Japanese bank Mizuho Financial to shed 19,000 jobs as profit falls 12%

Major Japanese bank Mizuho Financial Group said today it aimed to slash 19,000 jobs over the next decade as it announced a 12-per cent drop in its first-half profits.

The lender said it would cut its current workforce of around 79,000 in Japan and overseas by about a quarter by March 2027 and shut down 100 domestic locations.

Japan's lenders have seen profits squeezed after the Bank of Japan last year adopted a negative interest rate policy to work alongside its massive asset-purchase programme as part of a drive to kickstart lending and stoke inflation.

In September, Mizuho rival Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group said it planned to cut about 9,500 jobs, or around one quarter of its workforce, within seven years.

Fellow banking giant Sumitomo Mitsui said in May it will reduce what it described as the workload equivalent of 4,000 jobs by March 2021.