BSI Large Manufacturing QoQ

The BSI Large Manufacturing QoQ is the own-business-conditions Business Survey Index (BSI, rising share minus falling share) for Japan's large manufacturers. Large means capital of 1 billion yen or more, drawn from about 14,400 firms with capital of 10 million yen or more. It is jointly run by the Ministry of Finance and the Cabinet Office under the Statistics Act since April-June quarter of 2004. It measures quarter-on-quarter change in own sentiment (sales, orders, and profits judged together), not levels or realized output, and covers large manufacturing only.

Collection usually runs late April to late May, late July to late August, late October to late November, and late January to late February. Reference is May 15, August 15, November 15, and February 15. Release falls around June 12, September 12, December 10, and March 11 at 8:50 Japan time; dates may change.

It prints present and 2 outlooks for prior-quarter own change, domestic conditions, staffing, and capacity tightness, plus year-on-year sales, ordinary profits, and investment forecasts. Tables name top rising and falling industries, add rotating topical questions and regional splits, with no routine revisions except errata and later self-corrections.

This BSI has no fixed weights; it is 1 diffusion value per group, with companion series printed alongside.

• Own business conditions: the headline; quarter-on-quarter rise-versus-fall judgment on the firm's own sales, orders, and profits.
• Domestic economic conditions: quarter-on-quarter judgment on Japan overall, for comparison with the own-conditions reading.
• Employees: quarter-end judgment of shortage versus excess, tracking labor tightness.
• Equipment for production and sales: quarter-end judgment of shortage versus excess, tracking capacity tightness for investment analysis.
• Sales, ordinary profits, and investment: quantitative year-on-year forecasts, covering new investment, land within it, software, and quarterly spending by large firms.
• Decision factors: the 3 factors each respondent picks when reporting a rise or fall, published as contributing industries.

The January-March 2024 round, released March 12, 2024, printed large-manufacturing own conditions at -6.7 % points, down from +5.7. It missed the prior +0.8 outlook by 7.5 points. Domestic conditions stayed positive at +1.9 and employment tightness rose to +18.3, so firms reported deterioration while seeing domestic improvement and staff shortages.

Motor vehicles fell to -23.8 after a +25.4 outlook and chemicals to -5.5, while production machinery (+10.6) and electrical machinery (+7.0) rose. The release then expected +1.4 for April-June and +7.5 for July-September, framing the dip as a pause before recovery.

1. Sample: Stratify firms by capital and industry, with firms at 3 billion yen or more fully surveyed. Each firm answers for itself alone and counts as 1 vote in its group.
2. Seasonal judgment: Respondents judge excluding seasonal factors in real terms and compare with the immediately prior quarter; no statistical seasonal adjustment is applied.
3. Expansion and shares: Expand tabulated counts to population firm counts within each group, then compute each option's share including Unchanged and Unknown.
4. BSI formula: BSI equals the share reporting Rising minus the share reporting Falling, in % points; Unchanged and Unknown affect only the base. Example: with 40.0 Rising, 25.0 Unchanged, 30.0 Falling, and 5.0 Unknown, BSI is 40.0 minus 30.0, or 10.0 % points.
5. Employment and equipment: Employment BSI is Shortage minus Excessive at quarter-end levels; equipment BSI is Shortage minus Excessive likewise, not changes.
6. Actuals and outlooks: Rounds ask present plus the next 2 quarters together, printing 1 actual and 2 outlooks; parenthesised values repeat the prior survey's outlook.
7. Neutral line: 0 is the dividing line; positive means Rising exceeds Falling and negative the reverse, with range -100 to +100 and no 50 line.