Japan March exports fall 11.7% amid coronavirus pandemic

The trade balance come to a surplus of 4.9 billion yen as imports fall 5.0%

20200420 Tokyo port Japan trade stat

The big drop in export in March followed a 1.0% fall in February.  © Reuters

TOKYO (Reuters) -- Japan's exports slumped the most in nearly four years in March as U.S.-bound shipments, including cars, fell at the fastest rate since 2011, highlighting the damage the coronavirus pandemic is inflicting on global demand and trade.

Monday's bleak data underscored the challenges Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government faces in dealing with a collapse in activity that is expected to send the global economy into its deepest slump since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

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