WhyItDropped

Nikkei 225 · January 4, 1996

A rare hopeful new year

+3.77%

single-day change vs previous close

Part of a longer stretch

The year the rescue bought

midway through · 1995-07-03 → 1996-06-26, +56.48% over the whole period

What happened that day?

  • On 4 January 1996 the Nikkei 225 rose 3.77% on the first session of the year
  • The yen had been weakening since the previous summer and exporters' profits were coming back
  • Rates were at a record low, and the government had decided for the first time to use public money on the bad loans
  • For the first time since the bubble deflated, several conditions improved at once
  • No single trigger can be pinned to this day
  • The dip before it was only 4.28% from the peak
  • The rise only ran to June. A consumption tax rise and the Asian crisis were waiting

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.