Japanese data on wages for November 2018
Labor cash Earnings 2.0% y/y
- expected +1.2% y/y, prior +1.5%
Real cash earnings 1.1% y/y
- expected +0.4% y/y, prior -0.1%
More:
overtime pay +1.1% y/y
regular pay +1.6% y/y, which is its quickest gain since June of 1997
Things looking up for Japanese workers after wages have been in the doldrums for so long. I am sure they ain't cracking open the champagne though, plenty of catch up to go! Maybe the BOJ will take some encouragement from these numbers too, maybe higher wages will feed into inflation and it'll get closer to the Bank's target. As such, this is, net (but small) negative for the yen.
