Nearly 70% of Japan’s companies see hit to earnings from Ukraine crisis: Reuters Poll

TOKYO, March 17 (Reuters) – Practically 70% of Japanese companies count on the fall-out from the disaster in Ukraine to harm earnings, a Reuters ballot confirmed, with a majority of these citing a surge in oil costs as their major concern.

The most recent Reuters Company survey highlighted the probability of extra ache forward for firms in resource-poor Japan, the place a weakening yen is additional including to the price of commodities and heaping extra strain on households.

A complete of 69% of firms surveyed mentioned they anticipated the disaster to hit earnings, with 9% of companies saying they anticipated a big influence.

“As the value of merchandise rises, customers are tending to favour inexpensive items and providers as they turn out to be extra thrifty,” a supervisor of a retailer wrote within the survey, which polled 500 non-financial companies between March 2 and March 11.

Some 240 firms responded on situation of anonymity.

“We’re involved about the price of uncooked supplies in addition to forex fluctuations,” mentioned a supervisor at a equipment maker.

International concern about Russian oil provides have pushed up oil costs above $100 per barrel to ranges not seen in virtually a decade and costs of many different commodities from metals to grain have surged, too.

In the meantime, the yen has fallen to its weakest in 5 years, at 118 to the greenback, additional driving up the value of oil and different imports for Japanese consumers.

Of the companies that cited concern about influence from the Ukraine disaster, 63% picked oil worth spikes as their major fear whereas 15% cited supply-chain disruptions as their predominant fear.

Requested what areas they need the federal government to deal with essentially the most, 63% of companies selected efforts to counter vitality and broader worth hikes, 50% picked financial progress technique and 43% chosen COVID-19 measures.

The federal government is contemplating compiling a contemporary financial stimulus package deal to assist ease the ache from excessive vitality prices, the Kyodo information company reported on Wednesday. learn extra

Individually, the federal government has additionally mentioned it could elevate its gasoline subsidy for oil distributors to the higher restrict to assist ease the fee strain.

Reporting by Tetsushi Kajimoto; Modifying by David Dolan and Kim Coghill

: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.