The economy grew at an annual rate of 3.0 percent in the April-June quarter, the fastest pace in more than two years and much faster than initially reporte
The economy grew at an annual rate of 3.0 percent in the April-June quarter, the fastest pace in more than two years and much faster than initially reported thanks to an upswing in capital expenditure, the government said Monday.
The upward revision from a 1.9 percent expansion confirmed the world’s third-largest economy had rebounded from a temporary slowdown in the previous quarter following two years of continuous expansion, which had been the longest stretch of uninterrupted growth in 28 years.
The growth rate was the fastest since the January-March quarter of 2016 and beat the average 2.7 percent growth forecast by polled private-sector economists.
The growth in real gross domestic product — the total value of goods and services produced in the country adjusted for inflation — corresponds to a 0.7 percent increase from the previous quarter, revised up from the Cabinet Office’s preliminary reading of a 0.5 percent rise.
Companies have been stepping up investment in factories and equipment after enjoying record earnings in recent years, as they rush to meet robust demand from overseas, and in connection with a construction boom at home ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
“We expect this trend to continue through mid-fiscal 2019, with the economy then reaching a turning point… triggered by the consumption tax hike planned for October 2019,” said Tetsufumi Yamakawa, an economist at Barclays Securities Japan.
