Japanese bank profits are recovering at the same time as the banks are increasing their capital ratios, but they are growing their asset books only very slowly - quite a feat since deleveraging the balance sheet usually causes profits to fall.
Using figures from the total universe of Japanese banks (172) in The Banker database, rather than just the Top 100 in this year's ranking, shows that aggregate profits have increased 274%, while aggregate capital has increased 21% and total assets by a mere 3% for the financial year ending March 2010.
