Japanese central banker speaks out on his alleged involvement in the Ghosn transaction

FUKUOKA, Japan (Reuters) – A Bank of Japan board member declined to comment on Thursday on a media report that it was involved in an alleged attempt by former Nissan Chairman Carlos Ghosn to transferring personal investment losses to the car manufacturer while she worked in a sales agency. bank.

Japanese tabloid Shukan Bunshun reported Thursday that, as an executive at Shinsei Bank Ltd, Takako Masai was involved in an alleged attempt by Ghosn to pass 1.7 billion yen ($15 million) in personal losses to Nissan related to derivatives trading suffered during the 2008 financial crisis. The suspected transaction was first reported by the Asahi newspaper on Tuesday.

“I would like to refrain from commenting on individual transactions due to my duty of confidentiality,” Masai told a news conference after meeting business executives in Fukuoka, southern Japan.

“I also cannot comment on individual transactions carried out by Shinsei Bank.” The bank also declined to comment on Shukan Bunshun's report.

Citing an unnamed former Shinsei Bank official, the tabloid said a team of bank officials, including Masai, had sought to have Ghosn's investment losses transferred to the automaker on the condition that he obtain approval from Nissan's board of directors.

The attempt was later aborted after securities regulators inspected Shinsei Bank and Nissan and disapproved the idea, the tabloid said.

Masai joined the BOJ in 2016 after serving as an executive at Shinsei Bank from 2007.

($1 = 113.2600 yen)

(Reporting by Leika Kihara, additional reporting by Kaori Kaneko; editing by Chang-Ran Kim and Muralikumar Anantharaman)