WFlorid

Reality Check for Japanese Commodity Price Estimates

Thank you for these insights into METI's thinking.

The Japanese oil industry seems to have some kind of collective disfunction on its thinking about oil prices. Both of the listed oil producers (Inpex 1605 and Japex 1662) have forecast their earnings this year on prices of $85/bbl and $80 /bbl, respectively, and neither have revised their earnings upward, despite the fact that oil has been above $120 for the entire reporting period (now in its fifth month). I wonder why Japanese oil industry leaders are making analyses so far away from the market price. Can they really hope to prove this is a temporary peak?

Nikkei Weekly Outlook: Pre-Earnings Downside Risk?

I appreciate the use of data in the article - it made your overall argument more clear. Thanks!

Global 'Oil Shock' Rattles World Stock Markets

Very nice overview of macro trends. Thanks!

Is This Japan Circa 1992?

Has the dollar depreciated by 50% against the yen?

Pricing Japanese Banks for Bankruptcy is Overdoing It

Dear Mr. Whitten,

While the headline is very interesting, I must say that it does not seem to be supported by facts. Could it be that you were sloppy in preparing this conclusion?

The most glaring issue is that you state that Japanese Banks as measured by Topix trade at a P/B ratio of 0.32. I checked the 95 publicly traded banks today that have positive P/B ratios. The average P/B is 0.85, the Mkt Cap weighted average is 1.1, and the median P/B was 0.77. I could find only one bank below your quoted level of 0.32, and that was Bank of Kochi, listed at 0.31. It is hard for me to understand how this data would lead to a market average of 0.32. Are these banks going bankrupt? Maybe, but I don't see how you could determine that from the price.

In addition, the chart shows "Nikkei" data, but the heading says banks are the cheapest "Topix" sector.

It seems to me that this is not the first time I noticed sloppy fact checking in your articles. I would be very grateful if you could work to improve the standards of Seeking Alpha, which I otherwise enjoy and find very useful.

Sincerely,

William L. Florida

Japanese Property: Fear Has Overcome Greed

Thanks for the specific recommendations. What makes Mitsubishi Estate and Daibiru more attractive than other real estate firms?