TWO-WEEK SALES BAN LIKELY AT MITSUI-SUMITOMO

Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) is likely to impose a two-week sales ban on Mitsui-Sumitomo Insurance as a penalty for its non-payment or incorrect payment of about 30,000 insurance claims. The ban will apply to non-life products and to medical insurance products throughout the Mitsui-Sumitomo distribution chain, reports Nikkei . The FSA will make a formal announcement at 5pm today local time, when it is also expected to announce that it would not be authorising any new products at the insurer before it has shown an improvement in its internal supervision system. Mitsui-Sumitomo’s failure to pay a number of insurance claims between 2002 and 2005 was attributed to “serious flaws” in its office administration.