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Japan's economy slumped in the fourth quarter of 2011, raising doubts about the prospects for continued recovery from the natural disaster that hit last March. Seasonally adjusted, real GDP contracted by 0.6% from the previous quarter, dragged down by inventory adjustments and weak net exports in particular. Growth should resume this year, supported by post-tsunami reconstruction and by the easing of the recent disruptions to supply chains caused by severe floods in Thailand. However, global economic uncertainty, the financial crisis in the euro zone and the continued strength of the yen will continue to pose risks to growth.
The Cabinet Office's first preliminary estimate of GDP for October-December 2011, released on February 13th, marked a sharp decline from the robust growth of 1.7% recorded in the third quarter of the year. That was when a surge in post-tsunami consumption and exports had boosted the economy. In annualised terms, the fourth-quarter GDP contraction was 2.3%.
Japanese national-accounts data are prone to frequent revision, so the numbers could be significantly different when the government publishes its second preliminary estimate of GDP on March 8th. For now, though, the data paint a picture of an economy struggling to get back on its feet after the twin setbacks of the tsunami and the Thai floods. Domestic demand growth weakened abruptly in the fourth quarter, as the rebound in consumer spending and housing investment evident in the previous quarter's data was not sustained. In the three months to December, private consumption grew just 0.3%, down from 1% in the previous quarter. Private residential investment contracted by 0.8%, though this is a relatively small component of GDP and its decline had no impact on overall growth.In contrast, a sharp decline in private-sector inventories had a negative impact on the overall performance of the economy, subtracting 0.3 percentage points from GDP growth. This seems to have reflected, in part, the shutdown of operations at flood-hit Japanese factories in Thailand, causing component shortages that may have forced manufacturers back home to draw down existing inventories. That said, inventory movements can often be unpredictable and have unexpected causes, and part of the change in stocks in the fourth quarter may also have reflected renewed shortages related to damage from the March 2011 tsunami. More encouragingly, investment by private-sector businesses picked up, growing 1.9% quarter on quarter.
If domestic demand overall was weak, though, the external sector fared even worse. After a huge surge, of 8.6% quarter on quarter, in July-September—as export operations began to return to normal after the interruptions from the tsunami—exports of goods and services declined by 3.1% in the fourth quarter of the year. At the same time, imports continued to grow (albeit much less rapidly than in the third quarter), further subtracting from GDP. As a result, net exports' trimmed 0.6 percentage points from GDP growth.
Outlook
The latest data will reinforce doubts as to whether the rebound in the economy that ought to result from post-tsunami reconstruction will be as strong as hoped for. After natural disasters, there is typically a sharp initial drop in output that is followed by a recovery and reconstruction boom. Japan is likely to follow this pattern, but the question is whether it will gain the full benefit that usually ensues from such rebuilding. The latest data may still just mark a temporary blip in the recovery, reflecting the fact that the government's disaster response has been slow and ineffective. After a contraction in 2011, GDP growth in 2012 should still be robust by Japan's generally anaemic standards. Our most recent forecast (which predates the much weaker-than-expected fourth-quarter performance) is for growth of slightly less than 2% this year. But we are likely to revise this down in light of the latest data.
With the global economy slowing and financial risks in the euro zone still causing great concern, the outlook for non-reconstruction-related growth in Japan will remain uncertain at best. Weak demand in the developed world, combined with a strong yen, will prevent Japan's exporters from playing a bigger role in driving economic growth. In fact, as reconstruction (even if disappointing) will continue to support imports to a significant degree in 2012, net exports are likely to act as a drag on overall GDP this year. This will particularly be the case in light of the increased need for energy imports because of lower nuclear output.
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