Enjoy Rendering!: Сборник текстов для перевода и реферирования. Батурина С.А. - 34 стр.

                      Japanese Banks Rising                                         Despite all this, there are good reasons for caution. Jason Rogers,
                                                                             of Barclays Capital in Tokyo, gives warning that Japan's banks have
      Tokyo                                                                  merely moved back from near crisis a year ago to a more even keel.
      But not resurrected
                                                                             Their operating environment remains weak. Land prices are still falling
       Not for the first time, the message from the stockmarket looks        and bankruptcies are still high. Arguably, says Mr Rogers, the health of
clear. Japan's sickly banks are at last on the mend. The price of shares     the small and medium-sized businesses that make up 70 % of banks'
in Mizuho, the biggest, jumped by a third in two weeks, and is now           corporate loans is continuing to deteriorate. Hironari Nozaki of HSBC
five times its record low, set in April. The next three – Sumitomo Mit-      Securities points out that loan demand remains weak, banks are charg-
sui Financial Group (SMFG), Mitsubishi Tokyo Financial Group                 ing too little interest, given the risk, and banks' fee-based businesses
(MTFG) and UFJ-have enjoyed similar leaps. Even Resona, the num-             are barely growing.
ber five, which received ¥2 trillion ($17 billion) from the government              Although bad loans are being disposed of more speedily, their
in May (and still thinks it lost ¥1 trillion or more in the six months to    quantity remains enormous. What is more, much of the recent reduc-
September 3oth), has seen its share price triple since the bail-out.         tion in bad debts is accounted for by the forgiving of some loans to big,
       Resona's rescue, which cost shareholders nothing, signalled that      "zombie" firms. Instead of removing the living dead from their books,
the government would not let any top banks (or big borrowers) col-           banks continue to support them with credit lines or fresh loans, which
lapse. It sparked a general stock-market rally, helped along by evidence     analysts think will probably turn sour in a couple of years. The fact that
of economic recovery in Japan, though it was no surprise that banks          Resona's new management seems to have discovered another ¥1 trillion
thought too big to fail proved especially popular. First, foreign institu-   or so of bad loans since May is one sign that Japanese banks' difficul-
tions bought; then locals switched from bonds to equities. Investors         ties are far from over.
who were late to the rally seem to have given bank shares an extra fil-
lip, buying them because their ups and downs amplify those of the
economy. As the yen has climbed recently, bank snares have done well
again, as investors have turned away from exporters and towards do-
mestic stocks, such as banks and retailers.
       In addition, banks have been making rosy profit forecasts for the
half-year ending on September 30th. MTFG has almost quadrupled its
net profit forecast, to ¥270 billion. On October 6th, Mizuho raised its
estimate from ¥100 billion to ¥230 billion. Two days later, SMFG re-
vised its forecast from ¥80 billion to ¥130 billion. UFJ is expected to
follow suit.
       Banks made big profits by selling bonds in the spring. Now that
the stock-market has risen, they can count unrealised share-price gains
too. Their profits also include one-off tax refunds from the Tokyo city
government. MTFG and Mizuho say that the mild economic upturn
seems to have helped stem the flow of bad loans. MTFG has even cut
its general reserves against loans to weak borrowers, on the assumption
that the improving economy will have helped their finances.

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