© Reuters. A visitor walks past Japan’s Nikkei stock prices quotation board inside a building in Tokyo, Japan February 19, 2024. REUTERS/Issei Kato/file photo
(This Feb. 21 story has been corrected to fix the gender of the analyst in paragraph 2)
By Patturaja Murugaboopathy and Noriyuki Hirata
(Reuters) – As Japanese stocks approach record levels last seen in the 1989 bubble-era, valuation metrics suggest they are still far from overpriced compared to historic levels and global peers.
The Nikkei share average is up nearly 50% in the past year and closing in on its record high of 38,957.44 points touched on the final trading day of 1989.
Yet, on a popular price-to-earnings ratio metric, the MSCI Japan index’s 12-month forward ratio stands at 14.1, below the ‘s 17.4 and the MSCI United States index’s 20.1.
“From a historical perspective, Japanese stocks at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 15x do not look expensive versus…
