Talk:Kabushiki gaisha/Archives/2011

Pronunciation?

What's the difference between Kabushiki Kaisha and Kabushiki Gaisha? Just iffy romanization? -- Mikeblas 03:57, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

It's just a difference in regional pronunciation in Japan. There are many words where this happens (kurai and gurai, for example). Both are used, so both are mentioned at the beginning of the article. --nihon 05:53, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

”Both kabushiki kaisha and the rendaku form kabushiki gaisha are commonly used” -- is that so? Isn't it misleading (or could even be incorrect)? Well I admit I've spent most of the 20+ years of my life in eastern Japanese (Hokkaido and Kanto) but it is also true that I never heard kabushiki-Kaisha. I thought it's always rendaku^ja:ed and becomes kabushiki-Gaisha. To be specific, in what region is it pronounced as kabushiki-Kaisha? Although many companies seem to write KK, for pronunciation kabushiki-Kaisha is not so common I feel... To tell the truth, I didn't know **-Kaisha for writing the own name is in so widespread use until reading this article. I was a bit surprised.

Also note this 'rendaku' is applied not just to kabushiki- but also to the others. Any **会社 is (always, I think) pronounced as **-gaisha; see for example articles on Japanese Wikipedia: ja:株式会社, ja:有限会社, ja:合名会社, ja:合資会社, etc. -- for their readings you'll find **がいしゃ (**-Gaisha), not **かいしゃ (**-Kaisha). Here, **-kaisha do not appear even as options. Clearly, these readings reflect how they (only kanto-jin?) pronounce them. Another examples include 大会社 (dai-Gaisha // large corporation; also 大企業 dai-kigyou) or 子会社 (ko-Gaisha // subsidiary).

Why does this 'rendaku' so frequently happen for -kaisha? Probably simply it's hard to say **-Kaisha for a native Japanese speaker. - marsian 12:18, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

In Hiroshima Prefecture (where I lived for a few years), I always heard "kabushiki kaisha". It's like the "kurai/gurai" pronunciation: it just depends on where you're from. --日本穣 Nihonjoe 23:41, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I really didn't know that. When I see a person from Hiroshima I'll try to ask him/her. - marsian 06:32, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

And it may just be in the area where I lived (northeastern Hiroshima-ken) since they had their own "-ben" there (called "Saijō-ben) and said quite a few things differently than people from Hiroshima-shi. --日本穣 Nihonjoe 16:49, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Might this have something to do with the speed at which people speak? I mean, I can't say "kabushiki kaisha" in conversation without a rendaku slipping its way in. But I'm high on caffeine all the time, too. Perhaps in your part of Hiroshima, people just don't speak as quickly? - Sekicho 08:23, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

No, people spoke quite quickly there, but they definitely said "kaisha." --日本穣 Nihonjoe 23:12, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Hard to say. I'm not sure the "regional" argument is correct either (though I'd love to see some evidence). Where I work (a Tokyo law firm that incorporates companies on a regular basis), we always use "KK" and "kabushiki kaisha" in our English translations and correspondence. That's also the convention I've seen used by other firms, Japanese and Western, scattered around town. It's also what's used in a couple of English texts on Japanese law I have sitting on my bookshelf. On the other hand, the IRS regulations on pass-through entities use the "gaisha" spelling, so it isn't totally universal. Maybe the "kaisha" spelling is used to avoid confusing people unfamiliar with Japanese, who hear about companies being called "kaisha" and then see a bunch of companies called "gaisha." Or maybe old habits just die hard, who knows.

Google says: 955,000 hits for "kabushiki kaisha," and 37,100 for "kabushiki gaisha." However, 159,000 hits for "かぶしきがいしゃ" and 23,600 for "かぶしきかいしゃ" ... Also, I must say that when I see "gaisha" in romaji, I always think of '57 Ford Thunderbirds. - Sekicho 17:28, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, "gaisha" alone is not used for company, as far as I know. - marsian 06:32, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

It is gaisha. There is no doubt. The JPN page also sticks with this spelling. KK is a misunderstanding from earlier english "translations." 204.210.111.213 (talk) 08:11, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

The article should be moved to Kabushiki gaisha. There is no Kabushiki kaish entry on online ja dictionaries, 大辞泉 and 大辞林. Both dictionaries have a Kabushiki gaisha entry. [1]. and [2]. Oda Mari (talk) 17:22, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Investment Capital

I am not exactly sure when it changed (it is probably part of the 会社法) but investment capital is now only 8,000,000円. Some of the laws regarding the board members are significantly different as well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.2.42.120 (talk • contribs)

Interchangability

I work for a firm that works with a lot of company names and while they are officially registered as a KK or KG they seem to use both "Corporation" and "Company Limited" as the English version. Is this possible and if so, shouldn't it be mentioned? 78.32.103.125 (talk) 23:15, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

I see this is now the case! Good work! 78.32.103.125 (talk) 00:24, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Article name

If the official translation is "Stock corporation," why not use that name? WhisperToMe (talk) 05:44, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Spelling

I believe the discussion above about Pronunciation carried the wrong focus. Wikipedia is a print medium. What matters is not pronunciation, but spelling. Basically, the problem is that in Japanese this phrase is written primarily in kanji, so the romanization is ambiguous because of regional dialects where some pronounce it as gaisha and others pronounce it as kaisha. In accordance with Wikipedia naming convention, I believe the determining factor is which spelling is more common in romanized print. A google search turns up over 3 million hits for "kabushiki kaisha", and about 200k for "kabushiki gaisha". The previous discussion states that online Japanese dictionaries don't contain kaisha but do contain gaisha. However, according to the MOS[3] Japanese terms should be romanized according to most common usage in English, including unconventional romanization of titles and names. Therefore, based on Wikipedia's guidelines it would seem that the article should be named Kabushiki kaisha, as it was originally, because that is by far the more common romanization. It was moved to the current title in November 2008 with unsubstantiated reasoning that this was the proper form.[4] Ham Pastrami (talk) 04:58, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't know what to say about the Google searches; I never hear "kabushikaisha" in Japanese, so I would have agreed with Hoary on this one. I was corrected from "kaisha" to "gaisha" by my Japanese friend when I even tried to ask this question. The Japanese Wikipedia lists only かぶしきがいしゃ as a transliteration. This appears to be one of those cases in which the most common transliteration is outright wrong... but I think that if you want to move this back, you're going to have to argue that "kabushiki kaisha" is now an English term. The section you're quoting is meant for treatment of English titles and things that have become English words of Japanese origin, whereas this appears to me to be a question of straightforward transliteration. Is "kabushiki kaisha" an English phrase? Dekimasuよ! 04:16, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Although a general survey of this in Japanese refers to the same dictionary entries that are mentioned here, if you have a chance to take a look at the comments at the bottom of this blog entry, the suggestion is raised that the word may have a different reading in normal and legal contexts: "「もしかしたら法律用語だと『かぶしきかいしゃ』になるのかも？」と思い、手元にある有斐閣発行の『ポケット六法（平成１６年度）』を見てみましたが、読みまでは記載されていない事、そして私の不勉強により確認は出来ませんでした。有名な例で法律用語になると、『競売』も「きょうばい」ではなく「けいばい」と読むので、その様に考えてみたのですが…。" The blogger wasn't able to figure it out himself. If the "kaisha" reading is an artifact of legalese, then perhaps we should only be considering the English hits where it is mentioned in running text for laypeople, as opposed to in a particular company name or a legal context. Dekimasuよ! 04:43, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for your research effort. I don't think "kabushiki k/gaisha" is actually used in English contexts (if it were, this would be much easier to figure out). But rather, it is how Japanese companies decide to romanize their company names. The issue with the KK being an artifact of incorrect romanzation in legal texts is interesting, but I'm just as confused as to how this would apply to naming on the English wiki. Would it perhaps be more sensible to write the article up as something like Corporations in Japan, as a subtopic for Corporation#Japan, instead of using the Japanese transliteration to title an English article? Ham Pastrami (talk) 23:28, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Corporations in Japan seems like a reasonable compromise to me. As far as how each individual company chooses to transliterate its name, proper nouns are treated separately in the MOS and the title of this article shouldn't have any effect on them. On the other hand, we do generally deprecate adding things like "Inc." to the ends of articles on businesses (I've forgotten where exactly... maybe WP:MOS-TM?), so we might want to exclude "KK" for similar reasons. Dekimasuよ! 05:56, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm familiar with the guideline on omitting Inc etc. from titles, but the legal status is included in the lead paragraph, so the translation and romanization in {{nihongo}} templates probably needs to include it also. For individual companies and their chosen romanization, is there a business registry of Japan that can be used to look up this information? Ham Pastrami (talk) 07:06, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I'd never really thought about it before, so I'm not sure. For companies listed on the JSE, you can take a look at this search tool in English; that gives lots of company names with "Ltd.", but not any that I could see using "KK" or "Kabushiki kaisha", etc. The equivalent Japanese tool doesn't lend furigana to the kanji, so there's not any way to figure out the preferred transliteration. Dekimasuよ! 08:56, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Stock buybacks are allowed?

The text of this article says stock buybacks are not allowed, but this article in NY times details a buyback of Toyota stock and this article (not notable or authoritative, but provides details that could be used with proper citation from elsewhere) also hints that the stock buyback rules have been relaxed. However, I am unable to find a definite citation about stock buyback rules and possible taxes in Japan. Anyone have information? Tcrow777 ^Talk 05:27, 30 December 2009 (UTC)