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The 3 Billion Dollar Typo
Rand310 writes "Mizuho, the world's second largest bank based in Japan, with total assets of nearly the GDP of France (around 1.2 trillion USD) accidentally sold 610,000 shares, valued at $3.1 billion... for 1 yen each. A 27 billion yen loss would almost match Mizuho Securities' group net profit of 28.1 billion yen for the financial year ended in March, though... the incident would not threaten the brokerage's financial stability. FYI 1 yen is about .83 cents. Yesterday one share was selling at $5,065, today you could theoretically have bought 610,000 shares for $.0083 each. An expensive switch of variables."
What's with these asian traders? Does their software just suck or are they all fumble fingers? Didn't this just happen a few months ago in a similar story?
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
The company made a horrendous mistake and yet, there you see two executives bowing apologetically and taking responsibility on the day it happened
If there is one thing I learned about Japan, while living in Tokyo during the early '90s, it was that you can do ANYTHING, as long as you apologize (gomen'asai) appropriately.
Buy used panties off the local high school girls and sell them in a claw-machine game in your video arcade? Fine, just be sure to say 'sorry' to their mothers when they come looking to see why their daughter's clothing budgets have gone up.
Throw a 50 liter barrel of cutting oil into a hi-tech eco-nice furnace that is normally used to 'securly' burn office documents, and watch it rain crisp A4 all over the local neighborhood? Say the right words (five times should do it), with the proper contrition and your company gets an award from the city for doing such a good job on the after-explosion cleanup.
Get busted stuffing a camera & wide-angle lens down the front of a secretary's blouse while she sleeps on the train going home at night, and all it takes is the correct angle of degrees in the bow, along with no less than nine gomens to each police officer present, and you get to go straight home and keep your film!
A screw up over money is no big deal, no matter the amount...I'm sure the finance tech won't have to say sorry in public at all - the company head will take that duty, and three bold and crystal clear gomens for the HDTV cameras should cover it.