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Native name | 株式会社クレディセゾン |
|---|---|
Romanized name | Kabushiki gaisha Kuredi Sezon |
| Company type | PublicKK |
| TYO:8253 | |
| Industry | Financial services |
| Founded | 1951; 75 years ago (1951) in Tokyo, as Midoriya |
| Founder | Torajiro Okamoto |
| Headquarters | Sunshine 60, Tokyo ,Japan |
Key people | Hiroshi Rinno, CEO |
| Products | Credit card Insurance Consumer finance |
| Revenue |  ¥274.666 billionJPY (2006) |
| ¥42.220 billionJPY (2006) | |
| Owners | The Master Trust Bank of Japan (17.63%) Japan Trustee Services Bank (9.10%) Daiwa Securities Group (5.40%) Seven & I Holdings (1.08%) Mitsui Fudosan (0.81%) Takashimaya (0.65%) Dai Nippon Printing (0.20%) Seibu Holdings (0.18%) |
Number of employees | 3,239 (2019) |
| Website | www.saisoncard.co.jp |
Credit Saison Co., Ltd. (株式会社クレディセゾン,Kabushiki-gaisha Kuredi Sezon), commonly known asCredit Saison (クレディセゾン,Kuredi Sezon) or simplySaison (セゾン,Sezon), is a Japanesefinancial services company affiliated toMizuho Financial Group. Founded in 1951, Credit Saison is the 3rd largestcredit card issuer with over 20 million cardholders in Japan, behindJCB andVisa Japan.
Credit Saison was founded in 1946 asMidoriya (緑屋) by Torajiro Okamoto. It was originally an operator ofdepartment stores specialized in installment selling.
Seibu Retailing Group, one of the (now former) subsidiaries ofSeibu Railway, purchased Midoriya in 1976, attempting to add financial services to its portfolio of customer services. Midoriya's retailing division was transferred toSeibu Department Stores, and Midoriya itself was renamedSeibu Credit (西武クレジット,Seibu Kurejitto) retaining thecredit management division.
Seibu Railway spun off Seibu Retailing in 1983 and Seibu Retailing was rebranded as Saison Group. Seibu Credit issued the first Saison Card in 1983. Seibu Credit finally rebranded itself asCredit Saison in 1989, standing as one of theBig Five core businesses of Saison Group.
Following the collapse of theJapanese asset price bubble in the 1990s, Saison Group fell into financial difficulties. The group's longtime presidentSeiji Tsutsumi was expelled from management in 1991. The group's creditors includingDai-Ichi Kangyo Bank andIndustrial Bank of Japan (now part ofMizuho Financial) pressed the group to restructure its business. Credit Saison parted from other retailers of Saison Group, and formed an alliance with Mizuho in early 2000s.
Credit Saison issues credit cardsSaison Card (セゾンカード,Sezon Kādo) brandedVisa,Mastercard,JCB, orAmerican Express.
For their history, many cards are used by customers of former Seibu Railway group companies and Seibu Retailing Group companies includingSeibu Railway,Seiyu,Parco, andMUJI.Sogo & Seibu was acquired bySeven & I and left the group, but Credit Saison and Seven & I founded a joint company and issued Saison Card.As a Mizuho financial group company,Mizuho Bank and many other banks issue cashcard/Saison Card joint card.Credi Saison also has issues for many other non-group companies.
Annual fees of Saison Card are free for normal cards, 1,575 yen to 3,150 yen for some cards, and 10,500 yen or more for gold or platinum cards.
As of March 30, 2006:
