Japan's cabinet backs three oil-supply bills; Muji passes ¥100bn

Finance Minister Katayama cannot yet size the savings from reviewing tax breaks, subsidies and funds, though price-relief spending in supplementary budgets has run at roughly ¥3tn a year. Katayama has been nominated to chair the joint World Bank-IMF Development Committee, the first time a Japanese finance minister will hold the post since the committee was set up in 1974. She told a post-cabinet press conference on 13 October that she is due to be formally selected at the committee's meeting in Bangkok on 15 October, for a term running to October 2028. Overseas travel needs approval from the Diet's steering committee, which had not met, so she could not say definitively that she would go.

The number: Asked how much the review of tax breaks, subsidies and funds could free up, Katayama gave no figure and said the scale would be examined in the budget-compilation process. The clearest number was on supplementary budgets: price-relief measures have taken roughly ¥3tn a year in each of the supplementary budgets for the years to March 2024, 2025 and 2026. She said supplementary-budget compilation will be limited to measures of genuinely high urgency.

What to watch: Demands on the framework are growing. She listed a cut in the consumption tax rate on food and drink, a "Strong and Prosperous Japan" investment frame, and price-linked adjustments, against a stated aim of a steadily falling debt-to-GDP ratio.

The FSA and the transport ministry want non-life insurers to drop uniform improvement deadlines that lack a reasonable basis and to revisit terminations made without enough dialogue. On 13 October the Financial Services Agency and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism jointly asked the non-life insurers' trade association to make sure members run an agency quality scheme as intended: through sustained dialogue, tailored to each agency's size and business, and without treating it as a path to termination. The request lists seven steps for insurers and follows complaints from agencies, some of which said they were asked for excessive systems and controls, or that insurers had hinted at ending contracts without enough discussion.

Why it matters: The request singles out motorcycle dealers and repair shops, which it says help counter uninsured vehicles. It warns that fewer of them could cost customers the chance to buy compulsory auto liability insurance (jibaiseki). A ministry survey found some dealers and shops where insufficient dialogue with insurers was suspected.

What to watch: Insurers are asked to avoid uniform improvement deadlines or handling without a reasonable basis, and to review cases where a contract ended without sufficient quality dialogue, reopening talks if an agency asks. It is a request to the association, not a formal order.

The FSA's draft would end a carve-out for older non-life agencies and widen the related-party test, with an exemption for agencies whose commissions do not amount to a premium discount. The Financial Services Agency released draft changes to its supervisory guidelines for insurers on 11 September 2026, and the public comment period ended at 17:00 on 13 October. In-house agencies are intermediaries closely tied to a non-insurance business, mainly handling its group policies. The FSA says they may survive on commissions from non-life insurers even where practical sales ability is inadequate, and that the commissions may amount to a de facto premium discount.

What changed: The existing guideline treats an agency as mainly selling to related parties when specific contracts exceed half of the premiums it handles. The draft keeps that test but ends a transitional measure that limited the calculation to auto, fire and accident lines for agencies registered on or before 31 March 1996, so all lines would count. It also widens related parties to the holder of more than 50% of the agency's voting rights, directly or indirectly, and that holder's subsidiaries.

The catch: Agencies that meet two sets of requirements would be exempt: commissions that do not produce a substantive discount or rebate of premiums, and enough practical ability and independence from the parent. Under the draft mechanism the insurer calculates a commission that does not exceed the costs the agency reports. The FSA says the guidelines will apply after the comment process and the necessary procedures.

Each World share would convert into one Infinity United share and each TSI Holdings share into 0.8, a ratio just above the market-price range of 0.77 to 0.78. World and TSI Holdings agreed to combine under a new listed parent, Infinity United, with the joint share transfer planned for 1 March 2027. Both boards approved the integration agreement and share transfer plan on 14 October 2026. World reported ¥284.0bn of revenue for the year to February 2026 under IFRS, and TSI Holdings ¥167.1bn of sales under Japanese standards, so the two figures are not like for like.

Details: The plan would issue 121,858,487 ordinary shares, a count that can change with the number of treasury shares cancelled before completion. World hired Nomura Securities and TSI Holdings hired Mizuho Securities as independent valuers, and both used market-price, comparable-company and discounted cash flow methods. Infinity United would be based in Minato ward, Tokyo, with planned capital of ¥5bn. TSI Holdings' chief executive would become representative director and chairman, and World's president representative director and president.

What to watch: The plan lapses if either shareholder meeting rejects it or if regulatory approvals are not obtained by 1 March 2027. The meetings are planned for 24 December.

Holders tendered 13.1mn shares, enough to complete Luxshare's ¥795 offer for Seed, but the bidder will hold 43.29% of the votes after settlement and still plans a squeeze-out and delisting. Holders tendered 13,102,594 shares against a minimum of 5,408,800, so Luxshare Precision Cayman Limited's offer succeeded and it will buy every tendered share at ¥795 in cash. The offer ran from 27 August to 13 October and had no upper limit. Settlement starts on 20 October through Mizuho Securities, after which the bidder will hold 131,025 voting rights, or 43.29% of the total. Seed expects the bidder to become its second-largest shareholder.

The catch: The stake is not a majority on its own. The tender offer report puts the bidder's holding together with special related parties at 92.09% of voting rights. Those parties' 48.80% matches the 14,768,400 shares that Seed's largest shareholder, an individual, agreed not to tender. The bidder plans a series of procedures so that only it and that shareholder remain, and if they go ahead Seed's shares would be delisted from the Tokyo Stock Exchange Standard market.

What to watch: Seed says it will announce the specific steps and timing promptly once they are decided with the bidder. Until then, the 20 October settlement is the next dated step, and the squeeze-out and delisting remain plans.

Kamgras 1 K.K. raised its Kakaku.com offer by ¥1 to ¥3,682 a share, extended it to October 28 and moved settlement to November 5. The notice is dated October 14. The offer opened on May 13, 2026, and the new end date puts its total length at 115 business days, up from 105. Settlement now starts on November 5, not October 21. The price for each of the 11 listed series of share acquisition rights stays at ¥1 per right.

The catch: The notice is Kamgras's own document, and its criticism of the rival proposer is Kamgras's view. Kamgras says the rival's pre-announced offer at ¥3,597 has no realistic path to launch while its own offer continues. Under the May 12 agreement, it says, Kakaku.com can back a rival offer only if the rival price is at least Kamgras's, now ¥3,682. It says a conditional ¥3,720 price tied to a non-tender agreement with KDDI also falls short, because KDDI's agreement requires the rival price to be at least 2% above Kamgras's, a threshold it puts at ¥3,756.

What to watch: Kamgras says talks with Oasis on tendering into its offer continue, with nothing decided. For holders the choice on the table is a ¥3,682 offer that closes October 28, against a rival proposal that Kamgras says has no launch date.

Ryohin Keikaku's operating profit topped ¥100bn for the first time, but it guides to a 4.5% fall in net profit next year as this year's one-off gains reverse. Ryohin Keikaku, which runs the Muji chain, booked operating profit of ¥103.4bn in the year to August 2026 on revenue of ¥923.6bn. Operating profit rose 40.1% from ¥73.8bn and revenue rose 17.7%, lifting the operating margin to 11.2% from 9.4%. The company credits overseas sales growth, a weaker yen and more stores, plus in-house production savings and fewer markdowns that improved gross margin. Muji ended the year with 1,486 stores including licensed ones, 723 in Japan and 763 overseas.

The catch: Net profit rose 50.3% to ¥76.4bn, helped by foreign-exchange gains, a gain on selling policy-held shares and deferred tax assets booked at overseas subsidiaries. For the year to August 2027 the company guides to revenue of ¥1.014tn, operating profit of ¥114.0bn, up 10.2%, and net profit of ¥73.0bn, down 4.5%. Management says the net decline reflects the reversal of this year's one-off gains.

Details: The board resolved on 14 October to propose a year-end dividend of ¥22 a share, up from the ¥16 forecast in April, for an annual ¥38 against an earlier forecast of ¥32.

U-NEXT HOLDINGS grew revenue 20.4% to ¥469.96bn, yet operating profit fell 4.2% as power procurement costs hit fixed-price energy contracts. Operating profit fell to ¥30.26bn in the year to August 2026, and net profit attributable to owners fell 18.7% to ¥14.96bn. Against the plan set on 14 October 2025, revenue came in 10.8% above the ¥424bn forecast, while operating profit landed 9.7% below ¥33.5bn. The telecom and energy segment brought in ¥199.46bn of revenue, up 23.7%, but its operating profit fell 27.7% to ¥9.53bn.

The catch: U-NEXT attributes the shortfall to a Middle East problem that began at the end of February 2026 and pushed up energy prices. Plans whose customer price tracks procurement cost lifted revenue, while fixed-price plans deteriorated as costs rose. The company says it did not revise its forecast at the end of the third quarter because weather and sunshine hours made a reasonable estimate difficult.

The move: The recovery plan corrects high-voltage fixed-price menus, through price revisions or a switch to market-linked pricing, and turns sales agency commissions into a variable cost. It carries a customer cost: the forecast assumes net losses of 5,300 high-voltage and 53,400 low-voltage energy contracts in the coming year. Guidance for the year to August 2027 is revenue of ¥524bn, operating profit of ¥32.5bn and net profit of ¥16.5bn, and an institutional investor briefing is set for 15 October.