Capital spending by companies rose for the third straight quarter during the October-December period as growth in corporate profits on the back of the yen's slide prompted businesses to bolster investment, the government said Monday.
Business investment by all nonfinancial sectors for purposes such as building plants and introducing new equipment gained 4.0 percent from a year earlier to ¥9.44 trillion in the quarter ended in December, following a 1.5 percent climb in the previous quarter, the Finance Ministry said.
"Capital spending has been picking up" with the nation's economy moderately recovering, a ministry official said, but he added some firms are skeptical whether the world's third-biggest economy will continue to recuperate, given the April 1 sales tax hike.