Dentsu Inc. (President: Yutaka Narita; Head Office: Tokyo; Capital: 58,967.1 million yen) conducted an opinion poll in February 2002 directed at the well-to-do segment of the population on the so-called "payoff scheme." Conducted on the Internet and responded to by 1,030 men and women between the ages of 30 and 69 with household financial assets of 10 million yen or more, the poll was designed to measure affluent people's degree of awareness and understanding concerning the soon-to-be-launched limited deposit protection program as well as specific actions they may have taken or are contemplating.

According to survey results, nearly 100% of the respondents have heard of the "payoff scheme," which demonstrates that the affluent population as a group is very much aware of the new program.

Furthermore, 39% of the respondents said that they had already taken action to prepare for the planned reduction in the level of protection provided for their saving deposits. Twenty-eight percent said that they were considering taking some kind of action, and 5% were still gathering information. A high degree of interest in the "payoff scheme" among the wealthy is evidenced by the fact that more than 70% of the respondents had taken action regarding the new limited deposit protection system or were at least gathering information on it.

When asked about specific measures or actions already taken or currently contemplated, the largest portion of the respondents — 54% — replied that they had spread or planned to spread their cash holdings among several financial institutions instead of keeping their savings in one place. The total for this answer far exceeded the next most popular answer, the transfer of all cash holdings to a more trusted financial institution, which was selected by 25% of the respondents. On average, the "payoff scheme" seems to be prompting depositors to utilize the services of more than one financial institution, rather than making them concentrate their cash holdings at a handful of trusted financial institutions.

When asked about the most crucial factor in selecting financial institutions such as banks and securities firms in light of the pending �gpayoff�h program, the respondents cited stability of the managerial foundation as the most important factor for the selection of banks (68%) and securities firms (51%).

Dentsu plans to conduct, on a continual basis, additional surveys and analyses of consumer behavior and awareness concerning the financial market, which is currently undergoing rapid transformation.

Detailed data on the research is available in Japanese only.