Japan’s GDP pays for the Omicron effect: down by 0.2% qoq in the first quarter

Japan’s GDP for the first quarter of the year contracted by 0.2% on a quarterly basis and by 1% on an annualized basis. This is what emerges from the preliminary reading of the data, which confirmed the impact on the Japanese economy of the Omicron wave, which hit the country at the beginning of the year. However, economists had forecast a stronger contraction, equal to -0.4% on a quarterly basis.