Nikkei 225 · October 9, 1974
The oil shock in Japan
-37.40%
peak-to-trough, the whole slide
422 trading days · 1973-01-24 → 1974-10-09
back to the old high on 1978-03-28
What happened that day?
- From the January 1973 peak to the October 1974 low the Nikkei 225 fell 37.4% — 422 trading days
- Japan imported almost all of its oil, so the shock hit more directly than it did elsewhere
- Prices surged and people stockpiled essentials. A nationwide shortage of toilet paper became the symbol of the period
- The bigger break was to the assumption that high growth would simply continue. Japan's growth rate stepped down from here
- With the yen already dearer after the Nixon shock, soaring raw material costs stacked on top
- The old high returned on 28 March 1978
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.