Japanese stocks were back in the spotlight from top Wall Street firms, as the benchmark Nikkei 225 crossed the 35,000 mark for the first time in nearly 34 years.
The Nikkei 225
JP:NIK
ended up 1.8% to 35,049.86, in yet another strong showing for the Japanese index. The index has gained 5% this year, versus the virtually flat performance for the S&P 500. Over the last 52 weeks, the Nikkei has stormed 33% higher, surprising most everyone except Warren Buffett, who started making his big push in Japan in 2020.
“This owed primarily to the weak yen and a tailwind from risk-on sentiment in global stock markets after the Fed paused interest rate hikes,” say strategists at JPMorgan led by Rie Nishihara.
Nishihara points out that companies are starting to announce larger wage increases than last year, but that the country has yet to escape deflation. But the key question is whether these wage increases then show up in selling prices.
Bank of America strategists led by Masashi Akutsu also point to growth in real wages as a catalyst during the first half of the year. “Rising real wages are leading to a recovery in consumer sentiment, making it easier for companies to raise their prices and contributing to improving margins and ROE,” said Akutsu.
Both pointed to a Nikkei survey suggesting 5% wage growth this year, above the 3% rise last year.
JPMorgan’s Nishihara also said companies are become more conscious of the cost of capital and share prices, including through managed buyouts and mergers and acquisitions. She also flagged a new government tax-free stock investment system that fosters expectations for an inflow of funds from individual investors.
The Bank of America strategists say Japanese stocks will rise in the first half, then move sideways from July to September amid a possible dissolving of the Diet, and then rise again after the U.S. presidential election in November.
They say it makes sense to hold value stocks with high dividend yields, including Mitsubishi
8058,
Mitsui
8031,
Marubeni
8002,
and Sumitomo
8053,
— all holdings of Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway.
The markets
Stocks
DJIA
SPX
COMP
are creeping higher as investors weigh up CPI data, with Treasury yields
BX:TMUBMUSD10Y
BX:TMUBMUSD02Y
flat. Crude oil
CL.1,
is up 2% as investors monitor Middle East unrest — an oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman was boarded early Thursday by the Iran navy — and gold
GC00,
is up $12 to $2,039.20/oz.
| Key asset performance | Last | 5d | 1m | YTD | 1y |
| S&P 500 | 4,783.45 | 1.67% | 1.62% | 0.29% | 20.50% |
| Nasdaq Composite | 14,969.65 | 2.59% | 1.60% | -0.28% | 36.94% |
| 10 year Treasury | 3.991 | -0.75 | 6.96 | 11.04 | 54.49 |
| Gold | 2,037.60 | -0.65% | -0.67% | -1.65% | 7.23% |
| Oil | 71.74 | -0.91% | 0.13% | 0.57% | -8.33% |
| Data: MarketWatch. Treasury yields change expressed in basis points | |||||
The buzz
Consumer price inflation rose 0.3% in December, above an expected 0.2%, and jumped to 3.4% from a 3.1% prior. Core CPI, minus food and energy, slowed to 3.9%. Weekly jobless claims dipped in early January. Follow along with our Live Blog coverage
Cleveland Fed President Loretta Mester will appear on TV at 11:30 a.m. and Richmond Fed President Tom Barkin will speak at 12:40 p.m.
Eleven bitcoin exchange-traded funds, including Grayscale Bitcoin Trust
,
Blackrock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust and ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF will being trading on Thursday after a Securities and Exchange Commission green light and a chaotic 24 hours for the agency. Bitcoin prices
BTCUSD,
are up to around $47,206.
Chesapeake Energy
CHK,
is buying Southwestern Energy
SWN,
at a slight discount to Wednesday’s close, as the deal talks had been previously reported.
More tech job cuts — on the heels of Amazon.com
AMZN,
Alphabet’s Google
GOOGL,
reportedly plans to axe hundreds of workers.
Hertz
HTZ,
is downsizing its EV fleet by about 20,000 vehicles, citing weak demand and high damage expenses.
Citigroup
C,
has set aside $1.3 billion to cover risks related to turmoil in Argentina and Russia.
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The chart
With equity and house prices rebounding from 2022 declines, household balance sheets have firmed up, notes a team at Goldman Sachs led by chief economist Jan Hatzius. And they say total household net worth as a share of disposable income is now at all-time highs.
While those past stock and house-price declines dragged on consumption growth in 2023, the turnaround could boost spending this year. “We expect gains in household wealth to boost quarterly annualized consumption growth by an average of 0.4 pp [percentage points] in 2024,” said the Goldman team.
Top tickers
These were the top-searched tickers on MarketWatch as of 6 a.m.:
| Ticker | Security name |
|
TSLA, |
Tesla |
|
NVDA, |
Nvidia |
|
INFY, |
Infosys |
|
MARA, |
Marathon Digital |
|
NIO, |
Nio |
|
GME, |
GameStop |
|
AAPL, |
Apple |
|
COIN, |
Coinbase |
|
AMC, |
AMC Entertainment |
|
AMZN, |
Amazon.com |
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