WhyItDropped

Nikkei 225 · November 20, 2008

November 2008 relapse

-6.89%

single-day change vs previous close

Part of a longer stretch

Japan's lost decades

near the end of it · 1989-12-29 → 2009-03-10, -81.87% over the whole period

What happened that day?

  • On 20 November 2008 the Nikkei 225 fell 6.89% in a single day
  • The coordinated rescue had produced a bounce in late October, but November's real-economy data pushed the market back down
  • Japan's exports lean on cars and electronics, so falling world demand lands immediately
  • The yen kept strengthening as well, shrinking the yen value of overseas earnings
  • Fears that US carmakers might fail shook Japanese parts suppliers too
  • The Nikkei's low came in March 2009, and getting back to the old high ultimately took 15 years

Sources

Every figure on this page is recomputed from the original daily closing prices and checked against them at build time. The account of what happened is written from the sources listed above.