Japan’s wholesale prices dropped 3.8 percent from a year earlier in October for the seventh straight month of fall, dragged down by lower crude oil prices amid concerns about China’s slowdown, data from the Bank of Japan showed Thursday.
The index of corporate goods prices stood at 101.5 against the 2010 base of 100, the central bank said in a preliminary report.
It followed a revised 4.0 percent fall recorded in September.
The recent trend of falling crude oil prices pushing down wholesale prices continued in October, as petroleum and coal products slid 27.1 percent from the previous year. Chemical products dropped 8.5 percent.
On the back of growing worries about a China-led slowdown, iron and steel saw a 5.1 percent decline and nonferrous metal a 5.3 percent fall.
Still, the food, beverages, and tobacco category gained 1.1 percent from the year before, mainly due to higher import costs of raw materials.
A Bank of Japan official said developments in China will be a key factor to watch closely as they affect commodities markets.
“Whether food prices will rise is also in focus,” the official said.
via Mainichi
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Alfonso Esparza
trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
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