Off the wire
• Urgent: Putin orders air defense system to be deployed to Russian airbase in Syria  • Taiwan struggling with dengue outbreak  • Chinese banks' assets, liabilities grow  • Toyota reissues recall for 1.61 mil. vehicles in Japan over faulty air bags  • Urgent: Russian MoD confirms 2nd Su-24 pilot rescued  • China promises support for African development  • Two men arrested for trying to depart Singapore illegally  • China's discipline inspectors target ivory tower corruption  • 1st LD: Russia says Turkey's downing of warplane "deliberate"  • 1st LD Writethru: Russian PM warns Turkey of economic losses over warplane downing  
You are here: 　 Home

Japan gov't says economy on moderate recovery path, lowers view on investment

Xinhua, November 25, 2015 Adjust font size:

The Japanese government on Wednesday maintained its assessment of the current state of the economy as recovering moderately, but noted that business investment and exports are under pressure.

In its monthly report for November the Cabinet Office said the "Japanese economy is on a moderate recovery, while weakness can be seen in some areas," adding that downside risks still remain including the slowing down of emerging Asian economies.

The government said that while private consumption was holding firm and corporate profits are increasing, along with an improving employment situation and moderate rise in consumer prices, business investment remained an area of concern as spending remained flat.

The government's view of business investment was downgraded from "picking up" in the previous month to being "almost flat" in the recording period and the Cabinet Office also noted that both industrial production and exports "are in a weak tone."

Falling business investment and inventories, despite a number of major firms booking record profits in the period, showing they're not content with business conditions here, caused Japan's economy to slip into a technical recession for the second time since Prime Minister Shinzo Abe came to office in 2012, which has led to some analysts questioning the efficacy of his aggressive blend of economic policies dubbed "Abenomics."

Japan's economy contracted in the third quarter owing to waning business investment and slumping inventories, the government said, booking a 0.8 percent contraction in the July-September quarter of 2015, marking a second straight quarterly contraction, following a revised 0.7 percent drop in the second quarter.

The world's third-largest economy once again entering a recession comes as a blow to Abe and his personalized brand of economic policies, particularly in light of the fact that the prime minister has, since his return to office, pledged to rescue the nation from the doldrums of recession and return Japan to its former economic glory, before it became mired in decades of deflationary pressure and monumental public debt. Endit