Insurance
Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Company has expanded its strategic partnership with UK-based asset manager Man Group, agreeing to allocate ¥200 billion ($1.27 billion) in investments and mandates over the next three years and outlining plans to acquire an equity stake of approximately 5% in the firm. The agreement,
Weekly
Welcome to the one hundred eighty-seventh edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. The Reserve Bank of New Zealand, the Bank of Canada, and the Federal Reserve Board will make policy rate decisions on Wednesday this week, followed by the European Central Bank on Thursday, and the Bank of Japan
Insurance
Daiichi Life Group is facing pressure to raise its takeover bid for Challenger after the Australian annuities specialist declined an initial AU$11.80-per-share approach today. The Tokyo-based insurer first lobbed its non-binding proposal a week earlier on October 19 through its wholly owned subsidiary, TAL
Insurance
Sompo Indonesia has commenced operations for PT Sompo Insurance Sharia ("Sompo Syariah"), establishing a standalone general Sharia insurer in compliance with Indonesia's Financial Services Authority (OJK) regulations. The new entity formalizes and scales the group's Islamic finance activities in the country, where Sompo Indonesia
Weekly
Welcome to the one hundred eighty-sixth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. The AI infrastructure boom juices Korea's GDP per capita. The IMF's October World Economic Outlook database puts Korea's GDP per capita at USD 43,512 this year, up 19.5 percent
Weekly
Welcome to the one hundred eighty-fifth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. The past week was dominated by discussions around various forms of debt financing. First, questions raised by members of the Google for Startups community during a lunch session were mostly geared towards this domain. Second, one out
Insurance
In an unprecedented regulatory crackdown on a major foreign-backed insurance group, Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) issued severe administrative penalties today, October 9, 2026, against Prudential Life Insurance, The Gibraltar Life Insurance, and their parent holding company, Prudential Holdings of Japan. The financial regulator has imposed a months-
Weekly
Welcome to the one hundred eighty-fourth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. A few funny encounters on the money/pricing front: * Musashino City kindly provided us another annual allocation of helicopter money, which really does not make any sense from a social equality perspective; the money has to be
Insurance
On October 1, 2026, the Financial Services Agency (FSA) convened the inaugural meeting of the Insurance System Working Group under the Financial System Council. This landmark regulatory initiative marks a decisive step in Japan’s national strategy to fortify corporate resilience, unlock growth capital, and modernize the domestic financial sector.
Weekly
Welcome to the one hundred eighty-third edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. The new rainy season: as of Tuesday morning, September 29, central Tokyo has received 34 consecutive days of rain… breaking the previous official record of 33 days (June 2019); looks like the streak extended to 35 consecutive
Insurance
Sumitomo Life Insurance Company has joined forces with IRRC Corporation and Finatext to jointly develop an AI-powered digital support platform designed for multi-brand insurance agencies. Billed as an industry first, the solution aims to streamline compliance, enhance sales quality, and support agency autonomy in response to recent regulatory
Weekly
Welcome to the one hundred eighty-second edition of the Japan FinTech Observer. Post the Bank of Japan's Monetary Policy Meeting last week, we are in the middle of a five-day weekend, a typhoon passing through, and a continued cost-of-living crisis - despite rice prices coming