


Business / Corporate Jan 14, 2022
Green push ending 150-year tradition of bank passbooks in Japan
by Takashi Umekawa
The country’s largest bank will soon require new clients to pay ¥550 a year for a passbook in a bid to encourage them to embrace digital services.

Business / Corporate Aug 20, 2021
Mizuho Bank’s fifth outage draws government criticism
by Taiga Uranaka and Yuki Hagiwara
All 460 Mizuho Bank branches nationwide were not able to process transactions for about an hour on Friday morning due to an IT hardware failure the previous night.

Business / Corporate Apr 6, 2021
Mizuho says Hitachi hardware behind March banking system failure
The spate of glitches between Feb. 28 and March 12 has undermined confidence in Mizuho Bank, one of the country's three megabanks.

Business / Corporate Mar 18, 2021
Mizuho scraps plan to replace banking arm head after system failures
Koji Fujiwara, president of Mizuho Bank, will stay on for the time being as the Japanese megabank works to get to the bottom of the issue.

Business / Corporate Mar 1, 2021
Japan's Mizuho Bank restores ATM services after card-eating glitch
The system failure began Sunday, and by around 8 p.m. some 3,000 of its 5,400 ATMs had stopped functioning and failed to return customers' cash cards.

National / Media | BIG IN JAPAN Feb 13, 2021
Japan juggles power struggles, hotel woes and what to do with repurposed ATM spaces
by Mark Schreiber
The unusually cold winter this year is putting a strain on power utilities nationwide.

Business / Corporate Nov 8, 2018
MUFG Bank and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking to share ATMs, seeking lower costs amid decline in users
Two mega-banks plan to share their respective ATMs, from the first half of next year at the earliest, to cut costs as users decrease due to the spread of online banking, sources close to the matter said Wednesday. Under the plan, users with accounts at ...

Business Apr 11, 2018
Industry ministry report urges Japan to shed custom of cash dependence
by Kazuaki Nagata
A report said more cashless payments could help ease the country’s labor shortage and benefit foreign tourists.

Business / Corporate Aug 21, 2017
In Japan's remote areas, banks may soon pay visits to customers with mobile ATM vans
An increasing number of regional banks in Japan are introducing automated teller machines mounted on vehicles to cater mainly to elderly people living in remote areas with no bank-run ATMs. Shimane Shinkin Bank in Shimane Prefecture plans to introduce an ATM van as early as ...

Business May 25, 2016
Criminals who stole millions of dollars from automatic teller machines across Japan in a three-hour spree probably chose the country because banks consider it a low fraud risk, security experts say. The gang used counterfeit Standard Bank credit cards to withdraw ¥1.4 billion in 14,000 ...
Business / Corporate Mar 24, 2015
Seven Bank to offer 12 languages at ATMs for overseas-issued cards
Seven Bank is set to triple the number of languages available at its ATMs for foreign issued cards, in a nod to the growing number of people visiting in Japan. The bank, a unit of major retailer Seven & I Holdings, said Tuesday that offering ...