No. of Recommendations: 2
I'm becoming very interested in Japanese companies. The conventional wisdom about shareholder-unfriendly practices is starting to be less true, in part as a result of some recent regulatory changes. That said, it's still not uncommon to see massive cross-holdings, opaque corporate structures, companies with half their market cap in cash and no plan to spend or release it, measures designed to prevent foreign ownership, shareholder interests subordinated to those of employees, etc. etc.
In that context, it's interesting to see Japanese insurers going shopping over here. I've long liked W.R. Berkley but it wasn't cheap before the announcement.
