Japan's Tokyo CPI for December slips to 0.3%, unemployment ticks higher

The Tokyo CPI for Japan came in amongst several other datasets early Friday, and the bellwether reading of Japan's national inflation measures slipped to 0.3% over the annualized period into December, missing the 0.5% forecast and declining from the previous reading of 1.0%.

Key highlights

Japanese annualized inflation remains far below the Bank of Japan's (BoJ) target of 2.0%.

Japanese Retail Sales contracted in November, down -1.0% m/m versus the expected -0.4%; previous was 1.3%.

Retail Sales for the year into December was just 1.4%, missing the 2.1% forecast and falling sharply from the previous 3.6%.

Japan's Unemployment Rate also ticked upwards, from 2.4% to 2.5%.

The one bright spot in Japan's Friday dataset was Industrial Production, with the m/m November reading coming in at -1.1%, better than the -1.5% forecast (but still below the previous 2.9%).

Annualized Industrial Production for November (preliminary) was 1.4%, better than forecast 0.6% but also far below previous 4.2%.