Measures Capital Flow into U.S. Denominated Assets. Summarizes the flow of stocks, bonds and money market funds to and from the United States. The headline figure is the difference in value between American purchases of foreign securities and foreign purchases of American securities, expressed in millions of dollars. The Treasury International Capital or TIC statement is a major component of the American capital account and gives valuable insight into foreign demand for American investments and dollar.

A positive figure indicates that more capital is entering the US than leaving as sales of American securities to foreigners exceed American purchases of foreign securities. Such positive figures suggest that American security markets are competitive with those of other countries. Foreign security purchases are especially important in the case of a trade deficit, as a positive figure can offset the depreciating effect of a trade shortfall. On the contrary, a negative or declining TICS figure reflects a declining capital flow picture. Outflows are indicative of weaker demand for US assets which puts downward pressure on the value of the dollar.

A key feature of the TIC data is its measurement of the types of investors the dollar has; governments and private investors. Usually, a strong government holding of dollar denominated assets signals growing dollar optimism as it shows that governments are confident in the stability of the US dollar. Most importantly seems to be the purchases of Asian central banks such as that of Japan and China. Waning demand by these two behemoth US Treasury holders could be bearish for the US dollar. As for absolute amount of foreign purchases, the market generally likes to see purchases be much stronger than the funding needs of that same month's trade deficit. If it is not, it signals that there is not enough dollars coming in to match dollar going out of the country.

A comprehensive measure of Japan's overall production and consumption of goods and services. GDP is a significant report in FX Market, serving as one of the primary indicators of a country\\\'s overall economic health.

Robust GDP growth signals a heightened level of economic activity and often a higher demand for the domestic currency. At the same time, economic expansion raises concerns about inflationary pressures which may prompt monetary authorities to increase interest rates. Thus positive GDP readings are generally bullish for the Yen, while negative readings are generally bearish.

Most production reports that lead to Japanese GDP are released before the official GDP number. Therefore, actual GDP figures usually confirm expectations. However, an unexpected release can move markets due to the significance of the figure.

Technically, Gross Domestic Product is calculated in the following way:

GDP = C + I + G + (EX - IM)

where
C = private consumption
I = private investment
G = government expenditure
EX = exports of goods and services
IM = imports of goods and services

The headline figures for GDP are the percentage growth rate from the previous quarter and the annualized percentage change in GDP. Prices used are benchmarked to 1997 prices.

Broad gauge of inflationary pressures. The GDP Deflator is different from the Consumer Price Index in that it does not take into account changes in the prices of imports and tends to underestimate price changes. The Gross Domestic Product Deflator is also untimely, released quarterly about two months after the reporting period. Nonetheless, it is highly correlated with the CPI and a key indicator of inflation. Consequently, the deflator provides insight into the future direction of monetary policy as the Bank of Japan is inclined to raise interest rates when faced with higher inflation.

Specifically the deflator measures the magnitude of changes in prices for all domestically produced final goods. It is the ratio of output in current prices (nominal GDP) to inflation-adjusted output (real GDP). The headline value is the percentage change in the GDP Deflator from the previous quarter.

Consumer Sentiment (or Consumer Confidence) measures the level of confidence households have in economic performance. Generally rising consumer confidence acts as a precursor to higher consumer expenditures which drive economic expansion.