Top banks all post steep losses
Saturday 16th May, 06:25 AM JST
TOKYO —

Top Japanese banks tumbled to steep annual losses, hit by bad loans and plunging share prices, but said Friday that they expect to turn a profit this fiscal year. Mizuho Financial Group Inc, Japan’s second-largest bank, posted a group net loss of 588.8 billion yen for the fiscal year ended March, swinging from a 311.2 billion yen profit a year earlier. It was Mizuho’s first annual loss in six years.Mizuho’s smaller rival Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc, or SMFG, reported a net loss of 373.5 billion yen, down from 461.5 billion yen profit in the previous year. Japan’s major banks managed to weather the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis with far smaller losses than their Western counterparts, but they are now facing the painful impact of of the global recession.

　

EFOP: Japan’s governmental policy of pinning the Yen to the US dollar to keep exports at a competitive level while at the same time maintain profitability for Japanese businesses is taking beating due to the huge drop in it’s export markets as well as trying maintain the Yen parallel path with the increasing speed of the devaluation of the US dollar.




Panasonic reports Y378.96 bil loss

Saturday 16th May, 05:04 AM JST
TOKYO —

Panasonic Corp sank deep into the red last fiscal year, joining a growing list of Japanese electronics makers who have fallen victim to a stronger yen and an unprecedented slump in global demand.The Osaka-based company Friday reported a 378.96 billion yen loss for the fiscal year ended March—its first loss in seven years—and expects to stay in the red in the current fiscal year. Business slumped across all segments amid lackluster demand for everything from flat-screen TVs and digital cameras to home appliances and semiconductors.

Sales were down 14.4% to 7.77 trillion yen, and operating profit tumbled 86% to 72.9 billion yen. The result represents a major reversal of fortune for Panasonic, which just last year posted a record net profit of 281.9 billion yen.