Japan to expand Dollar loan program

The Japanese government said Tuesday it will continue to encourage companies in the country to boost their overseas investments and benefit from the strength of the yen, by expanding its dollar loan program to support such moves. Japanese Finance Minister Jun Azumi told reporters that Tokyo has decided to extend the deadline for the loan facility by six months into March 2013. Under the 10 trillion yen program, introduced last summer, the government offers dollar loans from its foreign exchange reserves to companies by way of the Japan Bank for International Cooperation, a state-owned policy financing institution, to prompt merger and acquisition deals for foreign firms and other investments such as in overseas energy development projects, Japan's news agency (Kyodo) reported.