUSINESS / Economy
Dec 29, 2023

U.S. dollar is set for worst year since 2020

The dollar’s fall stands in contrast to the pound, which is set for its best year since 2017.
A JFE Steel plant in the city of Chiba. JFE Steel plans to buy more coking coal on the spot market to increase the liquidity of the market and to reflect true demand and supply.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 29, 2023

Japan's JFE takes new tack to tame volatile coking coal prices

Japan's No.2 steelmaker plans to buy more coking coal from the spot market to boost activity and make prices more transparent.
Hideki Kuriyama, who guided Samurai Japan to the World Baseball Classic title in March, rings a bell during a ceremony marking the end of trading in 2023 at the Tokyo Stock Exchange on Friday.
BUSINESS / Markets
Dec 29, 2023

Japanese stocks post best yearly gain since Abenomics jolt

The benchmark Topix posted an annual return of 25%, and the 225-issue Nikkei average rallied 28%. That’s the best performance for both gauges since 2013.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida makes a toast with Indonesian President Joko Widodo at a Japan-ASEAN luncheon meeting at the Japan Business Federation in Tokyo on Dec. 18. Kishida’s chance of reelection in the LDP presidential race in September will largely depend on his administration’s response to the current funding scandal and its entanglement in it.
JAPAN / Politics
Dec 31, 2023

Scandal, economic policy and LDP race to weigh on Kishida in 2024

How he balances all three will determine whether he keeps his job as LDP party president and, by extension, prime minister.
The Bank of Japan's headquarters in Tokyo. In 2023, the dollar surged from around ¥130 at the start of the year to above ¥151.90 in mid-November as the gap between U.S. and Japanese interest rates widened on the back of the U.S. Federal Reserve's rapid rate hikes to curb inflation.
BUSINESS / Markets
Dec 30, 2023

Dollar could fall to around ¥130 in 2024, analysts say

Six of eight analysts predict that the lower end of the greenback's range against the yen next year will be between ¥130 and ¥135.
Tokyo's Ameyoko shopping district is crowded with shoppers on Saturday.
BUSINESS
Dec 31, 2023

Japan saw price hikes on over 30,000 food items in 2023

The figure marks a 25.7% rise from 2022, when prices went up for 25,768 food items.
Workers walk past an underconstruction area with completed office towers in the background in Shenzhen's Qianhai new district on Aug. 25, 2023.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jan 1, 2024

China's strained economy casts shadow over 2024

Last year, the economy was roiled by a real estate crisis, falling consumer confidence, deflation and the disappearance of foreign investment.
Tsai Ing-wen
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jan 1, 2024

Taiwan president urges China to maintain peace ahead of election

Tsai Ing Wen’s remarks come ahead of the presidential election on Jan. 13, that will also help shape the course of U.S.-China relations for years.
A Luckin Coffee store in Beijing on Dec. 8
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 2, 2024

China's new thirst for coffee spurs cutthroat cafe competition

Analysts expect China's growing thirst for coffee to be a key driver of future demand for the beans as coffee shops expand.
People's Liberation Army forces walk near the Sagaing Region in Myanmar on Nov. 23.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jan 2, 2024

Myanmar's 'watermelons': Soldier on the outside, rebel inside

Opposition groups say it is difficult to determine how many members of the security forces supplied information to the resistance, but they play a crucial role.
Paper pulp processed from used disposable diapers
JAPAN / Society
Jan 2, 2024

Graying Japan pushes to recycle disposable diapers to curb waste

The amount of diaper waste grew to 2.2 million tons in fiscal 2020. While efforts are being made to recycle them, high costs remain a hurdle.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida awaits the results of a no-confidence vote against his Cabinet in the country's parliament on Dec. 13.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 2, 2024

Unpacking the LDP's expected leadership race

LDP politicians are already talking about a leadership change, and the polls have shifted to who the public wants to see in the prime minister’s office.
Take any scientific issue that involves political choices, from public health to climate change, all sides claim to be basing their concerns on science.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 2, 2024

Let’s stop insulting each other as ‘anti-science’

Take any scientific issue that involves political choices, from public health to climate change, all sides claim to be basing their concerns in science.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the weekly cabinet meeting at the the Kirya military base in Tel Aviv on Sunday.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 3, 2024

Netanyahu boxed in by fierce pressure over war, politics and budget

Whether his government will survive 2024 is a renewed topic of debate that will now play out against the backdrop of war.
The Maersk Sentosa container ship sails southbound to exit the Suez Canal on Dec. 21.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 3, 2024

Maersk decides Red Sea too unsafe for its ships for now

The decision to reroute vessels from the vital trade corridor was made after another of its container ships came under attack from Houthi militants.

Longform

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