Both of these figures have decreased by approximately 10 trillion yen from the previous year, and thus, in general, it can be said that steady progress has been made in solving this particular problem. The amount of nonperforming loans that need to be disposed of, however, remains large.
The Bank of Japan will continue to strongly encourage financial institutions to dispose of the remaining nonperforming loans expeditiously and to exert themselves to the utmost to (1) restore their capital bases which have been impaired in the process of disposing of nonperforming loans; (2) strengthen their profitability through restructuring; and (3) enhance their internal risk management.