author

 
Menu
Search
 
September 19, 2025
 

Today's print edition

Home Delivery
Subscribe for more access

Meta

Nao Sano
The Government Pension Investment Fund is picking alternative asset funds in Japan on its own, in a shift from its previous practice of entrusting asset managers to choose on its behalf.
BUSINESS / Companies
Sep 17, 2025
GPIF bets on property and infrastructure in Japan, in alternative asset first
Pension funds around the world are seeking extra yields from alternative assets like private equity and real estate, but the yields reflect elevated risks in other areas.
Hiroshi Okada of the Financial Services Agency
BUSINESS / Companies
Sep 3, 2025
FSA urges rural banks to help companies get equity funding
The FSA is working to draw up a package of policy measures to expand regional banks’ roles in supporting economies hit by adverse demographic shifts.
Stefanie Drews, CEO of Amova Asset Management, speaks at an event in Tokyo on Monday.
BUSINESS / Companies
Sep 2, 2025
‘Nikko’ cut from new name of $260 billion Japanese fund manager
Nikko Asset Management is changing its name to Amova Asset Management.
Kazuto Uchida, president of the Government Pension Investment Fund, speaks during an interview in Tokyo on July 23.
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 12, 2025
Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund is hiring amid ballooning assets
GPIF has an unusually small headcount despite being one of the world’s largest retirement funds.
Brett Clark, Dai-ichi Life Holdings' senior managing executive officer in charge of the Asia-Pacific region
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 1, 2025
Japan’s Dai-ichi Life eyes M&A in Southeast Asia for growth
Japan’s biggest listed life insurer is looking at the Philippines and Malaysia as emerging markets that offer business opportunities as more households ascend to middle class.
Government Pension Investment Fund President Kazuto Uchida says there is no need to change the fund's portfolio even after a trade deal was reached between Japan and the United States.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jul 25, 2025
Japan’s top pension fund keeps strategy amid volatility
As it seeks to ride out the turmoil, the Government Pension Investment Fund aims to enhance portfolio rebalancing with futures and analyze correlations between different assets.
The Government Pension Investment Fund suffered a loss in the January-March quarter as a global trade war due to higher U.S. tariffs hurt equities and the outlook for interest-rate cuts dragged down the dollar against the yen.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 4, 2025
GPIF logs $61 billion loss as weak dollar hits overseas assets
The pension fund incurred losses on all four of its asset classes in the January-March period, the first time this has occurred since July-September 2022.
Tokio Marine has made a string of big acquisitions in the U.S. in recent years to make up for limited growth prospects at home.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 24, 2025
Tokio Marine hunts for deals abroad and sees room for growth in U.S.
The insurer has the capacity for more deals overseas after generating record profits by selling shareholdings worth tens of billions of dollars.
Japanese pension funds are moving to appoint chief investment officers with expertise to improve risk management and help make more effective market deals.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 10, 2025
Japanese pension funds holding $400 billion hire their first CIOs
Until recently, senior administrators often with limited experience doing deals in financial markets were responsible for making investment decisions.
New buyers are entering the market for Japanese government bonds and amplifying volatility, said Dai-ichi Life CEO Tetsuya Kikuta in an interview.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 27, 2025
Dai-Ichi Life sees falling volatility in JGB market
New buyers are entering the market for Japanese government bonds and amplifying volatility, Chief Executive Officer Tetsuya Kikuta said in an interview.
The Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance headquarters in Tokyo. Paper losses on Japanese bonds held by the company expanded to about ¥1.386 trillion ($9.7 billion) in the year ended March, compared with ¥161.4 billion a year earlier.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 26, 2025
Japan's biggest life insurers post $60 billion in unrealized bond losses
The paper losses on their domestic bond holdings in the last fiscal year underscore the risks they face as interest rates climb.
Nippon Life Insurance will stop the practice of temporarily sending employees to work in sales departments of other companies, such as banks, judging that the arrangements may distort fair competition.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 16, 2025
Nippon Life to stop sending staff to sales departments at banks
Critics have said the practice has led to misconduct, in addition to reducing competition.
Nippon Life Insurance is diversifying its investments to enhance yields, although it’s a tricky time to invest with U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war fueling global market volatility.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 14, 2025
Japan’s biggest insurer weighs riskier overseas CLO investments
Japan’s biggest life insurer is considering taking on a little more risk with its investments in collateralized loan obligations (CLOs), as it looks for ways to eke out better returns abroad.
MUFG Bank, a unit of the nation’s biggest banking group, is among firms that recently scrapped a clerical job category that consisted almost exclusively of women, a sign that the financial sector is finally getting more serious about reducing gender inequalities.
BUSINESS / Companies
Apr 23, 2025
Top Japanese firms scrap employment system that held women back
Abandoning the clerical job category may increase opportunities for women to advance to more senior positions.
MS&AD forecasts that net profit for its North American operations will reach ¥166 billion in the fiscal year ended in March, a 3.5fold increase from the previous fiscal year.
BUSINESS
Apr 22, 2025
Insurer MS&AD plans to invest $5 billion to double U.S. profits
The Tokyo-based casualty insurer has the highest market share in Asia among global firms, but it’s No. 3 among Japanese peers in North America.
The Government Pension Investment Fund will have Kazuto Uchida, a former Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group economist, as its new head on April 1.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 25, 2025
Japan names former MUFG economist to lead huge pension fund
Bond market veteran Kazuto Uchida will take over from current President Masataka Miyazono on April 1 for a five-year term to manage one of the world’s largest pension funds.
"It is an expanding field. We need more people,” said Kaoru Onishi, head of the global product division at Nissay Asset Management.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 6, 2025
Nissay Asset ramps up hiring as alternative investment booms
Japanese asset managers are trying to boost returns at a time when policymakers are encouraging households to shift their savings to investments.
Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group has decided to withdraw from the Net-Zero Banking Alliance, a spokesperson said.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 4, 2025
Japan’s SMFG joins Wall Street in exiting net zero banking group
Japan’s second-largest bank has decided to withdraw from the Net-Zero Banking Alliance.
In recent years, Japanese life insurers have increasingly entered contracts in which assets underwritten by reinsurance companies are invested to obtain higher returns.
BUSINESS
Mar 3, 2025
Japan’s FSA said to examine life insurers’ reinsurance risks
The Financial Services Agency is asking life insurers about the scale of the practice and the type of contracts they have in place.
Tokio Marine Holdings and other large non-life insurers are facing pressure to sell cross-held shares to improve their governance.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 17, 2025
Japan insurers sell $11 billion cross-held shares ahead of plans
The insurers are facing pressure to improve their governance after regulators fined them for coordinating adjustments in insurance fees in advance for companies.
Wealthy foreign nationals picking up ultimate souvenir — a condo in Tokyo
A high-end property in the fashionable Daikanyama district in Tokyo
Japan dispatches five language education 'partners' to India
Five members of the Japan Foundation's Nihongo Partners program (front) gather at the Japanese Embassy in New Delhi on Monday.
Struggling train firm in Chiba Prefecture turns to self-deprecating humor
"Laughter is important when you're in a difficult situation," said Katsunori Takemoto, president of Choshi Electric Railway, on Aug. 5 in Choshi, Chiba Prefecture.
Over 90% of low-income families in Japan struggling to feed children
Save the Children Japan domestic program chief Sonoko Kawakami speaks at a news conference in Tokyo in July. A survey conducted by the group in June has found that over 90% of low-income households with children face food insecurity.
Japan's elderly population down at around 36.2 million
The estimated number of people age 65 or older in Japan stands at 36.19 million as of Monday, accounting for record 29.4% of the country's total population, according to the internal affairs ministry.
Japan’s front-line researchers see bright path ahead for dementia treatment
A scientist looks at scans of grains at the Memory Centre at the Department of Readaptation and Geriatrics of the University Hospital (HUG) in Geneva, Switzerland, on June 6, 2023.
Still plenty to fight for, says Japan’s team leader at worlds
Race walker Hayato Katsuki earned bronze for Japan on the opening day of the World Athletics Championships on Saturday.
Wealthy foreign nationals picking up ultimate souvenir — a condo in Tokyo
A high-end property in the fashionable Daikanyama district in Tokyo
Japanese athletes inspired by raucous home fans at World Athletics Championships
Fans cheer on the home favorites during the women's marathon at the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo on Sunday.
Japan's major art events converge this fall
Shinji Ohmaki’s “Tokinokage” exhibited at Fuji Textile Week 2021 shows the use of fabric as art.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Sumadori Bar on Shibuya Ward's main Center Gai street targets young customers who prefer low-alcohol drinks or abstain altogether.
Rethinking that second drink: Japan’s Gen Z gets ‘sober curious’
By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

We are pleased to announce the winners of the 6th annual Sustainable Japan Award.
We are pleased to announce the winners of the 6th annual Sustainable Japan Award.

SPECIAL SUPPLEMENTS note

Read more

SUPPLEMENTS BINDER