Excluding fresh food, consumer prices in the capital increased 0.5% from a year earlier as utility bills soared, the internal affairs ministry said Friday.
(Bloomberg) The Bank of Japan offered to buy an unlimited amount of bonds at a fixed rate, pushing back against weeks of trader speculation about policy normalization.
The central bank will buy 10-year bonds at 0.25% on Feb. 14, according to a statement on its website.
Many Tokyo-based economists are among those warning that the omicron wave could trigger yet another quarter of negative growth for the world’s third-largest economy.
The jobless rate edged down to 2.7% in December, the internal affairs ministry has reported, with the number of workers increasing by 490,000 the most since 1986.
(Bloomberg) Japan’s industrial production fell in December, following record gains a month earlier but an overall solid quarter for manufacturing likely helped restore economic growth at the end of 2021.