Japanese banks held sizable amounts of corporate stocks, which turned out to impose serious risks when stock prices went down sharply. The Bank of Japan resumed purchases of stock held by financial institutions and began to provide subordinated loans to banks.
Moreover, the normalisation of relations with the rest of the world led to a turnaround in the international financial flows of South Africa from a net outflow of about R45 billion in the period from 1985 to 1993 to a net inflow of nearly R204 billion since 1994. At the same time the volatility in these financial flows increased.