Japanese households held a record 2,121 trillion yen ($15 trillion) in assets at the end of September, buoyed by stock and investment trust holdings that also hit their highest-ever levels, the Bank of Japan said Wednesday.
The data also showed the BOJ owned 574.11 trillion yen worth of Japanese government bonds, or a record 53.9 percent of the total debt outstanding.
Even after including short-term bonds, the Japanese central bank's holdings came to 47.7 percent of the total debt, also a record. Foreign investors, meanwhile, cut their bond holdings by 8.6 percent from the end of July, the sharpest drop since 2010, owning 13.7 percent of the total. It was the first decline since 2014, according to the BOJ.
While Prime Minister Fumio Kishida is seeking to encourage cash-loving Japanese households to increase their stock and bond holdings, the bulk remains in safe assets. Cash and deposits rose 1.2 percent to 1,113 trillion yen, accounting for 52.5 percent of the total.
Stock holdings jumped 30.4 percent to 273 trillion yen while investment trusts increased 17.4 percent to 101 trillion yen.
The U.S. Federal Reserve and other central bank raised interest rates aggressively to tame inflation, sending overseas yields higher. The BOJ has remained an outlier with its commitment to ultralow rates but it gradually eased control over long-term bond yields.
In July, the Japanese central bank decided to allow 10-year Japanese government bond yields to rise above 0.5 percent. It then removed that cap in October, letting the benchmark yield climb above 1.0 percent.
