Kagawa sat upright and looked around at everyone present.
Knowing it couldn't be hidden anymore, they came looking for me, huh...
A year ago, the people at this long table were not nearly this polite to him.
Back then, he had just shouldered an unauthorized commitment of 7.5 billion, and the board of directors surrounded him demanding an explanation, with some already privately discussing his successor.
If it hadn't been for Saionji's check, he probably would have gone for a "bungee jump without a cord" right then and there.
Later, when the Ministry of Finance examiners moved in, it was he who led the risk screening team through two grueling months, cooking the books of five core enterprises so the examiners couldn't find any major flaws.
Whenever the settlement period arrived, whether a loan should be rolled over or a bad debt moved off-balance-sheet, the proposals were all drafted by his people, and the executive director meeting only needed to sign the last page.
After spring, the screening of various branch offices, the custody of confidential materials, and the dealings with the Banking Bureau of the Ministry of Finance were all his responsibility.
When these people signed, they never asked where those bad debts ultimately went.
They only knew that if things were handed over to Kagawa, they would settle down.
Kagawa lowered his eyes, looking at the blue folder spread out before him.
However, judging by the results, this actually facilitated his work.
The instructions from the main family were "make the problem bigger."
Therefore, today's tableful of bad news was basically caused by his indulgence or even his own personal promotion.
Now they were all crammed into the same quarter, and the only solution these people could think of was naturally to look at him.
Kagawa went over those three expiration dates in his mind again.
The timeline was so tight, and the board of directors panicked to this extent; the fuss he could make this time was even greater than he had anticipated.
The task entrusted to him by the eldest miss looked like it would be completed before long.
He closed the blue folder in front of him and turned to the last page of the list from the risk screening team.
"President, everyone. Before discussing what to do, I'd like to clarify one thing first."
His fingers pressed against the last three lines.
"On October 25th, a loan for Fuyo General Development matures, and we need to add about 8.5 billion to pay interest and maintain the construction site in Makuhari."
"On November 8th, a commercial paper of a Fuyo-affiliated construction company matures, and we are its backup credit line bank, with a quota of 43 billion."
"At the end of November, a Fuyo-affiliated industrial enterprise applied to renew a batch of import letters of credit, amounting to 26 billion."
"All three of these are crammed into six weeks."
He looked at Tanimoto.
"Executive Director Tanimoto, if these three come to Fuji at the same time, which one should we save first?"
Tanimoto opened his mouth, but made no sound.
Kagawa turned to the financial executive director.
"If we save all three, how much will it take?"
The financial executive director lowered his head and calculated quickly.
"The new credit is close to 78 billion. Based on the current risk weight, the capital ratio will drop by more than another 0.1."
"Then, where does this money come from?"
The meeting room fell silent; once it involved issues of asking for money, generally no one would make a peep.
Kagawa waited for two seconds, his tone instead slowing down.
"Therefore, my point is not not to save. It's that we can no longer be like before, saving whoever comes."
Okabe's body leaned forward slightly.
"What plan do you have?"
"We need to ensure three things."
"First, starting today, the enterprises on the risk screening team's list will no longer be handled by the business headquarters and branch offices themselves. Additional loans, rollovers, and collateral changes must all be submitted to the Risk Management Department for review first."
Tanimoto's eyelids twitched. The business headquarters' line that most frequently added loans to protect clients was right under his command.
"Second, we will not conduct large-scale asset sales at this juncture. Selling now will immediately solidify book losses, and if the market sees Fuji dumping things, it will only become more nervous."
"First compress new credit to protect liquidity. Overseas, please Executive Director Mikami go talk to the interbank lenders one by one, and the Risk Management Department will prepare the exposure explanatory materials for the New York branch."
Mikami nodded, considering it accepted.
"Third, loan renewal applications from Fuyo-affiliated core enterprises will be reviewed case by case from now on. The Risk Management Department will issue review opinions first, and then it will be submitted to the board meeting."
Tanimoto heavily tapped his cigarette case on the desktop.
"Reviewed case by case? Kagawa-kun, do you know once these words get out—"
"Externally, not a single word."
Kagawa didn't let him finish.
"To the Fuyo Association, it's still the same as before. It's that internally, before every sum of money goes out, we calculate clearly how much is left after this sum goes out."
He looked at Tanimoto.
"Those three transactions just now, 78 billion, if approved together according to the past practice, by the settlement in March next year, I think the Banking Bureau of the Ministry of Finance will be very happy to send a new president over to clean up this mess for everyone."
Tanimoto's lips moved, but ultimately he didn't speak.
Kagawa withdrew his gaze and looked at Okabe.
"It hasn't reached the point of being out of control yet, President."
"As long as we don't proactively make large-scale impairments at this juncture, the first-half financial statements can be published normally. Problem enterprises can also be dealt with one by one."
Okabe looked at him, and after quite a while, slowly nodded.
"When the Ministry of Finance people came last year, it was also Kagawa-kun who stepped forward to smooth things over."
He raised his voice a little bit.
"Handle it according to what Kagawa-kun said. The disposal of key risk enterprises will be uniformly assigned to the Risk Management Department. Additional applications from Fuyo-affiliated core enterprises will be submitted to the meeting case by case."
He glanced at Mikami again.
"Mikami-kun, New York and London, thank you for making the trip."
Several people lowered their heads and acknowledged.
The atmosphere in the meeting room relaxed a bit.
Someone reached out to pick up the tea in front of them that had already gone cold, and someone subconsciously wanted to make annotations in the folder, but as soon as their hand picked up the pen, they put it down again—this material would not be made public, and would be collected immediately after the meeting.
Full-time Corporate Auditor Hori, sitting at the non-voting seat by the wall, raised his hand slightly at this moment.
"President Okabe, I have a small procedural matter I'd like to confirm."
Okabe looked at him.
Hori's tone was very ordinary.
"Vice President Kagawa just mentioned that the Risk Management Department hosted internal screenings of various branch offices this year."
"The Corporate Auditor's Office would like to ask the Risk Management Department to submit this year's branch office inspection schedule, including arrangements for surprise inspections and seal verification. This is to facilitate our annual audit report."
Kagawa nodded.
"No problem. Within next week, I will have General Manager Murase deliver it to the Corporate Auditor's Office."
"Sorry to trouble you."
Hori lowered his head, wrote a line in his small notebook, and closed it.
When the meeting adjourned, the Secretariat staff responsible for collecting the materials were already waiting at the door.
The directors handed back the blue folders one by one, and she checked off the numbers one by one in the registration book.
Mikami passed by Kagawa's side and patted him on the shoulder.
"Troubling you again, Kagawa-kun. I'll wait for the materials from New York."
"I'll give them to you the day after tomorrow."
Mikami nodded and walked out quickly.
Tanimoto walked behind.
He handed the folder to the Secretariat staff, watched her check off the number in the registration book, then turned around and smiled at Kagawa.
"Kagawa-kun is very well-informed lately. Whether it's the Ministry of Finance or the American side, you always know a step earlier than the rest of us."
"Being in charge of these windows, one naturally has to pay more attention."
"Is that so."
Tanimoto tucked his cigarette case back into his suit's inner pocket and walked out.
The last one to leave was Okabe.
He walked to the door and looked back once.
"Before the end of the year, hold on through it first."
He looked at Kagawa, lowering his voice a bit.
"I'm counting on you, Kagawa-kun."
Kagawa stood up and bowed deeply to him.
The door closed behind Okabe.
Kagawa's secretary was already waiting in the corridor.
Seeing him come out, the secretary opened the schedule book in his hand and took two steps to catch up.
"Vice President, at 1:30 this afternoon there is still—"
"Schedule as usual."
Kagawa didn't slow his pace, walked straight through the corridor, returned to the vice president's office, and pulled the door shut behind him.
He sat down behind his desk, opened his briefcase, and took out a black notebook from the innermost layer.
This thing never left his sight; he brought it on business trips and brought it home.
The first page recorded several key financings about to mature in late October and November.
Some of them had already appeared in the executive director meeting materials just now, and some hadn't.
Kagawa picked up his fountain pen and wrote a line of text next to today's date.
Key-observation enterprises: Additional loans, renewals, reviewed case by case. Risk Management Department issues opinions first.
After writing, the pen tip paused on the last few words.
A year ago, all he could do was submit the materials upward; whether to save or not was ultimately decided by the board of directors.
Even if he wanted to block a loan, he first had to pull enough people to stand on his side.
Starting today, it was different.
Enterprises on the list wanting to get money from Fuji again had to have their applications pass across his desk first.
He could request supplementary materials, re-rate them, demand additional collateral, or send a loan that ought to be directly renewed according to custom back to the executive director meeting for re-discussion.
Which company was already so weak that it could only survive by relying on Fuji's blood transfusions, when to continue hooking it up—the first opinion from today onward would be written by him.
The thing Endo wanted him to do in the board of directors last year finally had a tangible entry point as of today.
This matter must be let Saionji know as soon as possible.
As for specifically who to let live and who to stop, it should no longer be judged by him alone.
Kagawa closed the notebook and put it back into the innermost layer of the briefcase.
At noon, he had lunch with the financial general manager of an affiliated enterprise as usual.
The other party spent more than forty minutes explaining the fund arrangements for the fourth quarter of this year, and repeatedly assured him that orders would return next spring.
Kagawa listened very carefully, not missing a single question that should be asked, and when parting, politely reassured the other party that the head office would re-examine it according to normal procedures.
In fact, that enterprise's name was written on the second line of the second page of his notebook.
He didn't miss a single meeting in the afternoon.
After six o'clock, it started raining outside again, and the sky had grown completely dark.
Only then did Kagawa pull open the bottom drawer of his desk and take out a brown kraft paper envelope.
He used this kind of envelope once a month.
According to the usual cycle, this month's had already been sent out at the beginning of October, containing the internal ratings of late September and the monthly transaction flows of the Tobashi Account; everything that should be given to Saionji was complete without omission.
The same envelope was placed on the desk once more, and Kagawa himself stared at it for several seconds.
The executive director meeting materials from the morning could not leave the head office, nor did he intend to copy a complete set of figures again.
Ultimately, the only thing put into the envelope was a very thin piece of paper.
Resolution of today's executive director meeting: Subsequent additional financing and maturing renewals for key-observation enterprises will be subject to pre-review case by case by the Risk Management Department starting immediately.
Starting in late October, multiple risk exposures will centrally enter the renewal cycle.
Akasaka also has its first batch maturing on October 28th.
Kagawa wrote the last line very slowly.
Hope to arrange a face-to-face meeting.
He read through the words on the paper from beginning to end, confirmed that no one's name was written, then folded it up, put it into the envelope, and sealed it.
In the bottom right corner of the envelope was a small mark identical to every one in the past.
At 7:20, Kagawa left the head office.
The driver drove toward Denenchofu as usual.
When the car passed Toranomon, Kagawa in the back seat suddenly raised his head.
"Stop up ahead."
The driver glanced at him through the rearview mirror.
"Vice President?"
"I have some temporary personal business, wait in the car."
The car stopped beside an inconspicuous small street.
Kagawa opened his umbrella, walked less than 300 meters along the damp sidewalk, and entered an unmarked small building.
The second floor was a small tax accountant's office.
The young female receptionist at the front desk clearly recognized him.
She didn't call him by name, but just stood up and bowed slightly inward.
"Please wait a moment."
A few minutes later, a man in his forties came out from the inner room.
Without pleasantries, Kagawa directly took out that brown envelope from his briefcase.
Seeing the envelope, the man was stunned for a moment.
This month's stuff had clearly been sent out at the beginning of the month.
His gaze paused on the envelope for half a second before rising again.
"Still the same location?"
"Mn."
Kagawa handed the envelope over.
The man reached out to catch it and weighed it; the inside was so thin it almost had no weight.
"Is there a time requirement?"
Kagawa was silent for a moment.
"Today."
The man's expression finally changed a bit.
Over the past year, those envelopes had always been sent according to a fixed cycle; nobody cared if it was a day early or a day late, and Kagawa had never urged it even once.
He didn't ask further.
"I understand."
Kagawa nodded and turned to walk out.
When his hand touched the door handle, he stopped again.
"And one more thing."
The man raised his head.
Kagawa had his back to him, his voice not loud.
"Please tell the managing director that this envelope cannot wait until next month."
Having said that, he pushed open the door.
The rain outside was still falling, and as soon as the umbrella was opened, the dense sound of rain fell again.
The door behind him quickly closed.
That envelope, which shouldn't have appeared at this time, remained on the second floor.