Word: asahi
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...scandal erupted last July, when the daily Asahi Shimbun disclosed that the Recruit group, the parent company of a real estate firm called Recruit Cosmos, had sold unlisted stock in the subsidiary at bargain prices in 1984-86 to politicians, journalists and business leaders. The well-placed purchasers reaped millions of dollars in profits when Recruit Cosmos went public and its shares tripled in value. While Japanese firms often sell inexpensive stock to influential buyers, the scope of the Recruit Cosmos handouts was unprecedented. Hiromasa Ezoe, chairman of the Recruit group, sold more than 885,000 unlisted Recruit Cosmos shares...
...ability to topple the mighty, Tokyo's widening stock scandal is turning into a Japanese version of Watergate. Since July, when the daily newspaper Asahi Shimbun accused 76 highly placed political and business leaders of unethical trading in shares of the real estate firm Recruit Cosmos, 20 people implicated in the scheme have given up their posts. Last week Hisashi Shinto, 78, chairman of the giant firm Nippon Telegraph & Telephone, resigned after admitting that his bank account contained $73,000 in profits from the Recruit deal. Just five days earlier, Finance Minister Keiichi Miyazawa had departed under a similar cloud...
Japan is, in fact, the birthplace of dry beer. In 1987 Tokyo's Asahi Breweries, looking to reverse its declining fortunes, produced a beer that it hoped would capitalize on the country's traditional preference for dry drinks in times of prosperity. Asahi's fermentation process used high-power yeast to reduce a beer's sugar content. The resulting brew, called Super Dry, is clean and crisp, with only a trace of sweetness and a short, slightly bitter aftertaste. It swept the Japanese market, in which dry beer now accounts for 35% of sales, and triggered a pack of imitators...
...outside the walled and moated Imperial Palace to watch and pray. Tens of thousands lined up to sign visitors' books at the main palace gate and elsewhere throughout the country. Autumn festivals, including Tokyo's Grand Ginza extravaganza, were canceled, as was the 100th-anniversary celebration of the daily Asahi Shimbun. Said Mitsu Fujisawa, 112, believed to be the oldest person in Japan: "I have worshiped His Majesty for a long time. I hope he will recover and live longer than I have...
...Japanese call it kinken-seiji, or money politics -- the widespread if sleazy practice in which businessmen curry favor with politicians by giving them insider stock tips or cozy deals. Last week the biggest such scandal in years rocked Japan after the daily Asahi Shimbun disclosed a list of 76 political staffers, journalists and others who allegedly earned millions of dollars investing in the stock of a fast-growing real estate company called Recruit Cosmos. On the list were top members of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (L.D.P.), including aides to both Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita and his predecessor, Yasuhiro Nakasone...