In Japan, Banks And Consumers Turn to Plastic Lenders Seek New Growth Areas
As Traditional Business Declines; Swapping Cash for Credit Cards
TOKYO -- Japanese consumers, who long have preferred to pay with cash instead of credit cards, are finally embracing plastic, amid a push by the nation's banks to expand into a business they previously neglected.
For years, many Japanese shunned the notion of going into debt, opting instead to carry around thick wads of cash to buy big-ticket items like television sets. Credit-card payments account for just 8% of Japan's consumer spending, compared with about 25% in the U.S., according to American Express Co.
Now, the card business is taking off. In the fiscal year ended March 31, Japanese shoppers charged 24.3 trillion yen, or about $206 billion, on credit cards, up 14% from a year earlier, according to government data. The growth rate has been accelerating, from 10% the previous fiscal year and 6.4% for the year ended March 2004.
The growth is occurring in part because of changing consumer habits. The popularity of online shopping is encouraging young Japanese to flip out their cards. Also, as Japan's low crime rate has risen in recent years, there is a bigger risk to carrying around cash.
Another reason behind the card boom: Big Japanese banks like Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. and Mizuho Financial Group Inc. have cleaned up bad debt that plagued them for years and are looking for new sources of growth. Their traditional business, lending to big corporations, is declining as companies shift away from borrowing from banks and instead raise funds by issuing stocks and bonds.
The banks are focusing on individual customers, many who used to have only deposit accounts at banks, and are showering them with a new selection of mortgages, mutual funds and credit cards. Credit cards account for just a small part of Japanese banks' earnings. The consumer-finance business, which includes credit cards, was 7.8% of Mitsubishi UFJ's total gross profit for the year ended March. In comparison, at Bank of America Corp., 17% of its total revenue came from credit-card-related services in 2005.
"The credit card was almost an afterthought for Japanese banks in the past," says Katsuhito Sasajima, a banking analyst for J.P. Morgan Securities Japan. "Now it has been elevated among one of their main products."
The push by Japanese banks is benefiting U.S. credit-card companies such as Visa International Ltd., MasterCard Inc. and American Express. Most credit cards issued in Japan carry logos from such international players. American Express, for example, saw global customer spending on its cards rise 16% last year. The company wouldn't give an exact growth figure for Japan, but executives say its business here is expanding at a rate of 20% to 25% a year.
Industry executives are betting the growth will continue, given the limited credit-card use by Japanese consumers. Customers of Visa cards in the U.S. charged $4,135 on average on their cards last year, compared with $1,500 in Japan, according to company data.
Mizuho, Japan's second-largest bank by market capitalization after Mitsubishi UFJ, has been at the forefront of the credit-card push. Mizuho has issued nearly two million credit cards in the past two years by automatically adding the credit-card function to new ATM cards unless customers object. The dual-usage card has no annual fee for basic services, and the rate of rejection among applicants is low. One of the bank's goals: to slip the cards into the hands of older Japanese, who tend to be particularly reluctant to sign up for a credit card.
"When credit cards are combined with ATM cards, even older customers begin to carry them in their wallets," says Tsuneo Fukugawa, a manager at Mizuho's retail-business division. "This opens up a new market for us."
To encourage frequent usage, Mizuho offers benefits that are linked to its other businesses. If a cardholder uses the credit card at least once a month, Mizuho waives the transaction fees at some ATMs. If a customer does a lot of shopping -- say, $17,000 a year -- Mizuho offers a rate discount of 0.1 percentage point on some mortgages. Mizuho says the number of cardholders is rising, but profitability of the card business still is low -- something the bank hopes to change by encouraging customers to use cash advances and revolving credit more often.
Mitsubishi UFJ has started pitching ATM cards that double as credit cards and that also can be loaded electronically with prepaid money to shop in convenience stores and at kiosks.
Still, challenges remain. The concept of revolving credit -- the main source of revenue for card companies in the U.S. -- is new to many Japanese. Instead, many often pay for their purchases in full in a month or two. In the U.S., a revolving-credit customer can borrow up to a preapproved limit and pay it back on a flexible schedule as long as a minimum-payment requirement is met. In Japan, revolving-credit customers usually have set amounts taken out of their bank accounts every month. If they want to pay back more, they usually have to go to an ATM to make the payment.
Customers who pay off their balance in full each month don't generate much revenue for card companies because the companies usually don't start charging interest until a balance is two months old. Card-industry executives say revolving credit accounts for a majority of card spending in the U.S. and some other countries, but well below 10% in Japan.
Citigroup Inc.'s Citi Cards Japan Inc., which has been issuing cards in Japan for 20 years, is promoting a revolving card aimed at people in their 20s and 30s. The key is to educate customers, says Sameer Vakil, president of Citi Cards Japan. The company uses flow charts and payment tables in its brochures to explain how revolving credit works, and how the customer can have more control over spending and repayment. To attract more young customers, Citi also issues cards to those without bank accounts and lets them make payments at ATMs.
信用卡消费在日本渐趋流行
一直喜欢用现金付款的日本消费者终于肯接受信用卡了，这个变化背后的原因是日本银行业开始进军一个它们以往忽略的业务领域。
多年来，许多日本人一直不愿负债消费，他们宁愿带着大叠的钞票去购买电视机等大件物品。美国运通公司(American Express Co.)提供的数字显示，日本的消费者支出中只有8%是通过信用卡付款的，而美国的这一比例为25%左右。
不过日本的信用卡业务现在终于起飞了。政府数据显示，在截至今年3月31日的财政年度中，日本购物者的信用卡付款额为24.3万亿日圆，约合2,060亿美元，较上年同期增长了14%。这一增速呈逐年加快之势，此前一个财年的增长速度为10%，而截至2004年3月底的那一财年只增长了 6.4%。
增速加快的部分原因是人们的消费习惯正在发生转变。网上购物的流行使刷卡消费在日本年青人中风行起来。此外，随着日本的低犯罪率局面近年来逐渐被打破，随身携带现金的风险也加大了。
信用卡热背后的另一个原因是：三菱UFJ金融集团(Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc.)和瑞穗金融集团(Mizuho Financial Group Inc.)等日本大银行已经清除了困扰其多年的坏帐，目前正在寻找新的业务增长点。这些银行的传统业务是向大企业贷款，但随着日本大企业的融资方式正从向银行借款转为发行股票和债券，日本银行业的这一传统业务正在日渐萎缩。
各家银行开始将个人消费者当作了业务重点，许多日本人过去在银行只开有存款帐户，而银行现在纷纷向消费者提供了按揭贷款、共同基金和信用卡等多种金融产品选择。信用卡业务对日本银行业的利润贡献率很低。在截至今年3月底的财政年度中，包括信用卡业务在内的消费者金融业务所创造利润只占三菱UFJ金融集团毛利润总额的7.8%。相比之下，2005年美国银行(Bank of America Corp.)的信用卡相关业务所创造收入占该行总收入的17%。
J.P. Morgan Securities Japan的银行业分析师Katsuhito Sasajima说，日本银行业以往并不重视信用卡业务，而信用卡现在已经跻身于它们的主要产品之列。
日本银行业热衷信用卡业务正在使威士国际(Visa International Ltd.)、万事达(MasterCard Inc.)和美国运通等美国的信用卡公司从中受益。日本发行的信用卡大多印有这些信用卡国际机构的标志。以美国运通为例，全球消费者使用运通卡的消费支出去年增长了16%。虽然这家公司不愿提供日本的运通卡刷卡消费额的确切增长数字，但其管理人士表示，该公司日本业务的年增长率达到了20%至25%。
鉴于日本消费者的信用卡使用率依然不高，业内管理人士断定日本目前的信用卡消费增长率仍将维持下去。威士国际提供的数字显示，美国的威士卡持有者去年的刷卡消费额平均为4,135美元，而日本的这一数字只有1,500美元。
日本以市值计仅次于三菱UFJ金融集团的第二大银行瑞穗金融集团在开展信用卡业务方面走在了同行前列。通过给新发行的金融卡自动增加信用卡功能的办法(在消费者不表示反对的情况下)，瑞穗金融集团在过去两年中已发行了近200万张信用卡。这种双重用途卡不针对基本服务收取年费，且申请人的被拒绝率也很低。该银行的目标之一是：使中老年日本人接受这种银行卡，这一类人往往尤其不愿意成为信用卡用户。
瑞穗金融集团零售业务部门的经理Tsuneo Fukugawa说，在把信用卡的功能附加在金融卡之上后，中老年消费者甚至也开始把这种银行卡放入自己的钱包了。他说，这种做法为瑞穗金融集团开辟了一个新市场。
瑞穗金融集团还向经常使用信用卡的客户在该行的其他服务方面提供一些优惠以资鼓励。如果一位信用卡持卡人每月至少刷卡消费一次，瑞穗金融集团就会免除他使用部分自动提款机时的交易费。如果一位持卡人的刷卡消费额很高，比如说每年达到17,000美元，瑞穗就会将其所借某些按揭贷款的利率下调0.1个百分点。瑞穗金融集团称，虽然持卡人的数量在增加，但该行信用卡业务的盈利水平依然不高，瑞穗希望通过鼓励持卡客户预借现金和更多尝试循环贷款等方式来改变这一局面。
三菱UFJ金融集团也推出了具备信用卡功能的金融卡，它既可以当信用卡用，也可以用卡中预存的款额在便利店和自动售货机购物。
不过，挑战依然存在。虽然循环贷款在美国已经成为信用卡发行公司的主要收入来源，但对许多日本人来说它仍然是一个新概念。许多人仍然是一个月或两个月一次集中偿还信用卡贷款。在美国，一位循环贷款的信用卡用户可以使自己的透支额达到限额，而只要他满足了最低还款要求，就可以灵活安排自己的还款时间。而在日本，循环贷款的信用卡用户通常会设定其银行帐户每月固定划出一笔钱去还贷。如果他们想偿还更多贷款，就往往不得不到自动提款机上去完成支付。
那些每月都还清其信用卡贷款的用户不会给发卡公司创造多少收入，因为发卡公司通常会在一笔信用卡贷款的存续时间超过两个月后才开始收取利息。信用卡业的管理人士们说，循环贷款是美国等国信用卡支出的主要方式，但这类支出额不足日本信用卡支出额的10%。
花旗集团(Citigroup Inc.)旗下的Citi Cards Japan Inc.在日本开展发卡业务已有20年，该公司正在针对二、三十岁的日本人推出一种循环贷款卡。这家公司的总经理Sameer Vakil说，关键是让客户接受更多相关知识。Citi Cards Japan在其产品说明书中以流程图和支付表等形式向人们解释循环贷款的运作方式、以及客户如何能对自己的支出和还款有更多控制权。为了吸引更多年青客户，Citi还向那些没有银行帐户的人发行信用卡，允许他们在自动提款机上还款。
Yuka Hayashi
