NIPPON




 

Japan and the United States have yet to work out the first batch of U.S.-bound investment deals worth 550 billion dollars planned by Tokyo, visiting Japanese economic minister Ryosei Akazawa said Thursday.

After a 90-minute meeting with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in Washington, Akazawa told a press conference that "the gap remains wide open" over the initial deal.

Potential U.S. targets for the first-round Japanese investment are gas-fired thermal power generation for artificial intelligence data centers, synthetic diamond production for stable semiconductor supply and a new port construction.

Also under consideration is Japanese purchasing of synthetic diamonds from a plant to be built in the United States by global diamond leader De Beers Group, people familiar with the matter said.

But Akazawa declined to clarify what projects are being specifically discussed and when they will be announced.

"We still have issues to address," he said. But he also said that the Japanese and U.S. ministers "agreed to work closely with each other to come up with mutually beneficial projects."

"We are negotiating with a view to making (Japanese) Prime Minister (Sanae) Takaichi's U.S. visit fruitful," Akazawa added.