Tag - life-insurance

 
 

LIFE INSURANCE

Tokyo-listed Dai-ichi Life has been aggressively expanding beyond traditional life insurance in Japan and focusing on asset management as one of its growth areas.
BUSINESS
May 30, 2025
Dai-ichi Life to buy $1.1 billion M&G stake in partnership
Tokyo-listed Dai-ichi Life has been aggressively expanding beyond traditional life insurance in Japan and focusing on asset management as one of its growth areas.
Japan’s biggest life insurers collectively lowered bullish yen wagers tied to their foreign investment holdings, a move that suggests they see a lower likelihood of the yen showing the kind of strength it did in the past.
BUSINESS / Markets
May 30, 2025
Japanese life insurers cut bullish yen hedges to 14-year low
Nine of Japan’s biggest life insurers collectively lowered bullish yen wagers tied to their foreign investment holdings to 44.4% at the end of March from 45.2% six months earlier.
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.
Yoshinobu Tsutsui (left), who is expected to become the new Keidanren chairman, speaks during a news conference in Tokyo on March 25, as the current chairman, Masakazu Tokura, looks on.
BUSINESS / FOCUS
May 23, 2025
Keidanren to install first leader from financial sector
The post of Keidanren chairman has traditionally been held by leaders from the manufacturing sector.
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.
As the global trade war intensifies, the debt, the main investment for Japan’s life insurers, has seen wild swings along with its U.S. counterparts.
BUSINESS / Companies
Apr 18, 2025
Major Japan life insurer to pile into domestic superlong bonds
Investment decisions by Japan’s life insurers can move global markets, and Fukoku Mutual Life Insurance will be the first among its major peers to report such plans.
A former Prudential Life Insurance employee was arrested in June last year on suspicion of fraud.
BUSINESS / Companies
Apr 11, 2025
Prudential Life ordered to report preventative measures after three arrests
Between June last year and February this year, three former employees were arrested over acts of misconduct that included defrauding customers.
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.
Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance will acquire Banner Life Insurance in the United States as it seeks to expand its business overseas amid sluggish domestic market.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 9, 2025
Meiji Yasuda to acquire U.S. peer Banner Life
Japanese life insurance companies are expanding overseas for growth as the domestic market shrinks.
Nippon Life Insurance will establish a new headquarters division in late March to manage its foreign businesses, and its overseas insurance and asset management departments will be absorbed into that organization, people familiar with the matter have said.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 27, 2025
Nippon Life to revamp overseas business operations after acquisitions
Japan’s biggest life insurer will establish a new headquarters division in late March to manage its foreign businesses, and absorb related departments into that organization.
Tokio Marine & Nichido Fire Insurance plans to raise its starting monthly salary for university graduates joining the nonlife insurer in April 2026 to as much as ¥410,000.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 12, 2025
Tokio Marine to raise starting pay to up to ¥410,000
The insurance firm aims to secure and retain human resources amid continuing labor shortages in Japan.
Dai-ichi Life Insurance sold about ¥500 billion of Japanese government notes, mainly 20- to 40-year bonds, in the fiscal first half that ended in September.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 6, 2025
Dai-ichi Life takes ¥140 billion loss selling off long bonds
The insurer sold about ¥500 billion of Japanese government notes, mainly 20- to 40-year bonds, in the fiscal first half ended September.
Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance headquarters in Tokyo
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 4, 2025
Meiji Yasuda girds to be more daring in global M&A hunt
The firm’s ambitions reflect bold moves also being made by many of its local rivals, all hunting for growth outside of the country.
Hiroshi Shimizu (left), president of Nippon Life Insurance, and Satoshi Asahi, vice president and future president, shake hands after a news conference Wednesday in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 23, 2024
Nippon Life’s $12 billion acquisition spree is just beginning
Having committed to pouring billions into a pair of global insurers, the firm is now turning to asset managers, as it seeks to diversify business at home and abroad.
Nippon Life Insurance, Japan’s largest insurer by assets, will buy $250 million worth of convertible notes and $300 million of preferred securities issued by TCW Group.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 12, 2024
Nippon Life ramps up global push with $550 million TCW deal
The announcement comes just a day after Nippon Life agreed to buy Bermuda-based Resolution Life Group Holdings for about $8.2 billion.
The $8.2 billion deal is the largest overseas acquisition by a Japanese insurer to date and the second major transaction announced by Nippon Life this year.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 11, 2024
Nippon Life to buy Resolution in $8.2 billion deal as it pursues U.S. growth
The deal is the largest overseas acquisition by a Japanese insurer to date and the second major transaction announced by Nippon Life this year.
Founded in 1879, Tokio Marine was Japan's first nonlife insurance company and it has since expanded into life insurance and now has a presence in 46 countries besides Japan.
BUSINESS
Oct 18, 2024
Tokio Marine pauses sale of Southeast Asia life insurance business, sources say
The delay appears to be due to the firm's dispute with a Malaysian partner.
At least 10 firms have temporarily suspended some business activities with Nomura because of its market manipulation scandal.
BUSINESS / Companies
Oct 18, 2024
Big clients halt trades with Nomura over market manipulation scandal
At least 10 firms have temporarily suspended some business activities with Japan's biggest brokerage because of the breach.

Longform

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How Japan's youth are slowly changing the country's work ethic