Japan's retail sales expanded 5.3% year over year in May to 13.45 trillion yen, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said Monday.
The latest reading surpassed the consensus forecast of 3.1% growth, as tracked by Investing.com, and compared with a 2.8% increase recorded in the previous month.
It also marked the third month of expansion and the strongest pace since November 2023.
On a seasonally adjusted month-over-month basis, retail sales grew 1.9%, faster than the 1.3% expansion between March and April.
The upbeat performance was largely driven by a 23.7% year-over-year jump in retail sales of automobiles, followed by machinery and electronics retailers at 14.5%, various goods at 6.9%, and food and beverage retailers at 2.4%.
Department stores and supermarkets combined rose 5.3% year over year to 1.95 trillion yen, with department stores outperforming at 7.6% and supermarkets adding 4.5%. On an existing-store basis, department store sales climbed 8.8%, while supermarkets saw a 3.6% increase.
However, not all categories reported growth in retail sales. Fuel retailers reported a 2.6% drop, while textile, clothing, and personal goods retail decreased 0.7%.
The broader commercial sales total, which includes wholesale trade, rose 5% year over year to 52.55 trillion yen in May, with wholesale expanding 4.9%. Among wholesale sub-sectors, minerals and metals posted the strongest gain at 10.7%, followed by other wholesale at 7.4% and agricultural and marine products at 6.9%.
The data further suggests that the government's efforts to shield residents from the fallout of the Iran conflict are working. The government has rolled out fuel subsidies since March amid rising diesel and gasoline prices.
Earlier this month, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi approved a 3.1 trillion yen supplementary budget for the current fiscal year to offset the impact of rising energy costs on households.
However, the PM also hinted at reducing gasoline subsidies in a bid to cap gasoline prices at around 170 yen per liter.
Meanwhile, the retail outperformance in May comes amid rising inflationary pressures in Japan. In May, Japan's national headline inflation ticked up to 1.5% from 1.4% in April, but missed the Trading Economics forecast of 1.6%.
Core CPI, which strips out fresh food items, rose 1.4% year over year in May, unchanged from April's reading, while core-core CPI inflation, which excludes both fresh food and energy prices, eased slightly to 1.8% from 1.9% in April, falling below the Trading Economics forecast of 1.9%.
The Bank of Japan recently raised its policy rate by 25 basis points to 1.0%, the highest level since 1995.
Last week, BOJ Governor Kazuo Ueda warned that inflation could exceed the central bank's target of 2% as higher crude oil prices drive energy and goods prices upward.
"Given that the underlying inflation rate is approaching 2% and the current monetary environment is accommodative, we believe that we will continue to raise the policy interest rate and adjust the degree of monetary easing in accordance with economic, price, and financial conditions," Ueda said in his prepared speech to the National Shinkin Bank Convention after missing the policy meeting for June.
