| The Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission (SESC) conducted 
                an inspection of CIBC World Markets (Japan) Inc., Tokyo Branch 
                (CIBC), based on provisions of the Law on Foreign Securities Firms 
                (LFSF), and found legal violations described below.
 Today, the SESC sent a recommendation to the Prime Minister and 
                the Commissioner of Financial Services Agency (FSA) to take a 
                disciplinary action against CIBC pursuant to Article 20(1) of 
                the FSA Establishment Law.   Solicitation with promise of special profit 
            In November 1997, CIBC proposed a corporate customer a scheme 
                  to defer a loss of a note, which was nearly of no value at this 
                  time, with adding new fund. In this scheme, a pecuniary profit 
                  was also promised to be provided to the customer. Consequently 
                  the whole process was purported to avoid the realization of 
                  a loss from the original note.
In October 1998, CIBC also promised a corporate customer 
                  that, when it made an advance payment for a new note to a checking 
                  account in a CIBC-affiliated bank, CIBC would add interests 
                  upon the new note, corresponding to the duration of the deposit, 
                  in fact that the checking account itself does not normally produce 
                  any interests. (Violation of a Ministerial Ordinance, Article 50 (1) (vi) of 
                the Security and Exchange Law, including the application of Article 
                17 (1) of the LFSF prior to the amendment of December 1st 1998 
                is applied.) |