Japan's fourth quarter GDP falls

Japan's economy grew at a slower pace than initially estimated in the final quarter of 2014, as corporate capital spending declined amid a weak recovery in consumer spending following last year's sales tax hike, government data showed Monday.
Gross domestic product, the total value of goods and services produced at home, for October-December grew an annualized real 1.5 percent, downgraded from 2.2 percent. The outcome compared with an average market forecast of an around 2.2 percent expansion, Japan's News Agency (Kyodo) reported.
The figure translated into a 0.4 percent increase from the previous quarter, against 0.6 percent growth in a preliminary report released Feb. 16 by the Cabinet Office.