"Japanese household financial assets totaled 1,433.5 trillion yen at the end of December, falling 5.7% on the year to a 4-year low, the Bank of Japan's preliminary data released Tuesday showed. This is the sharpest annual drop on record.The highlighting is mine...this is not good news for a country where a large proportion of the population is expecting to live off of savings fairly shortly. Further, Japanese consumers are unlikely to provide a boost to GDP as they are not going to increase discretionary spending in the face of investment losses.Slumping stock and investment trust prices took a toll on household assets. Stock holdings plunged 40.2% on the year to 87.8 trillion yen, while investment trust beneficiary receipts decreased 33.4% to 47.9 trillion yen.
In contrast, as Japanese sought to stash money in safer places, cash bank deposits inched up 0.9% to 791.6 trillion yen, 455.1 trillion yen of which were in time deposits, up 2.5%."
Japan Real Time Charts and Data
Edward Hugh is only able to update this blog from time to time, but he does run a lively Twitter account with plenty of Japan related comment. He also maintains a collection of constantly updated Japan data charts with short updates on a Storify dedicated page Is Japan Once More Back in Deflation?
