Nissan Motor Co chief executive officer Hiroto Saikawa yesterday said that he received more pay than he was entitled to, but denied wrongdoing.
“I left the issue to someone else, so I had thought it was dealt with in an appropriate manner,” he told reporters in Tokyo.
He denied any wrongdoing and said he would return the excess payments.
The statement came after Japanese media reported that an internal Nissan probe found that Saikawa and other executives received more equity-linked remuneration than they were entitled to.
The automaker said that the “findings from Nissan’s internal investigation are scheduled to be reported to the board of directors on September 9.”
“We have heard that share appreciation rights will also be part of this report,” it said, declining to comment further.
The Nikkei business daily reported that Saikawa was suspected of improperly adding ¥47 million (US$441,000) to his compensation by altering the terms of a bonus.
However, Nissan does not believe the overpayment was illegal, the Kyodo news agency reported, citing unnamed sources.
The overpayments were made in a scheme known as stock appreciation right, under which directors can receive a bonus if their company’s share price rises above a certain level in a set period.
Nissan is undergoing an overhaul intended to strengthen governance after a scandal over the arrest and ouster of former chairman Carlos Ghosn, who is accused of wrongdoing, including misrepresenting his compensation.
In June, Nissan shareholders voted in favor of measures including the establishment of three new oversight committees responsible for the appointment of senior officials, pay issues and auditing.
They also approved the election of 11 directors as the firm restructures, among them two Renault executives and Saikawa.
Tatsuo Yoshida, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence, told reporters that Saikawa’s “leadership authority is jeopardized” by the pay issue.
Already weakened by the Ghosn fallout, Saikawa’s standing as CEO is “even more fragile than before,” Yoshida said.
“Before, the chances of his resignation were maybe 30 percent, the chances are now 50-50 or even higher,” he said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last