Amid this, Japan’s economy has continued its moderate recovery trend, with prices rising accompanying the increase in corporate profits and employee income. However, the year-on-year rate of increase in the consumer price index (CPI) has slowed recently, reflecting the substantial decline in crude oil prices since last summer.
In that situation, some opine that the Bank should take some time to achieve the price stability target of 2 percent while others think that 2% inflation is hard for the Bank to achieve in the first place. Today, I will first briefly discuss the current situation of and outlook for Japan’s economy.