Tokyo's stocks soar after a landslide at the polls
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Why did Japanese stocks soar after the recent election?
Tokyo stocks soar after a landslide at the polls. Live from the UK, this is the Marketplace Morning Report from the BBC World Service. I'm Stuart Clarkson. Good morning. Japanese stocks ended the day on a record high after the country's general election. Hi there. So quite a historic result. What does this mean for the economy in Japan?
Sanae Takeuchi's promise to increase government spending and reduce some taxes to try and ease the cost of living crisis in Japan. Just to give you a sense, the price of rice doubled in 2025. So people are really hurting. She's really connected with voters through her promises to reduce the burden on households. But there are deep structural issues in Japan's economy. And markets and investors until today had been very nervous about her increasing that government spending because Japan's already got one of the highest government debts in the world.
And defence spending is something else that's been talked about. And given the majority that she's got, it seems likely that's going to happen now.
That's right. She wants to invest in defense. And that was something that was agreed with longtime ally, the US, in order to reduce the reliance on Washington. Another area where she wants to focus on is new technologies. So things like electric vehicles. And Japan has a real problem with its workforce. It's got a shrinking population. Its population is aging very fast. So She wants to invest in things like robots and automation and factories. She wants to get more women back into the workforce. And she wants to extend the retirement age so that older people are more productive for a longer time. There's a lot at play and markets are really on edge. But from the looks of what happened today, they're definitely betting that whatever Takahichi has promised, she might be able to follow through on and it will ultimately boost growth in Japan.
OK, Surajana Tiwari, thanks for being with us here on Marketplace.
Thanks a lot.
Let's do the numbers now. And there's a general bounce back in stocks this morning with major markets up across Asia and Europe. Shares in Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk jumped more than 8% after US firm Hims & Hers said at the weekend it would drop its copycat of the new pill version of the weight loss drug Wegovy. And shares in Poland's Inpost were up 13% after news that a consortium led by Advent and FedEx...
What promises did Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi make for Japan's economy?
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