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☆ Luxury stocks are on a tear and now there's an index to follow the 1%
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-20 | by ( Bob Pisani | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Luxury stocks are on a tear, and they are pulling away from the other 99% of the world. Birinyi Associates sees an opportunity. LVMH is the largest luxury firm in the world. Rubin and Birinyi have created two new indexes to monitor all this money: the "1% Index" that consists of 16 luxury stocks, and the "99% Index" made up of 18 stocks that is, well, where the rest of us shops. Since the beginning of April, the 99% is making a comeback: The 1% vs. the 99% (since April 1) 1% index: + 3% 99% index: + 12% Source: Birinyi Associates What's happening?

☆ Analysis: Investors seek to break through Japan Inc's 'value trap'
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-20 | by ( Ankur Banerjee | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

SINGAPORE, April 20 (Reuters) - Corporate governance in Japan has suddenly become a cause celebre, rousing the world's third-largest stock market out of decades of lethargy and drawing in hordes of foreign investors. Japan's stock market has long been seen by investors as a 'value trap' where companies focus on market share, hoard cash and care little about shareholder returns. What has prompted investors globally to sit up and take notice is an endorsement from legendary billionaire investor Warren Buffett. The MSCI Japan Value index (.dMIJP0000VPUS) is up 9% since August 2020 versus a 9% drop for the MSCI Japan growth index (.dMIJP0000GPUS). "I think the value trap that was Japan is no longer."

☆ We're very happy to be holding Fast Retailing, says portfolio manager
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-14 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

Share Share Article via Facebook Share Article via Twitter Share Article via LinkedIn Share Article via EmailWe're very happy to be holding Fast Retailing, says portfolio managerRichard Kaye of Comgest says the company, which is the parent of Uniqlo, is "doing fantastically well in Asia."

☆ Uniqlo parent raises full-year outlook; sees China recovering
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-13 | by ( Eimi Yamamitsu | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

After a "substantial decline" in first-quarter revenue and profit in mainland China, Uniqlo operations began to recover in January, resulting in a sharp increase in second-quarter profit there, Fast Retailing said in a statement. It said operating profit was 220 billion yen ($1.65 billion) in the six months through February, against 189 billion yen a year earlier, as Southeast Asia, North America and Europe logged strong revenue growth. Fast Retailing raised its full-year profit forecast to 360 billion yen from 350 billion yen forecast in January. That compared with a consensus forecast for annual profit to total 347 billion yen, according to a Refinitiv poll of 14 analysts. Japan's biggest retailer logged a 2% fall for the first quarter ending November as COVID-19 restrictions in China were a drag on growth.

☆ Uniqlo’s Parent Company Bets Big on Tiny RFID Chips
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-07 | by ( Belle Lin | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +1 min

Uniqlo’s store on Fifth Avenue in New York. The retailer said RFID has resulted in ‘significant reduction in out-of-stock’ items on the sales floor. At Uniqlo’s Fifth Avenue store in New York, shoppers can checkout simply by placing their goods in gleaming bins of automated stations. This next-generation process is powered by radio frequency identification readers inside the checkout machines, which automatically read hidden RFID chips embedded in price tags. It is the strategy of Takahiro Tambara , chief information officer of Japan-based Uniqlo’s parent company, Fast Retailing Co., Asia’s top clothing retailer.

Privately-owned Miki House, like other Japanese companies, is contending with a shrinking workforce, with an estimated shortage of 3.41 million workers by 2030, according to labour policy research group Recruit Works Institute. When Kimura founded Miki House in 1971, Japan had about 2.6 million births a year and was undergoing a rapid economic expansion that prompted parents to splurge on fashionable goods for their youngsters. PRODUCTION SHIFTSJapan's Fast Retailing (9983.T), the nation's biggest clothing seller and owner of bargain brand Uniqlo, manufactures almost all of its products overseas. At Miki House, about 70% of products are still made domestically, but some items, such as children's shoes, cannot be made locally at scale and are manufactured in Vietnam. Demand is shifting too, with about 60% of sales coming from overseas, where Miki House operates 95 stores in 16 countries and regions.

☆ Bad news salvo gives Bank of Japan some cover
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( Pete Sweeney | Thomson Reuters | Asia Economics Editor Pete Sweeney Joined Reuters Breakingviews In Hong Kong In September Previously He Served As Reuters' Chief Correspondent For China Economy | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

HONG KONG, March 16 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Incoming Bank of Japan (8301.T) Governor Kazuo Ueda can breathe a sigh of relief; things aren’t going very well. Ripples from the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank have shoved down sovereign bond yields, inadvertently driving off an attack by traders who believed global inflation made rate hikes unavoidable. This year, however, spiking energy costs have pushed the core consumer index excluding fresh food over 4%, double the BOJ’s target. Consumer price inflation including energy but excluding fresh food touched 4.2% in January, a 41-year high. Core consumer inflation has now exceeded the Bank of Japan's 2% target for nine straight months.

The precedent set at the "shunto" spring wage talks also influences wages at smaller firms that employ seven out of 10 Japanese workers. The shunto wages eventually peaked in 1974 with a record 33% rise in pay. Wary of increasing fixed costs, many Japanese firms have long opted to pay one-off bonuses in good times rather than raise base pay. Economists projected a 2.85% wage increase in a January poll, with base pay increases accounting for 1.08% and 1.78% from an increase in additional salary, based on seniority. Asked whether they would carry out base pay increase, 41.6% said they intended to.

CASE FOR A SWIFT RETREAT1/ ENERGY PRICESTumbling energy prices are pulling down headline inflation. U.S. inflation rose 6.4% in January, the smallest rise since October 2021, from a 9.1% high last June. Instead, corporate profits have accounted for the lion's share of domestic euro zone price pressures since 2021, ECB data shows. A recent IMF study going back to the 1960s found that only in a small minority of cases where wages and inflation rose together for several quarters did sustained inflation result. The chief executive of Gunvor, a top oil trader, sees oil prices rising in the second half of 2023 on renewed Chinese demand.

The precedent set at the "shunto" spring wage talks also influences wages at smaller firms that employ seven out of 10 Japanese workers and supply big manufacturers. The focus on job security, rather than higher pay, is blamed for keeping Japan's wage growth stagnant. WHAT WILL BE THE OUTCOME OF THE WAGE TALKS? Analysts expect big firms to offer wage hikes of around 3% in wage talks, which would be the fastest pace of increase since 1997 when Japan was on the cusp of deflation. Kishida has approached Japan's union umbrella Rengo in prodding firms to hike base pay.

☆ Japan's real wages drop at fastest pace since 2014 as hot inflation takes toll
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-07 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

TOKYO, March 7 (Reuters) - Japan's real wages fell the most in nearly nine years in January, official data showed, as four-decade-high inflation squeezed the purchasing power of consumers and undercut efforts by policymakers to revive a COVID-ravaged economy. read moreInflation-adjusted real wages, a barometer of households' purchasing power, fell by 4.1% in January from a year earlier, the largest decrease since May 2014, labour ministry data showed on Tuesday. The fall in real wages comes as major Japanese firms including Toyota, Nintendo and Fast Retailing pay heed to policymakers' calls and union demands by announcing plans for historic pay rises. The feeble nominal growth in wages in January was well short of the 5.1% consumer inflation rate used to calculate pay in real terms. Currently, Japan's core consumer inflation, which excludes volatile fresh food prices but includes oil products, is running at 4.2%, the fastest pace since 1981.

☆ Japan unions ask average 4.5% wage hike, biggest since 1990s
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-04 | by ( Kantaro Komiya | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

A survey of more than 2,000 unions nationwide showed an average 4.49% raise request for this year, first time above 4% since 1998's 4.36%, according to the Japanese Trade Union Confederation (JTUC). Despite the higher cost burden, major Japanese firms have promised large pay increases to retain skilled workers amid labour crunch. The JTUC preliminary survey showed the average union demand during this year's annual labour talks, called "shunto" in Japanese, was much larger than 2022's 2.97%. JTUC, commonly known as "Rengo", is the largest labour organisation in the country representing about seven million workers. Bank of Japan officials have said the outcome of the wage hikes is an important criterion to determine the future course of its ultra-loose monetary policy.

☆ Toyota accepts union demands for biggest wage hike in two decades
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

As one of Japan’s biggest employers, Toyota (TM) has long served as a bellwether of the spring labor talks, which are in full swing at major companies. Toyota and the union federation representing 357,000 Toyota group workers said the base pay rise was the biggest in two decades, though they both declined to provide the percentage increase. Successful talksToyota said its wage increase would also apply to part-time workers and senior contract workers. Takaaki Sakagami, deputy secretary-general of the Federation of All Toyota Workers’ Union, said the union was pleased it had been able to reach a deal with the company quickly. Video game maker Nintendo (NTDOF) said earlier this month that it planned to lift workers’ base pay by 10%, despite trimming its full-year profit forecast.

TOKYO, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Toyota Motor Corp (7203.T), the world's biggest automaker, said on Wednesday it would accept a union demand for the biggest base salary increase in 20 years and a rise in bonus payments, as Japan steps up calls for businesses to hike pay. As one of Japan's biggest employers, Toyota has long served as a bellwether of the spring labour talks, which are in full swing at major companies. The All Toyota Workers' Union is set to hold a media briefing later on Wednesday. "We will boost consumption and expand domestic demand by promoting efforts toward structural wage increases," Kishida said at a lower house budget committee session on Wednesday. Video game maker Nintendo Co Ltd (7974.T) said earlier this month that it planned to lift workers' base pay by 10%, despite trimming its full-year profit forecast.

☆ Shein's ambitions are a bit of a stretch
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-20 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Shein’s top-line growth slowed from 57% in 2021 to 45% last year; the company expects that to continue, with its 2025 target implying average annual expansion of 37%. Meanwhile, Shein's projected 13% profit margin dwarfs that of web retailers like China's JD.com (9618.HK). The $118 billion PDD (PDD.O) recently rolled out its Temu shopping service; it is now the most downloaded app in the United States. Using the same 2.4 times forecast 2025 sales multiple the Inditex enterprise trades on, Shein's valuation could top $140 billion. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias.

Last month, he called on companies to hike pay at a level above inflation, with some already heeding the call. Last month, Japan recorded its biggest drop in earnings, once inflation is taken into account, in nearly a decade. A changing job marketExperts say Japan’s wages have also suffered because it lags in another metric: its productivity rate. Hideya Tokiyoshi, a teacher in Japan, told CNN he had barely seen his salary go up over the last 30 years. “If some of the biggest companies in Japan raise wages, many other firms will follow,” if only to stay competitive, said Yamaguchi.

☆ Japan Inc strives to lure skilled workers as inflation, labour crunch bite
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Tetsushi Kajimoto | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

[1/2] A worker assembles an air drill at the factory of manufacturer Katsui Kogyo in Higashiosaka, Japan June 23, 2022. About a quarter of Japanese firms have offered inflation allowances or plan to do so, said corporate credit research firm Teikoku Databank. read moreThe private sector expects the drive to help boost productivity, meshing with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's "new capitalism" initiative on wealth distribution that put a top priority on wage hikes. "Bonuses or inflation allowances would have only a limited impact on easing the pain of cost-push inflation, as consumers tend to save one-off payouts rather than spend," added Kiuchi, now an executive economist at the Nomura Research Institute. Workers have high expectations from this year's labour talks, which they hope will counter cost-push inflation while tackling the tight labour market to help boost the economy.

☆ Want to cash in on China's reopening? Bank of America and UBS have some less obvious stock picks
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-26 | by ( Zavier Ong | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

China's unwinding of its strict Covid-19 controls has got analysts scrambling to identify reopening beneficiaries in the stock market. But there could be another way to play the reopening, with Bank of America and UBS having identified a raft of less obvious beneficiaries outside of China. UBS' stock picks Thai hospitality group Minor International is one of UBS' top picks. Within Thailand, UBS also named rail transit operator BTS Group, expressway and metro operator Bangkok Expressway & Metro, as well as Bangkok Bank as reopening beneficiaries. Student placement provider IDP Education, as well as property groups Lendlease Group and Mirvac Group also made the UBS list.

☆ Most big Japanese firms heed prime minister's call to raise wages this year
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-18 | by ( Rocky Swift | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

That push was boosted last week when Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing Co (9983.T) said it would raise wages by as much as 40%. Another 29% said they would carry out regular pay increases only, while 38% were undecided. "Prime Minister Kishida has been saying raise wages, raise wages, but the decision to hike pay isn't done on the words of a prime minister or president," said Masayuki Kubota, chief strategist at Rakuten Securities. Smaller firms generally cannot increase pay, business owners, economists and officials say, because they often struggle to pass on higher costs out of fear of losing customers. The Reuters Corporate Survey, conducted for Reuters by Nikkei Research between Dec. 23 and Jan. 13, canvassed 495 big non-financial Japanese firms on condition of anonymity, allowing them to speak more freely.

Yet the small companies that provide most of Japan's jobs generally can't increase pay, business owners, economists and officials say. Battered by the pandemic, small firms now struggle to pass on higher costs out of fear of losing customers. They feel they have no choice but to put up with impossible demands from big companies." The trend is most apparent in industries with many small suppliers. The fair trade watchdog last month named 13 big companies it said refused to accept higher prices from suppliers.

TOKYO, Jan 13 (Reuters) - Yields on Japan's benchmark 10-year government bonds breached the central bank's new ceiling on Friday in the market's most direct challenge yet to decades of uber-easy monetary policy. The central bank already holds 80% to 90% of some bond lines. REMEMBER THE RBAThere is talk in the markets that the central bank could shorten its yield target to three- and five-year bonds, but history abroad suggests the strain will remain. With the local economy recovering faster than expected and inflation accelerating, the RBA realised its pledge to keep three-year yields at 0.1% out to 2024 was no longer credible. So it abruptly dropped the whole thing and three-year yields spiked to 0.48%, an episode the RBA itself conceded caused "reputational damage" that would not be repeated.

☆ European markets set to inch higher as investors monitor inflation, rate outlook
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-13 | by ( Elliot Smith | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

European markets are set for a fractionally higher open on Friday after closing the previous session at their highest level since April 2022. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index closed Thursday's trading up 0.7% at 450.22 points, after a choppy session following the latest U.S. inflation print. The December consumer price index report was in line with economist expectations for a monthly dip of 0.1% but a 6.5% rise in consumer prices year over year, compared with a 0.1% monthly gain in November and an annual rise of 7.1%. Investors around the world are closely monitoring inflation data for clues to how long and how far monetary policy tightening from central banks will go. Shares in Asia-Pacific were mostly higher on Friday, though Japan's Nikkei 225 slumped 1.25%, dragged down by a sharp decline for Uniqlo owner Fast Retailing as well as broad weakness in food and electronics stocks.

☆ Asia stocks hit 7-month high on China and CPI bets
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-12 | by ( Tom Westbrook | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

Following gains for Wall Street indexes overnight, MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan (.MIAPJ0000PUS) rose 0.5% and touched an almost seven-month high. Bonds were bought around the world overnight and the U.S. dollar wavered, to touch a seven-month low at $1.0776 per euro . "(It) is the CPI number that could help settle the debate for the February meeting," said NatWest Markets' U.S. rates strategist Jan Nevruzi. "We expect a below consensus CPI print, which if it materialises, could push this rally even further." Foreign exchange markets were elsewhere holding their breath ahead of CPI data while China's reopening kept a bid under Asia's currencies.

☆ December inflation data: Here's how it could move markets
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-12 | by ( Phil Rosen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

"Like we saw following November's CPI report, markets rallied and then pulled back," Conzo explained. The central bank remains "worried about the overheating labor market," and the CPI report is "unlikely to quell those concerns." If the inflation data shows further cooling today, how does that impact your economic outlook for the year? Along with CPI data, investors are also bracing for the release of the number of US jobless claims. Coinbase stock price on Jan. 12, 2023 Markets Insider10.

☆ Uniqlo goes out on a limb in salary hike
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-12 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

HONG KONG, Jan 12 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Fast Retailing (9983.T), owner of the Uniqlo clothing chain, announced it would hike wages by up to 40% for some roles on Wednesday. The bigger question, though, is how much of an outlier Fast Retailing will be. Although Japan’s labour market is tight, weak growth and rising prices have caused real wages to contract for eight consecutive months through November. Fast Retailing, set to announce earnings today, was a market outperformer last year and is preparing a 3-1 stock split. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias.

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