Wholesale prices in May rose at their fastest pace in 27 years, signaling soaring energy costs may erode corporate profits and bring an end to the economy's longest postwar expansion, the Bank of Japan said Wednesday.
Producer-price inflation accelerated to 4.7 percent from 3.9 percent in April, the BOJ said. The current-account surplus shrank 30 percent in April as record oil costs added to the nation's import bill.
Profits fell 17.5 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier, the steepest decline since the most recent recession in 2001, according to a report issued last week. The Cabinet Office said this week that economic growth has probably peaked, and companies including Nissan Motor Co. and Advantest Corp. expect conditions to worsen.
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