Chart interpretation is crucial for visual data analysis, but accurately extracting information from charts poses significant challenges for automated models. This study investigates the fine-tuning of DEPLOT, a modality conversion module that translates the image of a plot or chart to a linearized table, on a custom dataset of 50,000 bar charts. The dataset comprises simple, stacked, and grouped bar charts, targeting the unique structural features of these visualizations. The finetuned DEPLOT model is evaluated against its base version using a test set of 1,000 images and two metrics: Relative Mapping Similarity (RMS), which measures categorical mapping accuracy, and Relative Number Set Similarity (RNSS), which evaluates numerical interpretation accuracy. To further explore the reasoning capabilities of large language models (LLMs), we curate an additional set of 100 bar chart images paired with question answer sets. Our findings demonstrate that providing a structured intermediate table alongside the image significantly enhances LLM reasoning performance compared to direct image queries.

Mizuho Securities Co. aims to increase the balance of individual customer assets under its management by 1.5-fold to ¥60 trillion in 10 years, its president and chief executive officer, Koichi Iida, said in a recent interview. The Mizuho Financial Group Inc. unit will focus on demand from working generations for the formation of assets in an effort to achieve the goal, Iida said. The company will enhance collaboration with Mizuho Bank, another Mizuho Financial unit, to encourage customers to transfer some of their bank deposits to investment trusts and other financial products, he said. "The key is whether we will be able to make offers suitable for individuals' life plans," Iida said. Mizuho Securities will utilize artificial intelligence technology to enhance the quality of service, he said. Specifically, the company will have sales staff share the know-how of personnel adept at dealing with clients and build a system to speed up improvement in operations, he said.

Mizuho Financial Group Inc. plans to change its personnel policy to allow employees to hold side jobs by the end of next March, the first such move by a mega-bank. By helping employees seek new challenges and opportunities, Mizuho hopes they will use the experience and ideas they acquire outside of the group to create new financial services at Mizuho, President Tatsufumi Sakai said in a recent interview. "I want everyone to refine their skills through a diverse range of challenges so that they can all be specialists in their fields," he said. The 59-year-old chief executive hopes new job opportunities will encourage employees to make use of their experiences in startups, manufacturing companies and other industries to create new business ideas for Mizuho. The initiative is expected to be introduced in the second half of fiscal 2019, after rules on labor and information management are worked out.

When Swedbank customers face a problem, they reach out to Nina, the bank's virtual assistant. Visitors to Mizuho Bank are greeted by Pepper, a humanoid robot standing four feet tall. Santander allows payments to be activated by voice, and JP Morgan Chase now uses machine learning to review commercial loan agreements in seconds, a task that used to take 3,60,000 manhours every year. Wherever you look in the world of financial services, you will find some form of artificial intelligence (AI) at work. AI technologies such as machine learning and speech recognition are quietly working behind the scenes to improve lending decisions and prevent fraud.

When Swedbank customers face a problem, they reach out to Nina, the bank's virtual assistant. Visitors to Mizuho Bank are greeted by Pepper, a humanoid robot standing four feet tall. Santander allows payments to be activated by voice, and JP Morgan Chase now uses machine learning to review commercial loan agreements in seconds, a task that used to take 3,60,000 manhours every year. Wherever you look in the world of financial services, you will find some form of artificial intelligence (AI) at work. AI technologies such as machine learning and speech recognition are quietly working behind the scenes to improve lending decisions and prevent fraud.

Mizuho Bank and Softbank Group Corp. on Thursday agreed to set up a 50-50 joint company to provide loans to consumers using artificial intelligence technology. Using customers' business histories with both firms for credit screening, the new firm will provide an innovative, attractive loan service through low-cost operations without outlets, Mizuho Bank and Softbank said. Capitalized at 5 billion, the new company will be established in November. Its operations are seen starting in the first half of 2017. Inc., the parent of Mizuho Bank, and Softbank President Masayoshi Son announced the launch of the new company at a press conference in Tokyo.