Japan's Finance Minister hints at a supplementary budget of approximately 19 billion USD

Golden Ten Data, May 22 – Japan’s Finance Minister, Kaoru Katayama, hinted on Friday that the scale of Japan’s supplementary budget could be around $19 billion, while downplaying the potential impact of additional spending on the government’s finances. When asked by reporters today about local media reports suggesting the supplementary budget would amount to about 3 trillion yen (equivalent to $18.9 billion), Katayama said, “Those numbers are not far off.” She added that Japan’s Prime Minister, Sanae Takaichi, will provide more details next Monday. Katayama stated that some bonds issued under last year’s annual budget may be canceled, which would limit the need for new government bond issuance for the supplementary budget. Japan is currently reviewing revenue and spending from the previous fiscal year ahead of the June year-end settlement. “Taking these cancellations into account, our goal is to avoid relying on issuing additional deficit-covering bonds,” Katayama said. After repeatedly insisting that a supplementary budget was unnecessary, Sanae Takaichi changed her stance earlier this week, later indicating that she does not expect much debt financing to be required. The government continues to use reserve funds to pay for existing measures, but economists have warned for weeks that these funds may run out in the coming weeks.