Japan Economics Weekly Are low policy rates contractionary? Governor Kuroda has recently discussed the idea that extremely low interest rates could undermine bank profits and capital and, ultimately, lending. Evidence for this idea is lacking in Japan, where... 1st December 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Will private consumption continue to disappoint? Private consumption fell last quarter for the first time since end-2015. However, solid growth in household incomes, an elevated household saving rate and upbeat consumer confidence suggest that this... 24th November 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Is monetary easing doing more harm than good? Some commentators are arguing that the costs of continued loose monetary policy outweigh the benefits as house and stock prices have soared and banks’ lending margins have slumped. By contrast, we... 17th November 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Why is wage growth still subdued? Wage growth is likely to pick up over coming months as the labour market remains extremely tight. But unusually low job mobility in Japan, which is linked to the widespread use of seniority wages and... 10th November 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Is Japan still being hollowed out? Outward investment from Japan has soared in recent years but this doesn’t seem to have been to the detriment of domestic manufacturing. This isn’t entirely surprising: firms say their main reason for... 3rd November 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly How risky is overseas lending? Overseas lending by Japanese banks has risen sharply in recent years and now almost matches domestic lending. The bulk of foreign lending is financed in yen which exposes lenders to a sizeable... 27th October 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly How worried should we be about corporate scandals? Recent scandals underline that Japan’s corporate governance practices are still poor. Investors often pay a heavy price as shown by the bankruptcy of Takata and the slump in Kobe Steel’s stock prices... 20th October 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Will exports continue to impress? Export values rose the most since 2013 in August but the recent acceleration largely reflects a pick-up in export prices that is unlikely to last. While business surveys suggest that export volumes... 13th October 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Signs the recovery sputtering in Q3 Weak consumer spending data suggest that the expansion faltered in the third quarter. This might not spell the end of the economy’s extended growth spurt. But with the economy running into capacity... 6th October 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Abe recommits to sales tax hike Prime Minister Abe has pitched the snap legislative election that he has called for next month as a plebiscite on fiscal policy. He is arguing that the sales tax hike scheduled for October 2019 should... 29th September 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly When will R&D spending start to recover? Spending on research and development has been sluggish recently, but the recent rebound in corporate profits suggests it will start to recover before long. This would provide a boost to domestic... 22nd September 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Yen caught between Kim Jong-un and US Fed With long-term interest rates at home anchored by the Bank of Japan, the key determinants of the value of the yen are both outside Japanese policymakers’ control: geopolitics and the actions of the US... 15th September 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Full-time staff shortages point to faster wage growth Part-time wages have been rising at a reasonable rate for a while but, with evidence now building the firms are finding it harder to hire sufficient full-time workers, a pick-up in broader wage growth... 8th September 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Stronger growth, but inflation to rise only slowly We are lifting our GDP forecasts for both this year and next to reflect the strength of recent data. We are not making any changes to our inflation forecasts though, as price pressures still appear... 1st September 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Efforts to reform labour market fall short Japan’s government is worried that a sharp increase in the number of part-time workers will feed into weaker growth in productivity in future and it has proposed a package of labour reforms in... 25th August 2017 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly Is Japan still building bridges to nowhere? Japan’s government has scaled back its public investment spending dramatically since the 1990s but it remains high by international standards. The quality of the country’s infrastructure is therefore... 18th August 2017 · 1 min read
