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MUFG's Profit Jumps 36% While Kakaku.com's Buyout Clock Ticks Down
MUFG banked ¥1.73tn in profit this year, up 36.5%, while Kakaku.com's owners race toward a July 16 buyout deadline and a regional bank absorbs an ¥8bn hole from one bankrupt client.
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lead
MUFG's Profit Surge
MUFG's US GAAP Profit Jumps 36% to ¥1.73tn
Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group booked net income attributable to shareholders of ¥1.73tn for the year to March 2026, up 36.5% from ¥1.27tn the previous year, according to the group's earnings release under US accounting rules. Japan's largest bank grew profit nearly four times faster than revenue, which rose 9.5% to ¥11.87tn from ¥10.84tn, and income before income taxes climbed to ¥2.51tn from ¥1.80tn.
Why it matters: A profit jump this size at Japan's biggest banking group tracks how much fatter net interest margins have become as the Bank of Japan lifts rates off a decade of near-zero policy. MUFG's numbers are usually the marker the rest of the megabank sector gets measured against when its peers report their own year-end results.
The catch: Non-interest expense grew 12.3% to ¥4.20tn from ¥3.74tn, faster than revenue growth. Profit still surged because income before taxes outran both lines, but a cost base growing faster than revenue is the item to watch if the rate tailwind eases. Earnings per share came to ¥151.74.
secondary
Briefs
Nomura's Kakaku.com Stake Slips Below 5% as ¥3,000 Buyout Clock Runs to July 16
Nomura Securities and its joint holders, Nomura International and Nomura Asset Management, filed an amended large shareholding report on Kakaku.com showing their combined stake fell to 4.29% of the price-comparison group's shares as of June 30, down from 5.72% previously. The drop, to 8,508,876 shares out of 198,218,300 outstanding, took the group below the 5% line where Japan's disclosure rules require ongoing reporting.
Why it matters: The filing lands as Kakaku.com's ¥3,000-a-share take-private tender offer runs toward its July 16 deadline. A separate filing the same day showed major shareholders Digital Garage and KDDI plan to sit out the tender rather than sell directly into it, cashing out afterward instead through a separate arrangement with the buyout group.
What to watch: Whether the tender clears by July 16 and what becomes of Digital Garage and KDDI's positions once the deal closes.
Towa Bank Faces ¥8bn Exposure After Client's Bankruptcy Filing
Towa Bank told the Tokyo Stock Exchange that a client, Zentoshin Co., a credit-card payment agency and cash-advance service provider, filed for bankruptcy at the Osaka District Court on July 6, with proceedings opening the same day. The bank has ¥8bn in loans outstanding to Zentoshin, equal to 8.83% of Towa Bank's consolidated net assets as of March 2026.
The number: ¥5.89bn of that exposure is due for full provisioning within the current year, a meaningful hit for a regional lender of Towa Bank's size. The single-client concentration is the bigger structural flag: one bankruptcy has become a balance-sheet event large enough to require disclosure to the exchange.
Oricon Founder's Holding Company Skips Tender Offer, Founder Tenders His Own Shares Separately
Littlepond, the asset-management vehicle holding Oricon founder Koh Koike's family stock, will not tender its 31.16% stake into the pending buyout of the Tokyo-listed ratings group. An amended large shareholding report filed with the Kanto Local Finance Bureau on July 7 shows Littlepond instead plans to convert deferred buyback proceeds into equity of the acquirer's parent company once the deal closes, while Koike tenders his own, smaller personal holding in full.
Why it matters: The structure lets Oricon's founder keep an economic stake in the business through the acquirer's parent rather than cashing out entirely, a common way founders retain influence after a take-private deal even as their operating company changes hands.
quick hits
Quick Hits
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