Monday, January 28, 2008

Japanese firm rapped over Sony, Toyota 'acquisition' claims

TOKYO (AFP) - Japanese authorities have ordered a little known firm to correct its claim that it had bought controlling stakes in a clutch of corporate giants including Sony and Toyota Motor, officials said Monday.

Teramento Corp., reportedly capitalised at 1,000 yen (9.3 dollars), raised eyebrows on Friday as it announced "acquisitions", together worth 188 billion dollars, of majority stakes in some of the nation's leading companies.

It claimed it had bought 51 percent of Sony Corp., Toyota Corp., Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT), Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd., Fuji Television Network Inc. and Astellas Pharma Inc.

The company, which is registered in Kawasaki City near Tokyo and involved in IT and other businesses, made the claim in filings with the Financial Services Agency's electronic information disclosure system after the market close Friday.

The filings prompted the agency to launch a probe as the total value of the deals would be some 20 trillion yen (188 billion dollars), nearly one quarter of Japan's national budget.

The agency "judged the claim about the (acquisition of the) 51 percent stakes is false and ordered the company to correct its reports," said an inspector at the regional financial bureau supervising Kawasaki.

Teramento was ordered to correct the filings by 5:15 pm (0815 GMT) on Monday when the electronic disclosure system halts for the day, the official said.

The company had not submitted a correction as of late morning, he said, adding that failure to obey the order was punishable by imprisonment of up to one year or fines of up to one million yen.

The mass-circulation Yomiuri Shimbun quoted Teramento's representative as saying: "I run an IT company but live on doing part-time jobs. I didn't know what I filed would be made public as they are."

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