weekly
Welcome to the one hundred eighteenth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. We are going to be a bit policy- and white paper-heavy this week. From a macro perspective, we have included the government's "Grand Design and Action Plan for a New Form of Capitalism, 2025 Revised
regulation
The Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission (SESC) has submitted three recommendations for the strengthening of market surveillance functions to the Prime Minister and the Commissioner of the FSA: * Expanding insider trading regulations to cover more types of related parties * Strengthening administrative monetary penalties by increasing amounts and expanding scope to
carbon credit
Carbon credits are expected to play an important role in achieving carbon neutrality by 2050, including providing incentives for decarbonization efforts. With the full-scale operation of the emissions trading system starting from fiscal year 2026, further expansion and diversification of trading is anticipated. Under these circumstances, similar to other financial
weekly
Welcome to the - exceptionally late - one hundred seventeenth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. At the Monetary Policy Meeting held last week, the Policy Board of the Bank of Japan decided, by a unanimous vote, to set the following guideline for money market operations for the intermeeting period:
capital markets
SMBC Nikko Securities has published its "Corporate Earnings Outlook for 2025-2026," presenting a comprehensive analysis of the Japanese equity market, centered on the firm's proprietary NIKKO250 index, which covers approximately 75% of the total market capitalization of all listed Japanese companies. The outlook revises its forecast
weekly
Welcome to the one hundred sixteenth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. We are back, and so is the Bank of Japan, with their June Monetary Policy Meeting. While a change in the policy rate is not expected, the Bank will update its plan for JGB purchases starting in April
weekly
Welcome to the one hundred fifteenth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. Greetings from Lake Biwa! Our annual sake brewery tour & domestic holiday has us hovering around Japan's biggest lake, with our path leading us across Gifu, Shiga, Fukui, and Kyoto prefectures so far. We got to
weekly
Welcome to the one hundred fourteenth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. Never a dull moment in banking! Deal-making galore, and finally the cash on those balance sheets is put to productive use (rather than stock buy backs and increased dividends, i.e. financial engineering), with the aim of developing
blockchain
R3, which is represented in Japan through a joint venture with SBI Group, has entered into a strategic partnership with the Solana Foundation to create next-generation internet capital markets that fuse public and private blockchains. Read also: Progmat, in collaboration with NTT DATA and SBI R3 Japan, has launched both
weekly
Welcome to the one hundred thirteenth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. When I joined an investment bank in 2000, we had afternoon fruit baskets. These disappeared after the internet bubble burst, and even before 9/11 happened. A few years later, fruit baskets made a comeback, only to be
weekly
Welcome to the one hundred eleventh edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. For many, this was a three-day working week. For some, it was a four-day working weekend. Reading the announcements of Sony Bank's migration to a new core banking system reminded us of our own time in
weekly
Welcome to the one hundred tenth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. The decades-long (if not forever) pricing system for Japanese sake has been broken. It has not happened overnight, rather it has been a slow, post-pandemic process as far as I could tell, but by now most of the