Tokyo :  JCB, the only international payment brand based in Japan, and Nowcast, a Japanese financial research and technology startup, are pleased to announce the release of the updated and expanded consumption index service JCB Consumption NOW on 5 November. JCB Consumption NOW was launched in May 2017 to enable users to track Japan retail consumption trends on a real-time basis. A wide range of national and local government agencies, institutional investors, financial institutions as well as consumer-goods companies have been taking advantage of the consumption indexes based on JCB group cardmember spending data[1].

 

The updated JCB Consumption NOW will provide a breakdown by age, gender, and residence area of statistics for consumer spending – goods, consumer spending – services, and five industries including ecommerce. In addition, statistics will be released sooner than before for even timelier information.

JCB Consumption NOW Features

1. Multifaceted analyses
Based on actual consumption data so you can follow consumption trends by industry and channel of sales, analysis that is unavailable with other indexes. Now JCB Consumption NOW will provide even finer-grained analysis by age, gender, and residence area.

2. More timely updates
Consumption indexes for actual spending from the 1st to the 15th of the month is available on the 1st of the next month, and for spending from the 16th to the end of the month on the 15th of the next month – faster than other consumption index services.

3. More detailed analyses
The index uses a data sample from JCB group cardmember payment information, providing statistics that are close to the population of Japan as a whole with a high degree of accuracy.

4. Protection of privacy and personal information
Customer payment and demographic information is anonymized as required by Japan’s Act on the Protection of Personal Information to protect the privacy and personal information of JCB cardmembers.