TOKYO, July 3 (Reuters) – Japan’s services sector returned to expansion in June after stalling the previous month, though business confidence remained \u200csubdued amid concerns over Middle East tensions and intensifying cost \u200cpressures, a private survey showed on Friday. <\/p>\n
\u2022 The S&P Global final Japan Services Purchasing Managers’ \u200bIndex (PMI) rose to 52.2 in June from 50.0 in May, signalling a renewed rise in business activity. Readings above 50.0 indicate growth in activity, while those below point to a contraction. <\/p>\n
\u2022 The upturn marked the 14th expansion in \u200cthe past 15 months, \u2060with the exception of May, though the pace of growth was modest and slightly softer than the average seen \u2060over the past year. <\/p>\n
\u2022 New business increased at one of the quickest rates seen over the past two years, despite a further marked reduction in new \u200bexport business, \u200bwhich has now fallen for three \u200bconsecutive months. Some firms noted \u200cstronger demand across the transport sector, linked to new product releases and events. <\/p>\n
\u2022 Cost pressures intensified sharply, with input prices rising at the fastest pace since June 2022, driven by increases in oil, energy, food and wages. However, prices charged for goods and services to customers eased from \u200cMay’s near-record high. <\/p>\n
\u2022 Employment growth remained modest, \u200bquickening from May’s recent low but staying below \u200bthe average recorded over \u200bthe 10-month period of payroll growth. <\/p>\n
\u2022 Annabel Fiddes, Economics Associate \u200cDirector at S&P Global Market Intelligence, \u200bsaid: “Although growth momentum \u200bimproved, overall business confidence strengthened only slightly in June, as uncertainty over the war and rising expenses weighed on forecasts.” <\/p>\n
\u2022 The broader \u200bComposite PMI, which includes \u200cboth manufacturing and services, climbed to 52.8 in June from 51.1 \u200bin May, marking the strongest expansion in three months. <\/p>\n
(Reporting by \u200bKaori Kaneko; Editing by Jacqueline Wong) <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TOKYO, July 3 (Reuters) – Japan’s services sector returned to expansion in June after stalling the previous month,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52225,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175],"tags":[217,20949,215,35056,20102,35057,8,214,216,4488,35058],"class_list":["post-52224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-business-confidence","tag-business-of-japan","tag-employment-growth","tag-goods-and-services","tag-growth-momentum","tag-japan","tag-japans-business","tag-japanese-business","tag-middle-east-tensions","tag-transport-sector"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52224"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52224\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52225"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}