Tag - economic-indicators

 
 

ECONOMIC INDICATORS

A kitchenware recycling team collects equipment at a closed hotpot restaurant in Beijing last month.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 22, 2025
China's restaurants race to the bottom in deflation-hit economy
A restaurant in China has an average lifespan of just about 500 days, analysts say, falling to as low as a year in Beijing.
Citizens’ holdings of cash in the three months ended in December was down 3.4% from a year earlier in the biggest drop in the data going back to 1998.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 21, 2025
Japan’s households slash cash at record pace as inflation bites
The decline mostly likely reflects the wider adoption of cashless consumption as well as a rise in nominal consumer spending due to inflation.
While headline inflation cooled in February, underlying price pressure remains steady, raising concerns for households as real wages remain stagnant.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 21, 2025
Japan’s inflation slows less than expected, backing BOJ hikes
Consumer prices excluding fresh food rose 3.0% from a year ago in February, decelerating from a 3.2% pace in January.
Japan's shipments abroad have advanced in the first two months of this year, as Japanese companies brace for the rollout of higher tariffs in the United States.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 19, 2025
Japan’s exports rose more quickly in February ahead of Trump tariffs
Global trade flows face potential major disruptions as the U.S. continues to escalate its tariff campaign, targeting nations where Japanese carmakers have manufacturing bases.
One year on from the Bank of Japan's historic rate hike, the biggest winners are the banks.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 17, 2025
Banks boom and shoppers scrimp a year after Japan’s rate pivot
Higher borrowing costs are also fueling a political battle over how the government can rein in its outlays.
The gloom is a sign of just how much U.S. President Donald Trump’s policies, particularly around trade, have rattled Wall Street nerves.
BUSINESS / Markets
Mar 14, 2025
Stocks tumble into correction as Trump policies roil sentiment
The gloom is a sign of just how much U.S. President Donald Trump’s policies, particularly around trade, have rattled Wall Street nerves.
Japan's economy expanded in the October-December quarter at a slower pace than earlier reported as consumption came in weaker than expected.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 11, 2025
Japan’s economic growth revised lower ahead of BOJ meet
The revised figures highlight pockets of weakness in the Japanese economy even as it continues to moderately expand.
Japan logged a deficit of ¥257.6 billion in the current account, a measure of trade and investment flows, compared with a surplus of ¥334.3 billion a year before, according to the Finance Ministry.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 10, 2025
Japan logs its first current account deficit in two years in January
The nation logged a deficit of ¥257.6 billion in the current account compared with a surplus of ¥334.3 billion a year before.
Qianmen street, Beijing, in March 2023. Though the immediate shock has passed, COVID-19's legacy continues to reshape global economies and markets.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 8, 2025
Five years on, the economic impact of COVID-19 lingers
Though the immediate shock has passed, COVID-19's legacy continues to reshape global economies and markets.
The weighted average of wage hikes demanded by 2,939 member unions of the Japanese Trade Union Confederation, or Rengo, in this year's shuntō labor-management negotiations came to 6.09%, a Rengo survey showed Thursday.
BUSINESS
Mar 6, 2025
Japan pay hike demands top 6% for first time in 32 years
It is the first time in 32 years for the average wage hike request to exceed 6%, amid the soaring cost of living and labor shortages.
Tariffs and trade uncertainty are causing the U.S. economy to lose steam, and companies more vulnerable to slower growth are starting to show the cracks.
BUSINESS / Markets
Mar 6, 2025
Investors spy the dawn of a tectonic shift away from U.S. markets
For most of the last three years, investors had bet on "U.S. exceptionalism," with the country ahead of others in economic growth, stock prices and AI.
The Auckland skyline at sunset in 2023. New Zealand's economy was the worst performing in the developed world last year, according to HSBC.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Mar 4, 2025
New Zealand's economic missteps hasten exodus to sunnier shores
A total of 128,700 people permanently left the Pacific nation of 5.3 million in 2024, provisionally the largest exodus on record.
Shoppers walk through a shopping area in Shanghai. China's household spending is less than 40% of annual economic output, some 20 percentage points below the global average.
BUSINESS / Economy / ANALYSIS
Mar 1, 2025
China urged to think big, go hard on reviving battered consumption
With China's consumer support focusing on subsidies rather than reforms, pressure is growing on Beijing for policies with a longer-term impact.
Consumer prices excluding fresh food in the capital rose 2.2% in February from a year earlier, the internal affairs ministry said Friday.
BUSINESS / Economy
Feb 28, 2025
Tokyo inflation slows slightly more than expected on subsidy impact
Consumer prices excluding fresh food in the capital rose 2.2% in February from a year earlier, according to the internal affairs ministry.
Japanese nominal wages rose at the fastest pace in nearly three decades according to data out this month, and GDP figures showed Japan’s economy outperformed forecasts.
BUSINESS / Economy
Feb 27, 2025
Yen traders raise focus on Japanese data as economy shifts gears
The news marks a mindset change since the Bank of Japan ended its negative-rates policy last March.
Economic pessimism is rife in the U.K., with households looking to cut their expenses,
BUSINESS / Economy
Feb 23, 2025
The reluctant British consumer is a problem for Keir Starmer
Pessimism is rife and households are looking to cut expenses as fear rises over inflation and job losses.
Coffee beans are harvested in Corquin, Honduras, on Feb. 6. Climate change has diminished the supply of coffee around the globe via rising temperatures, droughts and excessive rains.
BUSINESS / Markets
Feb 23, 2025
Coffee prices are at a 50-year high. Producers aren’t celebrating.
Around the world, coffee traders, farmers and roasters fear how climate change and economic factors will affect their livelihoods.
A customer visits a store along the Togoshi Ginza shopping street in Tokyo on Jan. 23. Rising fresh food prices contributed to the acceleration in overall inflation in January, as vegetable prices, including cabbage, soared.
BUSINESS / Economy
Feb 21, 2025
Japan’s inflation speeds up, keeping BOJ on rate hike path
Overall inflation accelerated to 4% from 3.6%, according to the internal affairs ministry, hitting that mark for the first time in two years.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during an event in Miami Beach, Florida, on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Feb 20, 2025
Trump's approval rating slips as Americans worry about the economy
The share of Americans who think the economy is on the wrong track rose to 53% in the latest poll from 43% in the Jan. 24 to 26 poll.
A visitor feeds the deer at Nara Park in Nara on Jan. 27. The monthly number of foreign visitors to Japan hit a record high in January.
JAPAN
Feb 19, 2025
Monthly number of visitors to Japan hit record high in January
The number of inbound visitors is estimated to have risen 40.6% from a year before to 3,781,200, exceeding 3 million for the fourth consecutive month.

Longform

The sun shines from behind a waving Philippine flag at the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial.
Eighty years after the Battle of Manila, old foes forge new ties