Astellas and Kyowa Kirin are the first Japanese drugmakers to sign most-favored-nation pricing deals with Washington. A September 29 tariff deadline explains the timing, and Japanese prices sit inside the U.S. formula.
Transits through the Strait of Hormuz have fallen from 21.6 to 4.9 million barrels a day, and Gulf producers are building seven bypass pipelines. Japan restored procurement, but July brought a 634.5 billion yen deficit.
Japan's Environment Ministry will stop subsidising the purchase of conventional solar panels for new projects from fiscal 2027. The stated reason was not carbon but industry: the money was benefiting factories abroad.
On August 24 Takaichi pledged continued aid to Ukraine and sanctions on Russia at the Kyiv summit. Japan also draws 8.9% of its LNG from Russia, and a US Senate bill counts it among the top five buyers of Russian gas.
Japan's trade ministry is reportedly winding down the Cool Japan Fund and its 54 billion yen in losses. Hours later it published a strategy targeting 20 trillion yen in content exports by 2033.
From November 1, 2026, Japan drops instant tax exemption at the register. Visitors pay full price and get the 10% consumption tax back only after customs confirms the goods are leaving.
Japan's calorie-based food self-sufficiency fell to a record-low 37% in fiscal 2025 while the production-value measure rose to 66%. A 48% rise in rice prices moved both. By production value, Japan ranks above the US.
On August 7 Japan's Financial Services Agency turns its crypto team from a councillor's office three levels down into a standalone division, one of five created that day. The EU and US answer it differently.
Japan bought yen without warning on July 30, moving the currency five yen in an hour. The BOJ then held at 1% and warned inflation could overshoot, as Washington and Seoul moved too.
Japan's Patent Office has issued a final rejection of Nintendo and The Pokemon Company's application for a touchscreen creature-capture patent. The decisive prior art was a 2013 fan-made 3D Pokemon video, and the examiner dismissed Nintendo's argument that a copyright-infringing video cannot count. Here is what it means for the Palworld lawsuit, fact separated from speculation.
Japan's Diet passed the FIEA amendment on July 15, making crypto a financial product under the same law that governs stocks and bonds. Insider trading rules, tougher penalties, and disclosure duties arrive with it, and the preconditions for a 20% flat tax and domestic crypto ETFs are now cleared. Enforcement is expected in fiscal 2027, with the tax change from January 2028. Meanwhile, the US CLARITY Act remains stuck in the Senate.