This paper analyzes commodity investment trusts and commodity ETFs as a method for investing in commodities, which are expected to be an important tool for individual investors to participate in commodity investments. The "Financial Big Bang" reforms during the latter half of the 1990s...

The large weight of public financial institutions is often identified as one of the characteristics of the Japanese financial system. It is believed that reform of the private financial sector is not enough to revitalize the Japanese financial system, but reform of the public financial sector is...

The Japanese "main bank" relationship, under which a bank holds equity in a firm and plays a leading role in its decision-making and financing, may leave a firm dependent on its main bank for financing due its information advantage over other potential lenders. While alternative sources of...

In the fall of 1998, two important financial regulatory reform acts were passed in Japan. The first of these acts, the Financial Recovery Act, created a bridge bank scheme and provided funds for the resolution of failed banks. The second act, the Rapid Revitalization Act, provided funds for the...

Since 2003, the Financial Services Agency (FSA) has set relationship banking enhancement program as an important strategic task to improve the functions of regional financial institutions. In this enhancement program, the FSA recommended that regional financial institutions introduce new...

The letter discusses the contagion effect of the first bank liquidation in Japan. Performing the traditional t-test and Corrado's non-parametric rank test, it is found that the effects of the liquidation were concentrated only on banks that resembled the failing bank.

The Yen-Dollar Agreement between the United States and Japan in 1984 was an epoch-making event in Japanese financial history. In spite of the importance of the Yen-Dollar Agreement for Japanese financial liberalization, there are few empirical studies about its effects. In this paper, we...