Yakuza’s Series 7 Exam Is Harbinger for Economy: William Pesek

Oct. 7 (Bloomberg) -- Japan’s underworld can tell you a lot about what’s happening in the legitimate economy.

Gangsters are on the run as growth wanes and deflation worsens. Yet the oddest development by far involves yakuza members sitting for exams covering key aspects of their work.

If you think this is just a law-enforcement issue, think again. It’s a sign Japan’s funk will be longer than economists predict. That may surprise those betting Japan is recovering. Oddly, though, the plight of gangsters tells the story.

Read full article here: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aXERm052xVHI

Yakuza try matchmaking business to make ends meet

These are hard times for us all; hardest of all, says Spa! (July 21), for the yakuza. Once, organized crime bands pursued glory, as they saw it. Now it’s a brute, inglorious hustle for mere survival. Nothing’s beneath them, as long as it pays. Couple this fact with a surging marriage boom, and you get… yakuza infiltrating the matchmaking business? Sure enough, the magazine finds.

The buzzword is “konkatsu,” meaning literally “marriage activity” and written with characters suggesting a similarity to job-hunting. Singles once content to be that way are suddenly in the market for marriage partners, and brokerages, inevitably, are springing up to meet the demand.

Read full article here: http://www.japantoday.com/category/kuchikomi/view/yakuza-try-matchmaking-business-to-make-ends-meet

Yakuza stalk Japanese markets as organised crime opens new front

apan's powerful yakuza organised crime syndicates are mounting a widespread assault on the country's financial markets that may have left hundreds of listed companies riddled with mob connections.

In a surprisingly stark admission, the National Police Agency (NPA) says that it is locked in a battle for the economic soul and international reputation of Japan.

Police investigations suggest that the yakuza have become voracious traders and manipulators of listed Japanese shares, and, via a network of about a thousand apparently legitimate front companies, occupy big positions on the shareholder registers of many companies that may not even be aware of the connection.

Read full article here: http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/banking_and_finance/article4621950.ece

This Mob Is Big in Japan

I have spent most of the past 15 years in the dark side of the rising sun. Until three years ago, I was a crime reporter for the Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan's largest newspaper, and covered a roster of characters that included serial killers who doubled as pet breeders, child pornographers who abducted junior high-school girls, and the John Gotti of Japan.

I came to Japan in 1988 at age 19, spent most of college living in a Zen Buddhist temple, and then became the first U.S. citizen hired as a regular staff writer for a Japanese newspaper in Japanese. If you know anything about Japan, you'll realize how bizarre this is -- a gaijin, or foreigner, covering Japanese cops. When I started the beat in the early 1990s, I knew nothing about the yakuza, a.k.a. the Japanese mafia. But following their prostitution rings and extortion rackets became my life.

Read full article here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/09/AR2008050902544.html

Blood ties: Yakuza daughter lifts lid on hidden hell of gangsters' families

It is only when Shoko Tendo removes her tracksuit top that you appreciate why, even on a hot day, she prefers to remain covered up in public. Outwardly she is much like any thirty-something you would be likely to encounter on a Tokyo street. Her hair is of the dark-brown hue favoured by many Japanese women her age, her greeting is accompanied by a well-executed bow, and her voice seems to be pitched a little on the high side, a common affectation in the company of strangers.

But her protective layer comes off to reveal stick-thin arms covered, from the wrists up, with a tattoo that winds its way to her chest and across her back, culminating, on her left shoulder, in the face of a Muromachi-era courtesan with breast exposed and a knife clenched between her teeth.

Read full article here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2007/jun/27/books.japan

Japanese Mayor Shot Dead

The mayor of the Japanese city of Nagasaki, a prominent anti-nuclear activist, was shot by a yakuza gangster on Tuesday, and news reports said he later died of his wounds.

Mayor Iccho Ito was shot twice late Tuesday outside the city's main train station by a gangster reportedly disgruntled over damage to his car at a public works site, according to Nagasaki prefectural (state) police official Rumi Tsujimoto.

Kyodo News agency and national broadcaster NHK said Ito died of his wounds early Wednesday.

Read full article here: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/04/17/world/main2695446.shtml