Japan - Retail Sales





Japan: Retail Sales

Mnemonic WRT.IJPN
Unit Bil. JPY, NSA
Adjustments Not Seasonally Adjusted
Monthly 15.4 %
Data Jan 2023 12,851
Dec 2022 15,191

Series Information

Source Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry (METI) - Japan
Release Monthly Report on the Current Survey of Commerce
Frequency Monthly
Start Date 1/31/1980
End Date 1/31/2023

Japan: Consumer

Reference Last Previous Units Frequency
Consumer Confidence Feb 2023 31.1 31 Index, SA Monthly
Retail Sales Jan 2023 12,851 15,191 Bil. JPY, NSA Monthly

Release Information

The "Current Survey of Commerce" is conducted to clarify the trends in Japan in business activities of establishments (including department stores, chain stores, supermarkets, other large-scale stores and convenience stores) engaged in trade. Commercial Sales figures include all retailers; large-scale figures only include supermarket and department store figures. Monthly from 2002.

For this survey, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) commissions prefectural governments, through the survey-takers, to request the surveyed establishments to fill in questionnaires, which are then collected. The Ministry also directly request the head offices of the department stores, supermarkets, convenience stores, large-scale specialty retailers for home electric appliances, drugstores and the home improvement stores to fill in questionnaires and then retrieve the data from them.

The industry classification is JSIC.

Data is revised when new data becomes available.

Growth figures for retail sales values published by the source are calculated differently from the growth rates based on the corresponding indexes, so small discrepancies are possible.

Due to a benchmark update conducted by the source, there exists some discontinuity in the value series reported for retail sales and wholesale sales between February and March 2020. This results in a level shift which needs to be accounted for by multiplying data up to February 2020 by specific coefficients. The corresponding coefficients are reported in the appendix of monthly data reports published by the source. See pages 135-137 of this report for September 2021, for example.

For more information, please refer to the source file.