Deregulation and the succeeding changes, such as forming group affiliation, demutualization, and new entry from foreign countries, are widespread and worldwide phenomenon in the life insurance industry. This study examines impacts of the deregulation and the succeeding changes on efficiency of...

The purpose of this study is to investigate regional differences in the business characteristics of Japanese agricultural cooperatives (JAs), which have been widely criticized for depending on non-agricultural activities, contradictory to cooperative principles. We construct a panel data set...

Since Japan’s recent financial liberalization, online securities transactions have grown rapidly and changes have been promoted in the industry’s structure. In this research, we investigated the differences in efficiency and scale economies between the types of securities firms (i.e.,...