Mid-sized Japanese insurer Yamato Life goes bankrupt - ResearchInChina

Date:2008-10-10liaoyan  Text Size:

A medium-sized Japanese insurance company went bankrupt today, becoming the first Japanese financial company to collapse on the fallout from the global credit crisis.

"We are deeply sorry and offer apologies from the bottom of our hearts," Yamato Life Insurance Co. President Takeo Nakazono said, bowing deeply on nationally televised news.

Most Japanese banking and other institutions have averted the serious damage of their U.S. and European counterparts from the US financial crisis.

Yamato, with about 1,000 employees and 1 trillion yen (US$10 billion) in individual policy accounts, appears so far to be a relatively unusual case in Japan.

Nakazono said the company fell 11 billion yen in the red because of an unusually swift and drastic fall in global stock prices stemming from the US subprime mortgage crisis.

Nearly all of the insurance policies will be protected, according to Japanese media reports.

Yamato officials were not immediately available for comment. The company was founded in 1911, according to its Webpage.

Yamato racked up 269 billion yen in losses, largely from stock holding losses related to the US financial problems, Kyodo News reported.

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