¥521.9bn winter bill request, SMC's ¥294.0bn profit guide and a bank's restatement

SMC's operating profit forecast for the year to March 2027 now stands at ¥294.0bn, up from ¥219.0bn, after operating profit rose 74.0% to ¥157.9bn in the six months to September. Sales rose 38.3% to ¥553.6bn, net profit attributable to owners rose 62.9% to ¥129.0bn, and orders rose 64.3% to ¥640.3bn, a jump the half-year report ties mainly to semiconductor-related demand. The operating margin reached 28.5%, which SMC's results presentation says was well above plan.

The catch: Ordinary profit grew 60.5%, less than operating profit, because a foreign-exchange gain a year earlier turned into a ¥3.1bn loss. SMC expects semiconductor-related orders to stay at high levels in the second half and EV-related automotive demand in China to slow slightly. The interim dividend is ¥500 per share, the same as a year earlier.

Obayashi raised its operating-profit forecast for the year to March 2027 to ¥205bn from ¥180bn. The company says that with labour shortages pronounced, clients are securing construction workers earlier, which has pulled schedules forward and sped decisions on change orders in domestic building. Sales guidance rises to ¥3.115tn from ¥2.945tn and net profit attributable to owners to ¥173bn from ¥157bn. On a standalone basis, operating profit is now forecast at ¥145bn, up ¥30bn from the August forecast.

The catch: The group-wide upgrade is smaller than the standalone one. Obayashi completed the Multiplex acquisition in October and now includes it in the forecast, which adds to the ¥170bn sales increase. It attributes the smaller consolidated profit gain to higher labour and M&A-related costs. Overseas building sales are forecast up ¥100bn to ¥790bn while its operating-profit forecast is cut ¥4bn to ¥8.5bn.

Details: The board approved a buyback of up to 20mn shares, capped at ¥30bn, running from 16 November 2026 to 29 January 2027, with all shares to be cancelled. The annual dividend forecast is unchanged at ¥94 per share.

Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group corrected its accounts for the year ended March 2026 after finding an error in the fair-value measurement of purchased monetary claims. Those assets fall by ¥99.6bn, deferred tax liabilities by ¥31.4bn and the valuation difference on available-for-sale securities by ¥68.2bn, taking consolidated net assets from ¥15.93tn to ¥15.86tn. Ordinary profit (¥2.30tn) and net profit attributable to owners of the parent (¥1.58tn) are unchanged. The error runs through other comprehensive income, which drops from ¥544.3bn to ¥476.0bn for the year.

The number: The April-June quarter moves the other way. Its other comprehensive income rises by the same ¥68.2bn, from ¥225.0bn to ¥293.2bn, with quarterly net profit unchanged. The preliminary March common equity Tier 1 ratio is restated to 12.32% from 12.41%, and the total capital ratio to 15.60% from 15.69%.

Details: The amended annual securities report says the corrected consolidated statements were audited by the group's auditor, with an audit report dated 12 November 2026.

Mitsui & Co. has finished one deal and has another still to close. On 12 November it bought a further 19% of Nutrinova Netherlands from Celanese, taking its holding to 89%. The joint take-private of Penske Automotive Group at $212 a share, decided on 15 October, has not closed.

What changed: In September an amended shareholders' agreement made Nutrinova a consolidated subsidiary at a 70% holding. Mitsui remeasured its existing stake at a fair value of ¥105.4bn, booking a ¥6.26bn gain, and carries provisional goodwill of ¥59.8bn because the purchase-price allocation is unfinished.

What to watch: Penske completion depends on approval by a majority of voting shares and by a majority of votes cast by shareholders with no interest in the deal, plus regulatory approvals. Mitsui says the effect on its current-year consolidated results should be minor.

By the numbers: Interim profit attributable to owners rose to ¥574.9bn from ¥423.7bn, and Mitsui now guides to ¥1.05tn for the year to March 2027, up from ¥920bn in May. It also announced a buyback of up to ¥200bn running to 29 January 2027.

Funds advised by Bain Capital and GIC plan to sell 42,735,200 existing WHI Holdings shares in a Tokyo Stock Exchange Prime Market debut. The registration statement lists no new-share offering, so proceeds go to the sellers, not the company.

Details: The planned split is 25,534,300 shares in Japan and 17,200,900 overseas. The filing assumes a price range of ¥2,340 to ¥2,590 and uses the ¥2,465 average to put the Japanese tranche at ¥62.94bn. The provisional price range is due on 30 November, pricing is on 7 December and trading is planned from 15 December.

The catch: Borrowings were ¥188.44bn at the end of September, 45% of total assets, mostly floating-rate and secured on group assets. Goodwill of ¥225.29bn and other intangibles of ¥158.04bn make up 91% of consolidated assets. Nine-month revenue rose 18.0% to ¥56.22bn and operating profit was ¥22.28bn, yet the group booked a net loss of ¥587mn because tax expense reached ¥9.145bn.

Two draft notices from the environment and economy ministries would bring credits from a company's own forest conservation into the J-Credit definition and the emissions reporting method. Comments are due by 11 December 2026, the notices are due to be issued in January 2027, and the changes would apply from 1 April 2027.

What changed: The first draft adds 'own efforts to conserve and enhance greenhouse gas absorption, limited to forest development and conservation' to the definition of the J-Credit scheme. The second redefines 'emissions adjustment invalidation' as making a domestic certified reduction non-transferable.

Why now: The drafts follow a study group that met from September 2023 to June 2025 and concluded that forest-sink credits from a company's own absorption work should be usable to adjust its own adjusted emissions. A March 2026 notice already allows that use, and the reporting-method draft would align with it. Companies that report under the system, and anyone holding or developing forest-sink J-Credits, have until 11 December to say whether the definitions work for them.