JAPAN DATA: Barclays Capital’s Kyohei Morita and Yuichiro Nagai look for the Dec
14 Tankan release to show that the headline diffusion index for large
manufacturers declined to -10 (also MNI’s median, would be lowest level since
-14 in March 2010) in December from -3 in September and -1 in June and that the
large non-manufacturers DI slipped to +5 from +8. They maintain there are
downside risks “albeit a diminishing one, to these forecasts, especially for
auto, electrical equipment and retail industries, if anti-Japan demonstrations
and boycotts in China spread and intensify.”