THE MAINICHI


 

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- A governmental panel in charge of postal privatization proposed in a report Wednesday that the deposit ceiling at Japan Post Bank Co. be raised to 26 million yen ($235,000) from 13 million yen, raising concern that the state-backed bank could gain an unfair advantage over private financial institutions.

The Financial Services Agency and the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications will revise related ordinances and aim to implement the new deposit ceiling in April 2019, in what would be the first increase since March 2016, when it was lifted from 10 million yen.

Smaller, regional rivals worry the increase in the ceiling could prompt customers to shift to the state-backed bank. The profitability of regional banks has already been squeezed by years of Bank of Japan monetary easing.

Japan Post Bank held deposits of around 180 trillion yen as of the end of September and provides services nationwide through a network of about 24,000 post offices.

With the new change, the deposit caps for savings accounts and fixed-term deposit accounts would each be raised to 13 million yen.
The report also said that Japan Post Holdings Co. should reduce its stake in Japan Post Bank to less than two-thirds as a condition for raising the ceiling.

Japan Post Holdings, 57 percent owned by the government, held a 74.15 percent stake in Japan Post Bank as of the end of September.

The two group companies and Japan Post Insurance Co. went public in 2015 in the final stage of the privatization of Japan's postal system.