Good morning, Peter Vanham here in Geneva.
It’s hard for any business leader to make sense of economic indicators, these days, and no country better embodies this schizophrenic reality better than Japan.
As my colleague Nicholas Gordon points out today in an analysis of Japanese firms on the Fortune Global 500, Japan’s presence among the world’s biggest companies is in steep decline.
Back in 1995, when the Global 500 debuted, “the firm that beat everyone else on the list wasn’t Walmart or Exxon or GM...it was Japan’s Mitsubishi Corporation.” Japan had just about as many companies on the list as the U.S., and its companies generated more revenue than any other major market.
Fast forward to today, and Japan Inc. is almost nowhere to be found.
Its presence in the Global 500 shrank from 149 to 41 companies, featuring few if any newcomers. In its stead, China has become the top dog, alongside the U.S. Both countries also regularly boast newcomers on the list, especially from the tech sector. In a throwback to the 1980s and its Walkmans, Japan’s greatest tech player is still Sony Corporation.
Yet at the same time, Japan’s stock market today is partying like it’s (early) 1989. In May, the Nikkei index hit its highest level in 33 years. And bizarrely, some of the same indicators that explain its fall on the Global 500 are reasons for Japan Inc.’s stock market rise: A weak yen and the fact that it isn’t China.
On the currency side, a weak yen means that Japanese company revenues have declined year-over-year in dollar terms (the basis of the Global 500). But it also means that their export forecast is rosier, as Japanese companies become more competitive in the global market. Japan’s GDP growth beat expectations this past quarter, coming in at a whopping 6% annualized rate for Q2.
On the geo-economic side, China’s rise also hurts and helps Japan. It hurts the country, as many of its companies are displaced on the Global 500 by emerging Chinese competitors. But as tensions between China and the rest of the world mount, Japan also emerges as the most viable “not-China” destination in Asia, whether in stock investment or trading.
For business leaders, making sense of these seemingly contradictory realities is part of navigating the world today. One man who doesn’t have a problem with that, though, is Warren Buffett. In June, he significantly raised his shareholding in Japan’s top trading houses, their decline on the Global 500 be damned.
More news below.
Peter Vanham
peter.vanham@fortune.com
@petervanham
