November 18, 2004
Financial Services Agency, Japan

Participation in Open Hearing on How CESR Intends to Measure Equivalence between Third Country GAAP and IAS/IFRS

1. Financial Services Agency will visit Paris on November 23, 2004 with three Japanese private organizations (Accounting Standards Board of Japan, Japanese Institute of Certified Public Accountants and Nippon Keidanren (Japan Business Federation)) and participate in the open hearing on the draft ''Concept Paper on Equivalence of Certain Third Country GAAP and on Description of Certain Third Countries Mechanisms of Enforcement of Financial Information'', which is held by the Operational Group in the area of endorsement and enforcement of financial reporting standards in Europe (CESR-Fin), chaired by Mr. John Tiner, Chief Executive Officer of the UK Financial Services Authority.

2. CESR will deliver a technical advice on the matter of equivalence between certain third country GAAP (i.e., Japanese GAAP, US GAAP and Canadian GAAP) and IAS/IFRS to the European Commission (EC) by June 30, 2005. As a step in preparing its advice, CESR published the draft ''Concept Paper on Equivalence of Certain Third Country GAAP and on Description of Certain Third Countries Mechanisms of Enforcement of Financial Information'' on October 21, 2004, which is open for comment from interested parties by December 22, 2004.

   Our participation in the open hearing by the CESR-Fin is to express our views on the draft Concept Paper as a part of the process toward recognition of the equivalence of Japanese GAAP with IAS/IFRS.