Yoshihiko Noda, has been elected on August 30th the 6th prime minister of Japan in 5 years.
What to expect? Not too much except an increase in the consumption tax to go from current 5% to 10% in the next few years. This is a nice way to create a bit of inflation of Japan an reign in the huge public deficit over 200% of GDP. Beside that, I doubt that he will have enough leadership to open Japanese market by signing free trade agreement. This would require to lower agricultural barriers and the farm lobby is too strong in Japan. Impact on our foreign consulting and outsourcing clients at JMC: not much! Business will be slow as usual.
