Dealing with a Banking Crisis: What Lessons Can Be Learned from Japan's Experience?

Abstract

This article examines Japan’s policies in dealing with its banking crisis during the 1991–2004 period, in order to draw lessons for policymakers today. Japan’s policy choices reflected a difficult trade-off between the need to contain moral hazard on the one hand, and the need to limit systemic risk on the other. The resolution of the crisis ultimately required recapitalising banks and resolving uncertainty over banks’ asset valuations.