Core inflation in Japan fell further last month to just 0.5 per cent year-on-year, as plunging oil prices offset the effects of growing domestic economic activity and massive monetary loosening.
The sluggish rise in underlying prices, the lowest in 18 months, comes as some economists are ratcheting their forecasts still lower. Barclays economists are looking at an increase of 0.3 per cent for this month and, depending on oil prices, reckon a slide back into deflation from May “is now more likely”.
The deceleration came in spite of a 1 per cent rise in industrial production on the previous month, suggesting Japan is shaking off last year’s technical recession, and a fall in the unemployment rate to 3.4 per cent — the lowest since the 1990s.
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