Fast Retailing Co. said Thursday the brisk performances of its Uniqlo casual clothing brand in overseas markets helped lift the group's profits in the first half, but also downgraded full-year estimates by citing slowing sales in Japan.

Finance chiefs of the Group of 20 major economies will discuss ways to promote free trade as a driver for global growth, Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said Thursday ahead of the start of a two-day meeting in Washington.

The major U.S. stock indexes closed unevenly Thursday after an early rally gave way to a mostly sideways day of trading on Wall Street.

Fossil bones and teeth found in the Philippines have revealed a long-lost cousin of modern people, which evidently lived around the time our own species was spreading from Africa to occupy the rest of the world.

The International Monetary Fund forecast Tuesday that Japan's economy will grow 1.0 percent in 2019, down 0.1 percentage point from its estimate in January, due partly to sluggish exports amid a slowdown in the global economy.

Toyota Motor Corp. is considering offering Suzuki Motor Corp. a hybrid system for global sales and enhancing a joint car development project for India, according to an expanded tie-up deal unveiled Wednesday.

China's exports and imports plummeted much more than expected in February, official data showed Friday, adding to worries about slowing growth in the world's number two economy as it fights a trade war with the U.S.

TOKYO -- Japanese companies will be required to list lease contracts as assets on their balance sheets under planned accounting rule changes, a move that would erode their return on assets but increase the transparency of corporate finances.

Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies Co. is preparing to sue the U.S. government for barring federal agencies from using the company's products, the New York Times said in its Monday online edition, citing two anonymous sources.

Humorist Dave Barry, in his 1992 book “Dave Barry Does Japan,” wrote that as his family traveled the country, “nobody ever told us we couldn’t do anything, although it turned out that there were numerous things we couldn’t do.”

Over 7,000 cases of suspected money laundering linked to cryptocurrencies were reported to police in 2018, the National Police Agency said Thursday.

According to REINS, 2,667 second-hand apartments were reported to have sold across greater Tokyo in January, down 10.7% from the previous month but up 1.0% from January 2018. The average sale price was 32,940,000 Yen, down 2.5% from the previous month and down 1.9% from last year.