As SoftBank Group Corp. continues its transformation into a giant investment fund, some analysts are increasingly watching a metric more familiar to lenders as they judge its creditworthiness, Bloomberg News reported. And by that gauge, they say, its massive debt pile looks manageable. SoftBank’s loan-to-value ratio, its net interest-bearing debt over the value of its investment portfolio, is less than 20 percent, according to separate calculations by Daiwa Securities Group Inc. and SMBC Nikko Securities Inc.

Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told Theresa May the whole world wants to avoid a no-deal Brexit even as she faces likely defeat when Parliament votes on her plan next week, Bloomberg News reported. Following a day of meetings between the two leaders in London Thursday, Abe publicly backed May’s agreement and offered her his “deepest respect” for the work she has done in securing an agreement with the European Union. “We truly hope that a no-deal Brexit will be avoided and in fact, that is the whole wish of the whole world,” Abe said at a press conference in Downing Street.

Japanese prosecutors want Carlos Ghosn, the detained auto executive who oversaw an alliance that sold 10 million vehicles a year, to confess to financial misconduct, his son told France's weekly Journal du Dimanche (JDD), the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. Ghosn has been held in a Tokyo detention center since his Nov. 19 arrest on allegations of under-reporting his income at Nissan Motor Co Ltd. He is also accused of aggravated breach of mistrust in transferring personal investment losses to Nissan, from which he has since been ousted as chairman.

Japanese shares slumped at the open on Friday as markets in Japan came back online after a holiday during which a profit warning from Apple sparked a global equities sell-off and fuelled concerns over slowing Chinese growth, the Financial Times reported. The Topix, in its first day of trading for the year, fell as much as 3.2 per cent in early trading with resources stocks down 4 per cent and the technology segment off 3.5 per cent.

Tokyo District Court said on Monday it has extended the detention of ousted Nissan Motor chairman Carlos Ghosn until January 11th, The Irish Times reported. Mr Ghosn, accused of aggravated breach of trust, is facing allegations of making the car maker shoulder 1.85 billion yen (€14.6 million) in personal investment losses. The latest extension will see Ghosn remain in Tokyo’s main detention centre, where he has been confined since his first arrest on November 19th on allegations of financial misconduct.

Japan’s industrial output contracted in November and partially reversed the previous month’s gain, while retail sales slowed sharply as increasing global risks drag on demand and threaten the country’s export-reliant economy, Reuters reported. The 1.1 percent month-on-month fall, pressured by a pullback in production of general purpose machinery, compared with a median market forecast of a 1.9 percent decline, following a 2.9 percent increase in October, the data showed. While the latest figure was better than expected, the outlook pointed to a bumpier road for Japanese manufacturers.

The latest investigation by Tokyo prosecutors into Nissan Motor Co.’s Carlos Ghosn centers on his relationship with a Saudi Arabian businessman, Khaled Al Juffali, who runs part of Nissan’s Middle East business, the Wall Street Journal reported. Some of the people said that payments by Nissan to a Juffali company — on which prosecutors have cast suspicion — were for legitimate business purposes. Ghosn was initially arrested in Tokyo on Nov. 19 and charged Dec. 10 with underreporting his income on Nissan’s financial statements.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Cabinet approved a record initial budget for the 2019 fiscal year that offers plenty of help for consumers facing a higher sales tax while increasing the nation’s debt load, at least for now, Bloomberg News reported. The budget will top 100 trillion yen ($890 billion) for the first time, highlighting the government’s push to head off a potential economic downturn when the levy rises in October. The broad outline of the plans were revealed earlier in the week in draft documents.

Five months ago, Carlos Ghosn, a multimillionaire executive credited with reviving Nissan Motors, hosted the wedding of his daughter Caroline on Naoshima, a rarefied island enclave of art and sculpture. Now, Ghosn is living in a Tokyo jail cell, unable to communicate with his daughter or any family member, as investigators explore possible financial wrongdoing related to his nearly 20-year career at Nissan, the New York Times reported.