Bloomberg: Japan's Ashikaga Bank Attracts Bidders Including GE, Lone Star
Ashikaga Bank Ltd., taken over by the government three years ago because of mounting bad loans, is attracting potential bidders ranging from U.S.-based General Electric Co. and Lone Star Funds to domestic companies including Nomura Holdings Inc., people with knowledge of the matter said...The government is selling the bank now as it wants to recoup public money spent bailing out the country's lenders and Ashikaga has recovered...Yosano said Sept. 1 that any buyer of Ashikaga must consider "the community," as Ashikaga is a regional bank...more...
Rubbish reporting here by Bloomberg. Nowhere in this article is it mentioned that one of Ashikaga Bank's main claims to fame was processing yen transfers to North Korea on and off for nearly thirty years. The bank's failure was a blow to pachinko parlours and Korean restaurants who made up a good part of the loan book. That was all legal business but you would think that might be relevant to bring it up in any discussion about "the community" the bank serves and the appropriateness of a foreign takeover. It would also be worth investigating what business the bank has been conducting while under government ownership.
