Which Japan Grew

Japan grew 34.7 percent last year. Japan also grew 22.7 percent. Japan also grew 18.7 percent. The three figures cover the same twelve months, ended 31 December 2025, at ASICS Corporation; the first two are printed as rates in the company's own filings, and the third is a division of two amounts it prints. ASICS Japan went from ¥94.5 billion to ¥127.2 billion (US$577 million to US$777 million), printed at page 31 of the English summary under Change +32.7 and % Change +34.7; the rounded pair divides to 34.6, so the first of the three is read off the page rather than recomputed from it. The Japan reportable segment went from ¥166,432 million to ¥204,236 million (US$1,016.1 million to US$1,246.9 million), with 22.7 printed beside those two amounts in the segment table's 増減率 column. Sales to customers located in Japan went from ¥133,467 million to ¥158,442 million (US$814.8 million to US$967.3 million), which is 158,442 ÷ 133,467 − 1 = 18.7 percent.

All three settle onto one number. Consolidated net sales for the year were ¥810,916 million (US$4,950.6 million), up 19.5 percent, and operating profit ¥142,519 million (US$870.1 million), up 42.4 percent. Everything below is a way of cutting those two figures, and the cuts run on three dials: which entities sit inside the line, which currency basis the growth is measured on, and which twelve months the number belongs to.

Start with scope. The Japan line in the management discussion is ¥204,236 million. The Japan line in the segment note, headed sales to external customers, is ¥156,385 million (US$954.7 million). The difference is ¥47,851 million (US$292.1 million), and the same note prints that figure directly: its inter-segment row gives Japan ¥47,851 million against a total of ¥48,164 million (US$294.0 million) eliminated in consolidation, 47,851 ÷ 48,164 = 99.3 percent of it. The other six inter-segment lines are ¥277 million (US$1.7 million) for Greater China, ¥35 million (US$0.2 million) for Southeast and South Asia, zero for Other Regions, and a dash for North America, Europe and Oceania.

Those seven printed lines add to ¥48,163 million (US$294.0 million), one million yen (US$6,105) below the printed total; read instead as differences between the two tables — 120,514 − 120,236 gives ¥278 million (US$1.7 million) where the line prints ¥277 million, 52,078 − 52,077 gives ¥1 million where the line prints zero — the same seven add to ¥48,165 million (US$294.0 million), one million above it. The tanshin prints its consolidated results with amounts below one million yen truncated, by its own note, and a table of eight components shows what that convention does to a total: the printed external sales by segment add to ¥810,746 million against a printed segment total of ¥810,750 million (US$4,949.6 million on either count), a difference of ¥4 million (US$24,420), consistent with truncation. Lower down, ¥148,390 million (US$905.9 million) of segment profit less the ¥5,870 million (US$35.8 million) adjustment gives ¥142,520 million (US$870.1 million) against consolidated operating profit of ¥142,519 million. For the rest of this piece, pairs are compared rather than columns summed.

The same table exists for the year before and for the quarter after. In the 71st-term securities report, for the year ended 31 December 2024, the Japan segment is ¥124,780 million (US$761.8 million) of sales to external customers and ¥41,652 million (US$254.3 million) of inter-segment sales, ¥166,432 million (US$1,016.1 million) in total, with segment profit of ¥27,673 million (US$168.9 million): 27,673 ÷ 166,432 = 16.6 percent. The other six inter-segment lines that year are ¥29 million (US$0.2 million) for Europe, ¥66 million (US$0.4 million) for Greater China, ¥8 million (US$48,840) for Oceania, ¥168 million (US$1.0 million) for Southeast and South Asia, ¥1 million (US$6,105) for Other Regions, and a dash for North America. That table also carries a column outside the reportable segments, headed Other and given as running services and sports facility operation, and an adjustment of −¥41,658 million, which converts to the same US$254.3 million as the Japan line six million yen (US$36,630) below it. One quarter forward, in the first-quarter tanshin dated 13 May 2026, the inter-segment row reads Japan ¥12,782 million (US$78.0 million), Greater China ¥5 million (US$30,525), a dash in every other column, a total of ¥12,787 million (US$78.1 million) and an adjustment of −¥12,787 million; the same quarter a year earlier reads Japan ¥11,250 million (US$68.7 million) and a dash everywhere else. The quarterly table carries the Other column as well.

Regional profitability is computable, and the formula is the plain one: segment profit ÷ segment sales. Japan, 44,734 ÷ 204,236 = 21.9 percent (¥44,734 million is US$273.1 million). Europe, 36,746 ÷ 225,805 = 16.3 percent (US$224.3 million on US$1,378.5 million). North America, 16,018 ÷ 141,192 = 11.3 percent (US$97.8 million on US$862.0 million). Greater China comes out at 20.8 percent, Southeast and South Asia at 22.0 percent, Oceania at 16.0 percent, Others at 15.6 percent. All seven reproduce the operating margins printed at page 32 of the English summary, so the division a reader would perform is the division the company performed.

The formula is uniform. The denominators are not built the same way. For North America, Europe and Oceania, segment sales and external sales are the identical printed figure — ¥141,192 million, ¥225,805 million, ¥49,649 million (US$303.1 million) — so the margin is profit over sales to customers. For Greater China, Southeast and South Asia and Other Regions the two differ by the ¥277 million and ¥35 million above, and by nothing at all. On the last two that moves no margin at the printed resolution — 22.0 percent and 15.6 percent on either denominator. On Greater China it moves one: 25,099 ÷ 120,514 is 20.8 percent, the figure printed at page 32, and 25,099 ÷ 120,236 is 20.9 percent (¥25,099 million is US$153.2 million, on US$735.7 million and US$734.0 million). For Japan they differ by ¥47,851 million, which the note prints as Japan's own inter-segment line — ¥47,851 million of the ¥48,164 million eliminated in consolidation. The 21.9 percent and the 11.3 percent are one formula on two kinds of denominator. Which of the two a reader wants depends on the question, and both tables are on file.

Both tables are asked for, by different paragraphs of one standard. ASICS files under Japanese GAAP, and Accounting Standards Board of Japan Statement No. 17 separates segment information from what it calls related information: paragraph 29 requires the related information — products and services, geography, major customers — except where the same information is already disclosed inside the segment information, and paragraph 31(1) requires sales to external customers classified between domestic and overseas, with the basis on which the sales were classified stated alongside, its なお書き permitting amounts for grouped regions such as North America and Europe to be given in addition. Paragraph 25 requires the difference between the reportable segments' totals and the amounts carried in the financial statements to be disclosed, material items separately; paragraph 26 allows the profit line used for that reconciliation to be operating profit, ordinary profit, pre-tax profit, net income or profit attributable to owners of the parent, whichever is judged appropriate, and requires the line chosen to be stated. The basis for conclusions defines the management approach as taking as its base the way management has divided the enterprise into components in order to make decisions and evaluate performance, and says the method of segmentation and the method of measurement are not limited to any particular one. Two Japans, two paragraphs.

Inside the Japan region there is a second dial. The English pages show ASICS Japan on its own, the entity selling the five product categories, with comparability across regions given as the basis, and note that the Japan region also contains ASICS Trading and NISHI Athletic Goods. ASICS Japan: ¥127.2 billion of sales, ¥38.1 billion (US$233 million) of operating profit, 30.0 percent. Japan region: ¥204.2 billion, ¥44.7 billion, 21.9 percent. The residual — ¥77.0 billion (US$470 million) of sales and ¥6.6 billion (US$40 million) of profit — is of the same order as the ¥47,851 million (US$292.1 million) by which the region's segment sales exceed its sales to external customers, a figure the segment note prints on its own line; the sales side of that residual therefore carries intra-group transfers, and no margin is taken on it here. The note that produces the residual gives its contents as company names rather than as amounts, and the inter-segment line is printed for the region, not for the companies inside it.

The third array of Japan is the geographic note, where sales are classified by the location of the customer into five buckets rather than seven segments. Japan there is ¥158,442 million, against ¥156,385 million of external sales in the Japan segment, ¥2,057 million (US$12.6 million) apart. Europe is ¥209,689 million (US$1,280.2 million) by customer location and ¥225,805 million by segment. North America runs the other way: ¥145,477 million (US$888.1 million) by customer location against ¥141,192 million by segment. Two classifications, one total of ¥810,916 million.

That note has a prior year too. In the 71st-term report the five buckets read Japan ¥133,467 million (US$814.8 million), North America ¥139,131 million (US$849.4 million), Europe ¥168,683 million (US$1,029.8 million), Greater China ¥100,490 million (US$613.5 million) and Others ¥136,753 million (US$834.9 million), under the note's own statement that sales are based on the location of the customer. One of them can be carried across to the segment dial. Europe grew 209,689 ÷ 168,683 − 1 = 24.3 percent by customer location, against 25.9 percent by segment and 22.1 percent currency-neutral — three readings of one region over one year. Consolidated net sales for that prior year were ¥678,526 million (US$4,142.4 million), and 810,916 ÷ 678,526 − 1 = 19.5 percent, the rate printed for the year under discussion here.

The second dial is currency. Beside the yen growth rate sits a second column — 為替影響除く in the Japanese tables, currency-neutral in the English — and it carries a dash in the Japan row of the securities report and in the ASICS Japan row of the English regional table. Four documents carry the FY25 figures: the tanshin, the securities report, the Japanese results presentation and the English summary, three of them dated 13 February 2026 and the securities report filed on 4 March, nineteen days later.

The dash holds one quarter on. The FY26 first-quarter tanshin, dated 13 May 2026 and carrying 百万円未満切捨て on its cover, prints a dash for the Japan region in the 為替影響除く increase-rate column on both of its lines, net sales and segment profit, and prints a dash for Japan again in the supplementary tables of segment sales change and segment profit change on a foreign-currency basis. The other six carry figures in both places: on sales, North America 18.8 percent, Europe 27.2, Greater China 20.0, Oceania 12.4, Southeast and South Asia 28.7, Others 13.4; on segment profit, 6.2, 35.8, 54.0, −5.8, 37.6 and 16.9.

What the column does can be read off the rate table. Average translation rates moved from ¥163.66 to ¥169.09 per euro and from ¥99.86 to ¥96.78 per Australian dollar. Europe grew 25.9 percent in yen and 22.1 percent currency-neutral: 1.259 ÷ 1.221 = 1.031, against a euro 3.3 percent higher. Oceania grew 15.5 and 19.2: 1.155 ÷ 1.192 = 0.969, against an Australian dollar 3.1 percent lower. North America grew 4.6 and 5.8, implying 0.989, or −1.1 percent, while the average dollar rate moved from ¥151.36 to ¥150.32, −0.7 percent. A region is not a currency.

Product categories run on a separate axis with their own profit line: Performance Running ¥86.0 billion (US$525 million), Onitsuka Tiger ¥51.4 billion (US$314 million), Sportstyle ¥41.3 billion (US$252 million), Core Performance Sports ¥16.7 billion (US$102 million), Apparel and Equipment ¥5.9 billion (US$36 million). They sit in a table whose consolidated operating profit line is ¥142.5 billion (US$870 million). Where the two axes cross, they cross twice. Five category pages in the Japanese presentation and in the English summary print category-by-region net sales in yen — Core Performance Sports, at page 24 of the English summary, prints seven regional figures for FY25, 24.7 billion yen (US$151 million) for ASICS Japan through 4.8 billion yen (US$29 million) for Others — and two tables in the Japanese presentation give category-by-region and region-by-category sales mix in percentages. From FY26 the category axis is re-cut, with Apparel and Equipment renamed Apparel, and Walking shown on a line of its own.

The re-cut has since been printed. The FY26 first-quarter tanshin renames the Apparel and Equipment category to Apparel and shows Walking, previously undisclosed, as a category of its own, a change its note gives as made for the transparency of disclosure. The category table then runs six lines — Performance Running, Core Performance Sports, Apparel, Sportstyle, Onitsuka Tiger, Walking — with the year-earlier quarter restated onto the same six.

One line is arrayed on neither axis. Inbound sales in the Japan region went from ¥25.7 billion to ¥47.4 billion (US$157 million to US$289 million), up 84 percent, with Onitsuka Tiger moving from ¥21.9 billion (US$134 million) to ¥41.5 billion (US$253 million). The Japan segment's sales rose ¥37,804 million (US$230.8 million) over the same year. The inbound increase of ¥21.7 billion (US$132 million) is 21,700 ÷ 37,804 = 57.4 percent of that, with the caveat that the numerator and the denominator come from two documents wearing the same regional label.

Now the third dial. ASICS closes its books on 31 December. The tanshin is dated 13 February 2026, 44 days after the year end. The securities report for the 72nd term, 1 January to 31 December 2025, was filed on 4 March 2026, 63 days after. The general meeting is described in that filing as scheduled for 25 March 2026, 84 days after. Forty-four, sixty-three, eighty-four: the year is set down three times before the meeting that resolves on it. The cover of the securities report gives its authority as Article 24, paragraph 1 of the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act.

The interval is not a constant. The 71st term, 1 January to 31 December 2024, was filed on 31 March 2025, 90 days after the year end, against 63 days for the 72nd: the same form and the same filer, the two intervals 27 days apart. The form asks for two of the other dates. The exchange's preparation guide for results summaries provides a field on the summary cover for the scheduled date of the ordinary general meeting and a field for the scheduled filing date of the securities report, each to be stated as at the date of the results announcement. The same guide prints （百万円未満切捨て） as standing text on the reference form, gives truncation below one million yen as the treatment for amounts shown in millions while allowing rounding instead, rounds percentages to one decimal place, and asks that prior-year figures be stated after reflecting changes in accounting policy or presentation and corrections of error.

That has consequences on the page. The ¥16.00 (US$0.0977) year-end dividend appears in the securities report as a matter to be resolved at a meeting the document describes as scheduled, not held: filed 4 March, to be voted 25 March, three weeks apart. The English summary labels its fourth quarter October to December and its full year January to December, so the reporting periods carry the calendar's names. And by the time the year is presented, January of the following year is already on a slide, labelled preliminary.

The clock also runs at more than one speed inside one book. The financial statements in the securities report close on 31 December 2025. The materiality tables in the same filing carry 2024: OneASICS membership of 17.64 million against a 2026 target of 30 million, emissions down 43.1 percent for scopes one and two and 14.9 percent for scope three against a 63 percent target for 2030 on a 2015 base, and the filing states that the 2025 figures for those tables are to be published on the sustainability website around June 2026. The human-capital indicators later in the same item carry both years: women in management 38.7 percent for 2024 and 41.0 percent for 2025, against a 2026 target of 40 percent or more; engagement score 73 then 75. Two vintages, a few pages apart, of one filing's own measures.

Who reads all this is reported on a stated denominator. At 31 December 2025 a unit is 100 shares, and foreign corporations held 3,923,439 units of 7,341,296, printed as 53.44 percent; 3,923,439 ÷ 7,341,296 = 53.44 percent. The filing's own note prints where the treasury shares sit inside that denominator: of 25,846,871 treasury shares, 258,468 units are in the individuals-and-others row and 71 shares in the under-one-unit row. The denominator is the form's, and the note says what is inside it. Shares outstanding stood at 734,482,236 after 25,000,000 were cancelled on 28 February 2025.

The prior year's table is built the same way, on a larger holding. At 31 December 2024, of 43,740,506 treasury shares, 437,405 units sat in the individuals-and-others row and 6 shares in the under-one-unit row: 437,405 × 100 + 6 = 43,740,506. The note places the whole holding in two rows. The count above them moved twice in eighteen months — a split of one share into four on 1 July 2024 raised shares outstanding by 569,611,677 to 759,482,236, and the 25,000,000 cancelled on 28 February 2025 under the board resolution of 14 February took it to 734,482,236, which is 759,482,236 − 25,000,000.

For that readership the same figures appear at three scales. The tanshin and the securities report keep their statements in millions of yen, though the tanshin's outlook section, 今後の見通し, switches to 億円. The Japanese presentation counts in 億円, hundreds of millions. The English summary counts in billions of yen and carries an 億円 table inside it as well. Its regional labels run seven wide — Japan, North America, Europe, Greater China, Oceania, Southeast and South Asia, and a seventh printed Others, glossed as South America, Korea and so on, where the Japanese filings segment その他地域 — and in the regional net sales table the first is printed ASICS Japan, with the regional operating profit page opposite carrying the note that the Japan region includes ASICS Japan as well as companies such as ASICS Trading and Nishi Athletic. ¥204,236 million (US$1,246.9 million) in the securities report and 204.2 billion yen (US$1,247 million) in the English summary are the same Japan sales at two resolutions, and any comparison drawn across documents inherits the coarser one.

The 2026 plan sits on the same dials. Net sales ¥950.0 billion (US$5,800 million), operating profit ¥171.0 billion (US$1,044 million), an 18.0 percent operating margin, growth of 17.2 percent in yen and 16.7 percent currency-neutral. The assumed rates are ¥150.00 to the dollar, ¥170.00 to the euro and ¥21.00 to the renminbi, each within 0.6 percent of the FY25 average translation rates of ¥150.32, ¥169.09 and ¥20.93. The mid-term plan update published on 19 November 2024 assumed ¥150.00, ¥160.00 and ¥20.00.

A last figure arrayed three ways. The management discussion records a repurchase totalling ¥50.0 billion (US$305 million). The consolidated cash flow statement records ¥50,003 million (US$305.3 million) paid to acquire treasury shares. The tanshin's note on significant changes in shareholders' equity, at page 20, records two board resolutions, of 14 February and 12 November 2025, under which 6,515,500 and 8,072,900 shares were bought, both completed within the year, adding ¥19,999 million (US$122.1 million) and ¥29,999 million (US$183.1 million) — ¥49,998 million (US$305.2 million) — to treasury stock. A total in one statement, a payment in another, a carrying amount in a third, ¥5 million (US$30,525) between the widest pair. The management discussion's ¥50.0 billion is a repurchase total, the cash flow statement's ¥50,003 million is cash paid, and the tanshin note's ¥49,998 million is what the two resolutions added to treasury stock. Each is stated on its own basis.

There is a fourth scale, printed to the yen. Two completion notices set out the same purchases the tanshin note carries. Under the resolution of 14 February 2025, whose stated acquisition period ran from 17 February to 30 September, 6,515,500 shares were bought for ¥19,999,927,400 by market purchase on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, and the notice of 28 May 2025 states that the acquisition under that resolution ended with the purchases made to 27 May. Under the resolution of 12 November 2025, whose period ran to 31 January 2026, 8,072,900 shares were bought for ¥29,999,803,800, and the notice of 24 December states that it ended on 23 December. Both notices give the basis as Article 459, paragraph 1, item 1 of the Companies Act and article 39 of the articles of incorporation. Truncated below one million yen, the two amounts are ¥19,999 million and ¥29,999 million, which is what the tanshin note prints; added, they are ¥49,999,731,200, a fourth figure beside ¥50.0 billion, ¥50,003 million and ¥49,998 million.

The English summary sets down seven words at page 6, under the heading Regional Performance: "All regions showed sales and profit growth" (ASICS Corporation). Each dial carries it as far as its own lines go. The securities report's seven segments print sales and segment profit for both years, and all seven rise on both. The English summary's own regional tables print net sales and operating profit for FY24 and FY25 across the same seven, and all seven rise on both. The geographic note's five buckets carry sales alone — Japan ¥133,467 million to ¥158,442 million (US$814.8 million to US$967.3 million), and all five rise — so on that dial the sentence is a sales statement. And the three Japans remain three figures: 127.2 billion yen for ASICS Japan in the English table, ¥204,236 million for the Japan segment, ¥158,442 million for customers located in Japan. Which dial a given number was read off is the part that does not travel with it.

On the conversions: yen amounts are converted at ¥163.8 = US$1, the rate on 24 July 2026, applied to every period without adjustment, so consolidated net sales of ¥810,916 million ÷ 163.8 = US$4,950.6 million. Dollar figures are never carried finer than the yen they come from, which is why Japan sales printed as ¥204,236 million convert to US$1,246.9 million while the same sales printed as 204.2 billion yen convert to US$1,247 million, and why a repurchase total printed as ¥50.0 billion converts to US$305 million. Differences between printed integers — the ¥1 million, ¥4 million and ¥5 million above — are exact, and convert at full precision. Ratios, percentages, unit counts and share counts are not converted, and translation rates quoted per unit of foreign currency are prices rather than amounts, left in yen.