Global| Jul 17 2007METI Sector Surveys Show Some Weakness in May
Summary
The Industry index from METI is in a sharp decline and is lower over six months for a period of three months running. Services (the tertiary index) tend to be more stable. Their index has slowed in the past few months and even fell in [...]
The Industry index from METI is in a sharp decline and is lower over six months for a period of three months running. Services (the tertiary index) tend to be more stable. Their index has slowed in the past few months and even fell in May but it is growing at pace just below 2%.
The tertiary and industry index are still relatively strong in their five year context. Fixing them in the range of values they have experienced over the past five years we find that the tertiary index is in its 95Th percentile (top 5-percent). The Industrial gauge is a bit lower but resides in the 84th percentile about the top 15 percentile of its range. The percentile standing of the MFG sector is higher than we get from other surveys of Japan (NTC has the MFG sector in the bottom 30 percent of its five year range). Japan remains unconcerned about this weakness and the BoJ continues to talk of when it will go back to hiking rates. Onew BOJ board member thinks they should already have hiked them again.
| Raw readings of each survey | Percent of 5Yr range* | ||||
| Business Activity (METI:Indexes) | May-07 | Apr-07 | Mar-07 | May-07 | Apr-07 |
| Industry | 107.1 | 107.4 | 107.6 | 84.9% | 86.7% |
| Tertiary (Services) | 110.2 | 110.3 | 108.6 | 95.1% | 96.1% |
| *100 is high; Zero is low | |||||
Robert Brusca
AuthorMore in Author Profile »Robert A. Brusca is Chief Economist of Fact and Opinion Economics, a consulting firm he founded in Manhattan. He has been an economist on Wall Street for over 25 years. He has visited central banking and large institutional clients in over 30 countries in his career as an economist. Mr. Brusca was a Divisional Research Chief at the Federal Reserve Bank of NY (Chief of the International Financial markets Division), a Fed Watcher at Irving Trust and Chief Economist at Nikko Securities International. He is widely quoted and appears in various media. Mr. Brusca holds an MA and Ph.D. in economics from Michigan State University and a BA in Economics from the University of Michigan. His research pursues his strong interests in non aligned policy economics as well as international economics. FAO Economics’ research targets investors to assist them in making better investment decisions in stocks, bonds and in a variety of international assets. The company does not manage money and has no conflicts in giving economic advice.
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