London and Tokyo are two of the world’s three major financial centres. Currency pairs involving GBP and JPY trade around the clock, and the brief overlap between the London and Tokyo sessions is closely watched. Investment banks, insurers, and asset managers coordinate between these cities daily.
Japan Standard Time is UTC+9 with no DST. Greenwich Mean Time is UTC+0, shifting to BST (UTC+1) in summer. The standard gap is 9 hours: 9 AM in London is 6 PM in Tokyo. During BST the gap narrows to 8 hours.
The overlap window is tight but real. A 7–9 AM GMT meeting lands at 4–6 PM JST, catching the tail end of the Japanese workday. Alternatively, a 1–2 PM GMT call is 10–11 PM JST — outside normal hours but common for urgent financial matters.
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