The impact from COVID-19 and resulting restriction measures will likely decrease Japan’s real GDP. Japan tourist numbers saw a sharp decline due to government-imposed travel restrictions which negatively impacted the tourism, restaurants, amusement parks and other relevant industries.1
In 2019, 4,088 M&A transactions, including domestic, inbound and outbound, were completed, once again surpassing the prior year’s transaction count.1
The IPO activity in 2019 was steady with 86 companies that went public, compared to 90 companies in both 2018 and 2017. The application software industry was the leader with 34 IPOs in 2019.1
On March 24, 2020, the president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Thomas Bach and the prime minister of Japan, Abe Shinzo, held a conference call to discuss the constantly changing environment with COVID-19 and the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020. The below statement was made during the discussion:
“It was concluded that the Games of the XXXII Olympiad in Tokyo will be rescheduled to a date beyond 2020 but not later than 2021, to safeguard the health of the athletes, everybody involved in the Olympic Games and the international community”.1
Further, COVID-19 will disrupt industrial production as supply chains are impacted by a weakening labor force due to shorter working hours and other restrictive measures.1
Source
1 Company press releases, IOC and IHS Markit Japan Economic Outlook as of March 19, 2020
