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Kakaku.com's Bidders Raise the Stakes to ¥3,570
A takeover fight for Japan's price-comparison giant just got pricier, department stores are splitting shares on record profits, and Bitcoin's mark-to-market math finally caught up with one aggressive treasury bet.
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Market pulse
Tokyo equities advanced while the 10Y JGB yield nudged higher.
Sourced from Nikkei, JPX, BOJ, MOF - values, not commentary.
lead
EQT Sweetens Its Kakaku.com Bid Again
EQT-Backed Bidder Raises Kakaku.com Tender Offer to ¥3,570, Pushes Deadline to August 27
Kamgras 1 K.K., the vehicle pursuing full control of Kakaku.com (TSE Prime: 2371), lifted its tender offer price to ¥3,570 a share from ¥3,450 in an amendment filed August 13, and pushed the offer deadline out to August 27. The revised terms also delay the start of settlement to September 3, nine days later than the date fixed under the previous offer conditions.
What changed: The August 13 filing raises the per-share price and extends both the offer window and the settlement timetable for a tender that opened on May 13.
Why it matters: Kakaku.com is a contested target. Bain Capital and LINE Yahoo put forward a rival proposal for the company on July 29, and Kamgras 1's higher price is a direct answer aimed at keeping its cash offer the more attractive option for shareholders now weighing two competing paths to an exit.
What to watch: The tender closes August 27 and settlement is due to begin September 3. Whether Kamgras 1's latest price holds as final, or draws a further response from the rival camp, will determine how this contest for a major Japanese internet property ends.
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Retail and Dining: Record Numbers, Bigger Bills
Isetan Mitsukoshi Splits Stock and Raises Profit Guidance After a Record Quarter
Isetan Mitsukoshi posted its best first quarter on record and used the moment for more than a victory lap: a two-for-one stock split, a doubled share-buyback ceiling, and dividend guidance that works out to a real, if disguised, ¥10 rise once adjusted for the split. Management also lifted full-year operating profit guidance to ¥84.0bn on sustained inbound-tourist spending at its flagship stores.
Why it matters: The capital-return package landed alongside record results, not as a consolation prize for a soft quarter.
Skylark Raises Profit Guidance as Diners Keep Spending Despite Pricier Menus
Skylark Holdings raised its full-year profit forecast on August 13, now guiding to ¥20.5bn in annual profit, up ¥1.0bn from February's guidance, after existing-store sales grew 6.5% in the first half on higher customer counts and bigger average checks.
What changed: Diners kept eating out and spending more per visit even as the family-restaurant operator raised its inflation-cost estimate to ¥14.5bn from ¥13.0bn.
Why it matters: The guidance increase shows Skylark's pricing power is outrunning its own higher-than-planned ingredient costs, at least for now.
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Pharma's Big Swing
Taiho's Zipalertinib Clears Key Lung Cancer Trial Hurdle, Setting Up FDA Push
Taiho Pharmaceutical, the wholly owned Otsuka Holdings subsidiary, said its experimental lung cancer drug zipalertinib hit the primary endpoint of progression-free survival in a global Phase III trial testing the drug in combination with chemotherapy for non-small-cell lung cancer patients with EGFR exon 20 insertion mutations.
What changed: An independent data monitoring committee recommended unblinding the 285-patient study after the results came in, with the company calling the improvement both statistically significant and clinically meaningful, with manageable safety in the combination arm.
Why it matters: A first-line approval bid for a mutation with few existing treatment options would give Otsuka a new growth driver and open a path to a US regulatory push.
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Bitcoin's Balance-Sheet Hangover
Metaplanet's Operating Profit Doubles, But a ¥184.3bn Bitcoin Writedown Wipes It Out
Metaplanet's first-half revenue rose 133.7% year-on-year to ¥4.94bn, and operating profit climbed 136.3% to ¥3.33bn, growth the company attributes mainly to option premium income from its bitcoin derivatives trading. A ¥184.3bn non-cash writedown on its 43,000 BTC holding then pushed the company to a ¥182.8bn net loss for the half.
What changed: Operating results improved sharply even as bitcoin's mark-to-market swing wiped out the gain, and more, at the net-income line.
Why it matters: Metaplanet also closed its acquisition of Siiibo Securities, now renamed Metaplanet Securities, to issue corporate bonds under a program called BitBonds, extending its bitcoin-treasury strategy into debt-capital markets.
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Governance Watch
Sun* Pushes Back Half-Year Filing After Finding Unrecorded Cash at Vietnam Unit
Sun* asked the Kanto Local Finance Bureau to push its half-year filing deadline back a month, to September 14, after a cash inspection at its Vietnam subsidiary turned up cash that had not been recorded in the accounting books. The company's external auditor says it needs additional interim review procedures before signing off on the original schedule.
Why it matters: An unrecorded-cash finding, not a paperwork backlog, is now setting the timeline for a Tokyo-listed digital product studio's financial statements.
Showa Holdings Won't File First-Quarter Earnings Before Its August 25 Delisting
Showa Holdings will not file first-quarter results before its stock is delisted from the Tokyo Stock Exchange on August 25. A court-appointed administrator took over the rubber-products holding company after creditor J Trust Asia filed a reorganization petition, and the company says the accounting and audit work involved leaves no realistic path to filing on the standard 45-day deadline.
The catch: Shareholders and creditors will not see a first-quarter earnings report before the stock disappears from the exchange entirely.
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Ownership Moves
Oasis Management's AEON Financial Service Stake Crosses 10%
Oasis Management's voting stake in AEON Financial Service rose to 10.81% from 9.80% between May and August, according to a major-shareholder change notice the Tokyo-listed lender filed on August 13. The Cayman Islands fund's holding climbed to 233,243 votes, equal to 23,324,348 shares, from 211,360 votes three months earlier.
What to watch: The filing discloses the increase with no stated plan attached.
Atom Investment Cuts Rigaku Holdings Stake to 0.29% After Selling 27% Block to Onto Innovation
Atom Investment, L.P. cut its stake in Rigaku Holdings to 0.29% from 27.28%, according to a fifth amended large shareholding report filed with the Kanto Local Finance Bureau on August 13. The reduction followed a privately negotiated share transfer completed August 12 that sent roughly 27 percentage points of Rigaku equity to Onto Innovation Inc.
What changed: A near-total exit by a fund that had held more than a quarter of the company reshapes Rigaku's ownership base around a strategic industry buyer.
Why it matters: Onto Innovation, a US semiconductor equipment vendor, now holds a substantial block in the Tokyo-listed instrument maker, a link investors will watch for signs of closer commercial ties.
quick hits
Quick Hits
Tokio Marine Hits the Yen Ceiling on Its March Buyback, With a Second Pot Still Untouched
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AI Memory Boom More Than Doubles Half-Year Profit at Probe-Card Maker Micronics Japan
Read moreHalf-year net profit at the Tokyo-listed test-equipment maker jumped 140% to ¥11.5bn as memory makers redirected production capacity toward high-bandwidth chips, even as a smaller test-socket unit's losses nearly tripled.
Rokko Butter Cuts Full-Year Profit Forecast by a Third on Costs, Weak Yen and Kumamoto Quake
Read moreRokko Butter cut its full-year operating-profit forecast by ¥800mn, 34.8% below February's guidance, after ingredient-cost inflation in its cheese and nut lines, a weaker yen and earthquake damage at a subsidiary factory outran the price increases it has planned from September.
Oisix Profit Jumps 24% as Its Catering Arm Offsets a Sales Slide
Read moreOisix's B2B foodservice unit, built on the SHiDAX consolidation completed in September 2025, pushed first-quarter operating profit up 24% even as revenue fell 8.6% on a divested vehicle business. A separate, reorganization-driven tax cut, not the profit gain, funded the dividend increase management confirmed alongside results.
RS Technologies Posts Record Half-Year Profit, Then Buys Into China's Epitaxial Wafer Market
Read moreRS Technologies grew six-month operating profit 8.9% to ¥7.7bn, then days later had its China unit pay about ¥10.8bn for 60% of an Anhui epitaxial-wafer maker, a bet on higher-value power-chip materials that full-year guidance does not yet capture.
Tri Pointe Deal Lifts Sumitomo Forestry's Sales, Not Its Profit
Read moreConsolidating US homebuilder Tri Pointe Homes lifted Sumitomo Forestry's half-year sales 17.5% to ¥1.26tn, but high American mortgage rates, buyer incentives and acquisition costs nearly halved net profit and pushed the equity ratio down to 30.5%.
Trial's Full Takeover of Seiyu Pushes Sales Past ¥1.3tn, Sinks Profit
Read moreTRIAL Holdings' full takeover of Seiyu drove group sales past ¥1.3tn in the year to June 2026, but ¥6.7bn of loan fees, ¥4.3bn of interest and ¥15.3bn of goodwill amortisation cut net profit to ¥3.5bn, a 70% drop; management is guiding for net profit to more than triple next year as integration synergies land.
Medley's Profit More Than Doubles as It Borrows ¥5bn and Absorbs Recruit's Medical Staffing Business
Read moreMedley's first-half net profit rose 131% to ¥1.5bn on hiring-platform growth, and the healthcare-jobs company also borrowed ¥5bn from two banks and took full ownership of the business behind Recruit Medical Career weeks after the half closed.
UNIRITA Buys Back ¥1.07bn of Stock in an Off-Market Trade, Closing Out Its Buyback Plan
Read moreUNIRITA acquired 531,400 shares for ¥1.07bn through the Tokyo exchange's ToSTNeT-3 mechanism on August 13, using nearly all of the ¥1.11bn allowance its board approved just one day earlier.
Greenland Resort's Profit Slides on a Rainy Kyushu Spring, but a Hokkaido Hotel Sale Lifts the Bottom Line
Read moreBad weather cut theme-park visitors and operating profit by roughly a third at Greenland Resort in the six months through June, but a no-cash sale of a Hokkaido hotel business triggered a deferred-tax adjustment that pushed net profit up anyway.