Traders in Tokyo are predicting the most volatile return from "Golden Week" national holidays since Shinzo Abe became prime minister, as corporate earnings and a rising yen present "Abenomics" with one of its sternest tests to date. As well as a slew of major earnings reports from the nation's largest automakers Toyota and Nissan and from trading houses such as Mitsubishi Corp and Mitsui & Co hit by slumping oil and commodity prices, economic data are expected to expose the fragility of sentiment toward Japan after a massive sell-off by foreign investors. Particular attention, say analysts, will fall on the Economy Watchers Survey, due out May 12 — the first conducted since a series of earthquakes hit the southern city of Kumamoto in April and disrupted the supply chains of Sony and other leading Japanese electronics and auto-parts makers. As volumes ramp back up following nearly 10 days of closed or thinly traded markets, dealers predict that Japanese and overseas investors alike will be taking a critical look at how the first three months of negative interest rates — introduced on February 16 — have dragged on the financial sector and the economy. Results from Mizuho Financial Group, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group and, the most negatively affected by the policy, Japan Post Bank, could well confirm fears. The vulnerability to currency fluctuations will also be in sharp focus, say traders. Monday begins the first full week of trading since the Bank of Japan's unexpected decision on April 28 to forego further monetary easing — a move that caused the yen to surge into the Y106 zone against the US dollar and revived speculation that the Japanese authorities may be tempted to intervene. Currency analysts are expecting post-Golden Week markets to repeatedly test the Y105/$ level — the exchange rate that an increasing number of Japanese corporates are now building into their profit assumptions for the current financial year. An increasing number of forex analysts, however, anticipate a test of the Y100/$ level in coming weeks as Japan prepares to host the G7 leaders summit at the end of May. The currency's approach towards Y100/$ would see an effective reversal of the yen weakness that has driven Japan's long bull market since Mr Abe came to power in 2012. "Abenomics stands at a critical crossroads," said Goldman Sachs economist Naohiko Baba, commenting on forex markets ahead of the post-Golden Week trading resumption. Nomura's Japan equity strategist, Hisao Matsuura, expects an intensified rush by analysts this week to revise forecasts across the board as the market absorbs what is expected to be a severe impact of recent currency moves on earnings momentum. Although earnings are in a downward phase, he wrote in a note to investors, the early stages of the full-year results season has seen the number of companies where results were either higher or lower than Nomura's forecasts being roughly equal. But Mr Matsuura added that Nomura had slashed its forecasts for recurring profits at large-cap Japanese companies: where previously the brokerage had forecast a 6.6 per cent year on year decline in recurring profits in the first half of the 2016 financial year, Nomura now expects an 11.1 per cent contraction.
