TOKYO, Feb 11 (News On Japan) - Japan’s outstanding government debt totaled 1,342.172 trillion yen as of December 2025, marking a record high, the Finance Ministry announced.
The figure, which includes government bonds, loans and other liabilities, increased by 24.5355 trillion yen from a year earlier, continuing a steady upward trend driven largely by rising social security spending.
Source: テレ東BIZ
Kyoto City significantly raised its lodging tax from March 1st, increasing the maximum charge per person per night from 1,000 yen to as much as 10,000 yen, in a move aimed at tackling overtourism and funding the preservation of cultural assets, even as questions remain about its impact on visitors and the local economy.
A former emergency responder and foreign tourists worked together to rescue a woman in her 80s who was trapped inside an overturned light vehicle in Hakuba Village, Nagano Prefecture.
Tokyo Metro and Toshiba have launched Japan’s first demonstration test allowing passengers to pass through ticket gates without touching them by using their smartphones’ Bluetooth function.
The admission fee for the World Heritage-listed Himeji Castle in Himeji, Hyogo Prefecture, was revised on March 1st for the first time in 11 years, introducing a dual pricing system that significantly raises costs for visitors from outside the city.
An eight-year-old Australian girl died after a snowmobile overturned in Hakuba Village, Nagano Prefecture, at around 11 a.m. on February 28th, with authorities investigating the cause of the accident.
All Nippon Airways held a press conference to announce a change in leadership, with Executive Vice President Hisaichi Hirasawa set to assume the role of president on April 1st, stating that sweeping reforms to the airline’s struggling domestic operations are urgently needed as profitability continues to deteriorate.
As price hikes spread from fast food to daily necessities and households grapple with rising living costs, the steady depreciation of the yen has emerged as a central driver of inflation, with multiple indicators showing that the currency’s purchasing power has fallen to roughly one-third of its mid-1990s peak, underscoring how three decades of economic stagnation, prolonged monetary easing and renewed fiscal expansion have left Japan far more vulnerable to imported inflation than other major economies.
An AI startup that emerged almost overnight, Akari had long been known only to insiders due to its limited media exposure, but after receiving investment from Mitsubishi Electric at the end of January and seeing its corporate valuation surge past 100 billion yen, the Tokyo-born venture has rapidly positioned itself as a leading unicorn candidate in Japan’s AI sector.
Mizuho Financial Group has decided on a policy to improve operational efficiency through the use of artificial intelligence, aiming to reduce administrative work equivalent to as many as 5,000 employees over the next decade.
Honda announced on February 26th that it will introduce a new model of its SUV, the CR-V, with prices starting at 5,122,700 yen.
The Japan Fair Trade Commission has conducted an on-site inspection of Microsoft’s Japanese subsidiary on suspicion of violating the Antimonopoly Act by potentially restricting the use of rival services.
A long-awaited spell of steady rain fell across Japan following a record stretch of low precipitation, offering much-needed relief to farmers and manufacturers that had struggled with water shortages.
Food delivery service Wolt announced that it will withdraw from Japan on March 4th as competition in the domestic delivery market intensifies.
