Japan's January core inflation likely to have slowed to 2.4% y/y: Standard Chartered

Quotes from Standard Chartered:

-Japan will release key data for January on 27 February, including CPI, industrial production (IP), retail sales and job data. We expect core inflation (excluding fresh food) to have slowed to 2.4% y/y from 2.5% in December on lower energy prices.

-Excluding the sales-tax effect, core inflation likely slowed to 0.4% y/y, far below the Bank of Japan's 2% inflation target. IP growth likely picked up to 2.0% m/m on higher export volume and capex.

-We expect m/m retail sales growth to have rebounded in January after falling for three straight months on better consumer sentiment, although weak auto sales may have weighed on the headline number. We project an unchanged jobless rate at 3.4% in January, following an improvement in December.