Keidanren Summer Forum Opens: Big Business Told to Lead Investment-Driven Economy

Keidanren's summer forum opened in Karuizawa with Chairman Tsutsui setting the tone: realizing an 'investment-led economy' requires large corporations to lead domestic capital spending. In context, the remark carries weight—the government's 370-trillion-yen strategic investment vision needs private capital to answer, and the business lobby's endorsement backs that direction. Japanese firms have long been criticized for hoarding cash amid a shrinking home market; now AI infrastructure, semiconductors, decarbonization, and economic security offer more domestic investment themes than they can choose among. Nvidia's same-day Japan investment pledge forms a foreign-domestic confluence. For investors, capex is the core gauge of this cycle's substance: if corporate statistics and machinery orders keep rising, 'investment-led' turns from slogan into earnings momentum across machine tools, power equipment, and systems integration.