My view, however, is that the pace of growth will be somewhat more moderate than these forecasts. Specifically, the real GDP growth rate for fiscal 2018 is likely to be around 1.0 percent, mainly due to an increase in business fixed investment reflecting improvements in corporate profits and business sentiment, and to a rise in exports reflecting the expansion of overseas economies.
The rate for fiscal 2019 is likely to slow and move in the range of 0.5-1.0 percent as the pace of expansion in the global economy will probably decelerate and as domestic demand is likely to deteriorate mainly reflecting the effects of the consumption tax hike scheduled to take place in October 2019.