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2556 11
2012-05-26
Lending a hand-Japan’s biggest banks help pick up the slack from retreating Europeans




THERE are two, potentially overlapping, ways in which Asia’s export-driven economies could suffer from the euro crisis. One is from the slowdown in trade to Europe. The other is the drying up of finance, from trade credit to syndicated loans, extended by euro-zone banks. On neither score is Asia as vulnerable as it was after the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008, argued Iwan Azis of the Asian Development Bank, at The Economist’s Bellwether conference in Tokyo on May 16th. One of the reasons is that Japan’s mega-banks have lumbered off their home territory to pick up some of the slack left by the departing Europeans (see chart).

This is good news not just for Asia’s exporters. It also shows a rare stroke of boldness by Japan’s big three, Mitsubishi UFJ Group (MUFG), Sumitomo Mitsui, and Mizuho. After pulling back from lending to Asia following the 1998 financial crisis, and then suffering more than a decade of deleveraging by their deflation-sapped customers at home, they can almost smell the predicament of their European peers. Ken Takamiya of Nomura Securities says that in Australia, for instance, the mega-banks’ lending has recently overtaken that of BNP Paribas and Société Générale, two retreating French banks. It is the same story elsewhere in Asia, he thinks.

Some of the banks trumpeted their ability to buy discarded European assets abroad, as well as making fresh loans in Asia, when they released reports on May 15th showing a sharp increase in profits last fiscal year. These profits largely reflected the sale of big helpings of Japanese government bonds, but foreign activities help. Mr Takamiya says returns on overseas assets at MUFG’s biggest bank generate about 2.5%, versus less than 1.5% at home.

There are, however, some impediments to growing further in Asia, and especially to catching up with Western competitors such as HSBC and Citigroup. Firstly, although the mega-banks have huge deposits—MUFG has the second-biggest stash in the world—they lack matching-currency funding to make non-yen loans, and are thinking only gingerly about spreading branch networks across Asia, analysts say.

Secondly, their ambitions to be more innovative are modest for now. Rival bankers snort that Japan’s lending is “pure balance-sheet”, meaning they make large syndicated and project-finance loans that are often long-term and low-margin. They lack the more sophisticated and lucrative cash-management, foreign-exchange and other services of Western peers.

Business at home is so lacklustre, however, that they may have little choice but to place bigger bets abroad. And even if prospects for growth in Japan did improve—GDP rose by 1% in the first quarter, beating expectations—the banks would still benefit from diversifying. So exposed are they to Japanese government bonds that Masaaki Shirakawa, the governor of the Bank of Japan, has said the big banks could suffer losses of up to ¥3.5 trillion ($43.5 billion) if yields rose by an admittedly lofty one percentage point. That would more than wipe out their combined profit last year.


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2012-5-26 23:12:44
学习了
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2012-5-27 07:56:04
I heard that one foreign bank recruited new employees with the advertisement that the one should deposit more than 1million yuan RMB into this bank first. And it is said that some Chinese banks have newly set up affiliates or subsidiaries in USA and Canada. In the world top 500 enterprises, Chinese banks  occupy some high ranks in the list. How about their operation performance in the world market?
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2012-5-27 10:16:42
      The latest news :according to Japanese media reports, the bank of Japan in May 2012 22 to 23, convened the financial policy resolution , and mainly discussed economic situation and future predictions . Although they fear  the relapse of European unstable credit 、the yen appreciation and constantly share price falling, but affected the influence of the revival demand of the earthquake  , Japan's domestic economy recover gradually, the bank of Japan finally decided to maintain the current financial policies .
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2012-5-27 11:52:57
Business at home is so lacklustre, however, that they may have little choice but to place bigger bets abroad.  

soga!
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2012-5-27 13:28:42
It is risky, but sometimes fruitful for making a risk.
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