Japan Producer Prices Change

Japan’s producer prices rose 2.4% year-on-year in December 2025, easing from a 2.7% increase in the previous month and in line with market expectations. This marked the slowest annual rise since May 2024. Cost moderated for: transport equipment (1.4% vs 1.5% in November), drinks and foods (5.0% vs 5.1%), general-purpose machinery (2.8% vs 3.0%), other manufacturing (2.3% vs 2.4%), production machinery (3.5% vs 4.0%), and plastics (0.4% vs 0.5%). In addition, prices remained weak for chemicals (-3.2% vs -3.5%), iron and steel (-6.7% vs -6.9%), and petroleum and coal products (-8.6% vs -2.5%). In contrast, inflation accelerated for non-ferrous metals (22.1% vs 14.9%), electrical machinery (2.5% vs 2.4%), metal products (0.3% vs 0.1%), information and communications (1.8% vs 1.6%), and business-oriented machinery (2.4% vs 0.9%).On a monthly basis, producer inflation slowed to 0.1% from 0.3% in November, matching forecasts and registering the softest pace in four months.