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Strategies & Market Trends : The Epic American Credit and Bond Bubble Laboratory -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: yard_man who wrote (8748)	2/26/2004 6:49:41 PM
From: NOW	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 110194

stockcharts.com Correction over or just starting/: this is the key to the whole shebang....

To: yard_man who wrote (8748)	2/26/2004 7:01:41 PM
From: russwinter	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 110194

And now Japanese consumers can join in buying goods to fuel the giant resource sucking sound. Hope they don't need anything with chemicals, metals, or plastics. I'm convinced Japan is seeing a raging inflation starting up, price of keeping their currency locked with the USD. American get that last tax refund to help out with the final stage too. Is this a one percent (zero in Japan) world to you?: Japanese Retail Sales Have Biggest Gain in 7 Years (Update6) Feb. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Japanese retail sales had their biggest gain in almost seven years in January as Isetan Co. reported record New Year sales and other clothing stores benefited from rebounding consumer confidence. Sales rose a seasonally adjusted 4.5 percent in January from December, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said in Tokyo. The gain exceeded economists' forecasts and was the biggest since March 1997, when sales rose 7.2 percent. Confidence is rebounding after the jobless rate fell to a 2 1/2-year low and stocks rallied, spurring spending by consumers that makes up more than half of the world's second-largest economy. Retail sales for the three months through January rose an average of 0.5 percent, compared with a 1.8 percent drop for all of 2003. ``The figures obviously bode well for private consumption in the first quarter,'' Ryo Hino, an economist at J.P. Morgan Securities Asia Ltd., said after the report. ``We've definitely seen a sharp improvement in consumer confidence over the past year.'' Isetan's sales in January rose 3.5 percent, led by clothing, and gained at all stores for the first time since August, Iwamura said. Sales in February probably rose 7 percent from a year earlier, he said. ``New Year's clearance sales were the strongest ever,'' said Tatsuyuki Iwamura, a spokesman at Isetan, Japan's fifth-largest department store operator. Japan's economy grew at a 7 percent annual pace last quarter, the fastest in 13 years. A rise in consumer spending accounted for about a quarter of the growth, with the rest coming from capital spending and net exports. Household Spending More evidence of rising demand may come tomorrow. Spending at Japanese households headed by a salaried worker probably rose 2.9 percent in January, according to the median forecast of 18 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. A separate report also due at 8:30 a.m. tomorrow may show unemployment was unchanged at 4.9 percent. Japan's central bank today refrained from pumping more cash into the economy as a weakening yen eased pressure to slow the currency's gains to protect an export-driven recovery from a third recession since 1991. The yen fell 3.3 percent against the dollar last week. ``We saw relatively firm consumer spending numbers in the fourth quarter,'' Bank of Japan Governor Toshihiko Fukui said at a press conference after the board meeting. He said that the central bank will closely watch whether consumer spending extends its recovery in the first quarter. Shares Rise Fukui and his eight policy board colleagues kept interest rates at almost zero and left the upper limit of their target for reserves available to banks at 35 trillion yen ($321 billion.) The board also maintained monthly purchases of government bonds from lenders at 1.2 trillion yen. The yen was at 109.22 per dollar at 5:36 p.m. in Tokyo, from 108.99 late yesterday in New York. The Topix Retail Index, which tracks the performance of 119 retailers, rose 2.5 percent to 663.130 at the 3:00 p.m. close in Tokyo, led by supermarket Seven-Eleven Japan Co. and Ito-Yokado Co. It has risen 30 percent in the past year. The broader Topix Index rose 1.3 percent to 1060.03. Retail sales had been expected to rise 1.3 percent from December, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey of 10 economists. From a year earlier, sales rose 1.3 percent, the largest gain since March 2001. Fast Retailing Co., the operator of the Uniqlo casual clothing store chain in Japan, said same-store sales rose 10.8 percent in January. Shift in Habits Sales of food and beverages, autos and machinery all rose in January, according to seasonally adjusted figures in today's report. Sales at large retailers, which include department stores and supermarkets, rose a seasonally adjusted 7.2 percent. ``We're seeing a possible shift in consumer spending habits where instead of buying in December, people are spending instead during January and February'' clearance sales, said Makiko Adachi a senior economist at Mizuho Research Institute said. Many retailers offer discounts in December as well. The 0.8 percent growth in personal spending last quarter may not last because wages are falling. Wages in December had their biggest drop in four months and fell for the third year in 2003. ``Companies are still trying to keep wages down and consumers are going to be required to contribute more'' to pensions and social security costs, said Tatsuya Torikoshi, senior economist at Daiwa Institute of Research in Tokyo. ``We can't be optimistic.'' Isetan's Iwamura said that monthly sales compared with year earlier levels rose because of an extra Saturday in January. An extra Sunday in February because of the leap year will also boost sales, he said. ``For department stores in general, sales are still poor overall,'' Iwamura said.