Yukitoshi Funo: Economic activity, prices, and monetary policy in Japan

Speech by Mr Yukitoshi Funo, Member of the Policy Board of the Bank of Japan, at a meeting with business leaders, Miyazaki, 8 November 2017.

The views expressed in this speech are those of the speaker and not the view of the BIS.

I. Recent Economic and Price Developments

A. Overseas Developments

I would like to begin my speech by talking about overseas economies. Business sentiment of manufacturing firms has been on an improving trend on a global basis, and the world trade volume has been recovering. In this situation, overseas economies have continued to grow at a moderate pace on the whole.

In terms of the outlook, overseas economies are expected to continue growing at a moderate pace. According to the World Economic Outlook, released in October 2017 by the International Monetary Fund, the global growth rate is projected to be 3.6 percent in 2017 and 3.7 percent in 2018.