Finance Minister Uchida Says No Need for Reflation Remarks Reflects Current Wage and Price Conditions
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At his regular press conference on the 9th, Minister of Finance Minoru Uchida explained that his own remarks and those of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, stating that Japan is not in a phase requiring reflationary policy, were made in light of current wage and price conditions and price movements following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Uchida said on September 25 that "the phase for reflationary policy in the Abenomics sense is over," and explained that this reflected factors including the surge in global crude oil prices from around 2022, which moved Japanese prices in tandem with large overseas fluctuations, creating a situation that is not deflation in the sense of a sustained decline in prices, as well as the beginning of price increases driven by wage-related factors. As a specific example, he noted that the Bank of Japan abolished its yield curve control, which it had implemented as part of large-scale monetary easing, in 2024, and that the functioning of financial markets has begun to recover.