What’s New on the FSA Website

Week of February 22, 2021 - February 26, 2021

This page contains the latest in events, developments, and updates to the FSA website.

Public Comments

(The following public comments are available in Japanese)

February 26, 2021	Publication of the finalized amendments to the "Guidelines for Administrative Processes" regarding funds transfer service providers, and to the "Comprehensive Guidelines for Supervision of Major Banks, etc." <Summary> The FSA finalized the amendments to the "Guidelines for Administrative Processes" regarding funds transfer service providers, and to the "Comprehensive Guidelines for Supervision of Major Banks, etc." In response to the recent surge of unauthorized withdrawals* (by malicious and fraudulent third parties) from financial service users' accounts linked with (online) payment services provided by financial institutions, the amendments expressly set forth in the said two Guidelines that financial services providers shall conduct self-assessment/inspection of their entire financial services from the perspective of security vulnerabilities in their information security management systems and shall enhance their relevant applicable systems as necessary. The amendments were enforced on February 26, 2021.   * A typical case ascertained in the recent series of unauthorized withdrawals is that malicious and fraudulent third parties sign up with certain cashless/mobile payment services linked with deposit accounts, in which they use personal deposit account information fraudulently obtained from deposit account holders, thereby making withdrawals unbeknownst to those account holders whose personal bank account information has been stolen.
February 24, 2021	Publication of the draft regulatory notice designating market transactions of derivatives for the purpose of conducting cover-deals for specified currency-related over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives transactions based on Article 68, Paragraph 1, Item 3 of the "Cabinet Office Order on Financial Instruments Exchanges, etc." <Summary> The FSA proposed the draft regulatory notice designating market transactions of derivatives for the purpose of conducting cover-deals for specified currency-related over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives transactions based on Article 68, Paragraph 1, Item 3 of the "Cabinet Office Order on Financial Instruments Exchanges, etc." While market transactions of derivatives using a LG (Letter of Guarantee) issued by a bank as the substitute securities are currently limited to those designated by the FSA, the proposal mainly intends to designate market transactions of derivatives for the purpose of conducting cover-deals for specified currency-related over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives as FX-clearing transactions which are set forth under Article 2 Trading Member Regulations of Tokyo Financial Exchange, Inc.
February 22, 2021	Publication of the draft amendments to the regulatory notices pertaining to leverage ratio requirements <Summary> The FSA proposed the draft amendments to the regulatory notice pertaining to leverage ratio requirements. In June 2020, in light of the increased impact of COVID-19, the FSA took measures to exclude the outstanding balance of financial institutions’ current accounts at the Bank of Japan (BOJ) from the calculation of leverage ratio until the end of March 2021 in order to maintain harmonization with the monetary policy implemented by the BOJ and the prudential regulations for banks and other financial institutions.  Due to the continuous uncertainty regarding the impact of COVID-19, the proposal intends to extend the measures until the end of March 2022.
February 22, 2021	Publication of the draft "Cabinet Orders, Cabinet Office Orders and Others Pertaining to the 2020 Revision of the Act on Sales, etc. of Financial Instruments" <Summary> The FSA proposed the draft "Cabinet Orders, Cabinet Office Orders and Others Pertaining to the 2020 Revision of the Act on Sales, etc. of Financial Instruments." The proposal mainly intends to introduce the regulatory framework for financial services intermediary business.

Press Releases

(The following press releases are available in English)
Banks

February 26, 2021	The FSA publishes the status of loans held by all banks as of the end of September 2020, based on the Financial Reconstruction Act

Others

February 26, 2021	Updated statistics of money lending business

(The following press releases are available in Japanese)

Councils

February 26, 2021	Publication of the agenda and handouts of the ninth meeting of the "Payments Council on Financial Innovation" <Summary> The FSA published the agenda and handouts of the ninth meeting of the "Payments Council on Financial Innovation," which was held on February 16, 2021.
February 24, 2021	Updated one-stop access to the information on meetings of the "Networking Group on the corporate disclosure, financial reporting and audit of listed companies in Consideration of the Impact of the COVID-19 (Novel Coronavirus) Infection" (provisional English title) (Update on the 10th meeting) <Summary> The FSA updated the one-stop access to the information on meetings of "Networking Group on the corporate disclosure, financial reporting and audit of listed companies in Consideration of the Impact of the COVID-19 (Novel Coronavirus) Infection" (provisional English title). The latest update mainly pertains to the 10th meeting held on February 24, 2021. The key objective of the 10th meeting was to share initiatives and approaches so far taken by the respective members toward the full-scale implementation of work pertaining to their corporate disclosure, financial reporting and audit for the fiscal year ending March 31 in view of the prolonged impact of COVID-19.
February 22, 2021	Appointment of the Business Accounting Council’s chairperson and committee members <Summary> The FSA announced that the Business Accounting Council’s chairperson and committee members were appointed by the Commissioner of the FSA.

Banks

February 26, 2021

Overview of modifications to lending conditions by financial institutions <Summary> The FSA published an overview of modifications to lending conditions made by financial institutions for the period from March 10, 2020 to January, 2021.

February 25, 2021

Request for financial measures to deal with disasters caused by a large-scale fire outbreak in Ashikaga City, Tochigi Prefecture (Kanto Local Finance Bureau) <Summary> The Kanto Local Finance Bureau and the Bank Examination Department of the Bank of Japan issued a joint statement titled "Financial Measures to Deal with Disasters Caused by a Large-Scale Fire Outbreak in Ashikaga City, Tochigi Prefecture" to the relevant financial institutions. The statement requests financial institutions in Tochigi Prefecture to appropriately deal with victims of the disaster considering their circumstances, such as by making the repayment of deposits flexible.

Securities

February 26, 2021	Administrative penalty charge against Japan Display Inc. for making false statements in its securities reports <Summary> On February 25, 2021, the FSA issued an order to impose an administrative penalty charge against Japan Display Inc. for making false statements in its securities reports.
February 26, 2021	Administrative penalty charge against AEON DELIGHT CO., LTD. for making false statements in its securities reports <Summary> On February 25, 2021, the FSA issued an order to impose an administrative penalty charge against AEON DELIGHT CO., LTD. for making false statements in its securities reports.

Others

February 26, 2021	Publication of the monitoring results pertaining to financial institutions' implementation status of customer-oriented business conduct aimed at customers' stable asset building (as of the end of December 2020) <Summary> The FSA has been monitoring financial institutions from macro- and micro-perspectives as to whether their business approaches and initiatives reflect customer-oriented business conduct on a regular basis. To further ensure their "visualization" of such customer-oriented business approaches and initiatives from the external customer perspective, the FSA has published the updated monitoring results pertaining to financial institutions' implementation status of customer-oriented business conduct aimed at customers' stable asset building as of the end of December 2020.
February 26, 2021	Publication of the updated list of financial institutions signing up to the "Principles for Customer-Oriented Business Conduct" and publicizing their respective customer-oriented business conduct and KPIs (key performance indicators) (as of the end of December 2020) <Summary> The FSA updated the list of financial institutions signing up to the "Principles for Customer-Oriented Business Conduct" and publicizing their respective customer-oriented business conduct and KPIs (key performance indicators) inclusive of the common KPIs comparable across investment trust distributors by the end of December 2020 in order to visualize financial institutions' initiatives and efforts. The FSA aims at encouraging financial institutions to further "visualize" their customer-oriented business conduct.
February 26, 2021	Publication of "Statistics of NISA and Junior NISA Accounts" as of December 31, 2020 (preliminary figures) <Summary> The FSA has published "Statistics of NISA and Junior NISA Accounts" (preliminary figures). As of December 31, 2020, there were approximately 15.2 million NISA accounts in total, and approximately 22.0 trillion yen (approximately 207.7 billion USD) was invested through the NISA accounts, among which, 687.8 billion yen (approximately 6.5 billion USD) was invested through approximately 3.0 million accounts of the Tsumitate NISA (Dollar-Cost Averaging NISA) which has started since January 2018.