As a result, Japan’s export and GDP growth essentially halted in the first half of 1986. With the economy in recession and the exchange rate appreciating rapidly, the authorities were under considerablepressure to respond. They did so by introducing a sizable macroeconomic stimulus. Policy interest rates were reduced by about 3 percentage points, a stance that was sustained until 1989. A large fiscal package was introduced in 1987, even though a vigorous
recovery had already started in the second half of 1986. By 1987, Japan’s output was booming, but so were credit growth and asset prices, with stock and urban land prices tripling from 1985 to 1989.Then, in January 1990, the stock price bubble burst. Share prices lost a third of their value within a year,and two decades of dismal economic performance
followed. Today, nominal stock and land prices are back at their early 1980 s levels, one quarter to one-third of their previous peaks.