TOKYO: Japan’s savers held almost $25 billion in the nation’s tax-free investment accounts at the end of the program’s first year. Daiwa Institute of Research Ltd. says this falls short of the government’s target.
About 3 trillion yen ($24.7 billion) was invested in Nippon Individual Savings Accounts at the end of December, the Financial Services Agency said in a statement on its website yesterday. That’s up from 1.6 trillion yen at the end of June. NISA accounts increased to 8.2 million from 7.3 million six months earlier, the ministry said.
While the amount of money in the accounts almost doubled in the second half of the year, Daiwa Institute of Research says at the current pace the government won’t reach its target for 25 trillion yen in NISA investments by 2020. That figure would imply an annual pace of about 3.6 trillion yen. The goal was set by the Democratic Party regime in July 2012.
“There have been good increases compared with June,” said Shungo Koreeda, a Tokyo-based researcher at Daiwa Institute of Research. “But given their target, they need to speed up.”
The data are preliminary, and based on a survey in February of all financial institutions that offer NISA accounts, the FSA said.
Under the NISA program, individuals can invest 1 million yen a year for five years in stocks, exchange-traded funds, investment trusts and real estate investment trusts without taxes on capital gains or dividends. Such levies doubled to 20 percent at the start of last year for investments outside NISA accounts.
