Disappointing year hides some positives

The performance of the Japanese market this year has undoubtedly been disappointing (the Topix is up by 0.81% year-to-date in US dollar terms, compared with a return of 15.64% for the MSCI World index). However, investors should not give up on Japan, as there is an excellent range of good-value opportunities for longer-term investors to exploit in this market. Japan has been a domestic story for some time, with the economy slowly emerging from deflation. The macro picture in Japan reflects the maturity of the economy, with positive (but low) growth expected. Another positive is that corpo...