Tokyo, Feb 28, 2026, 14:58 JST — Market closed.
- Japan Exchange Group shares ended Friday at 2,135.5 yen, up 13.8% on the week.
- Cooling Tokyo inflation kept Bank of Japan rate-path bets alive, a key driver for the yen and equity flows.
- The next tests include a 10-year JGB auction on March 3, BOJ policy on March 18-19 and U.S. payrolls on March 6.
Shares of Japan Exchange Group Inc (8697.T) rose about 14% last week and finished Friday at 2,135.5 yen, up 3.5% on the day after touching 2,139. The stock ended the week 13.8% above the previous Friday’s 1,877 yen close, with about 6.84 million shares traded on Friday. 1
That matters now because JPX runs Japan’s main equity and derivatives venues and earns fees linked to trading and clearing. Japan’s Nikkei ended Friday at a record high and logged a 10.4% jump in February; “investors are bullish on the two-digit profit growth rate,” Hiroyasu Mori at Okachi Securities said. 2
Macro signals stayed noisy. Tokyo’s core consumer inflation (a measure that strips out fresh food) slowed to 1.8% in February from 2.0% in January, dipping below the Bank of Japan’s 2% target for the first time since October 2024, while a gauge excluding fresh food and fuel rose 2.5%. “I don’t think this result alone would affect the Bank of Japan’s stance,” said Kanako Nakamura, an economist at Daiwa Institute of Research; the BOJ raised rates to 0.75% in December. 3
The yen is still the swing factor for offshore flows into Tokyo stocks. Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama told parliament the government was watching the currency with “a strong sense of urgency,” when asked whether depreciation was pushing up import costs and hurting wages. 4
Corporate action also kept the tape busy. Toyota is planning to facilitate the unwinding of cross-shareholdings — stakes companies hold in each other — via a share sale worth around $19 billion, while Nintendo said it would sell stakes in three listed firms and start a buyback of up to 17 million shares, as pressure builds on Japanese firms to improve governance. 5
JPX’s own market pages show buyback trades piling up. The Tokyo Stock Exchange lists multiple off-auction repurchase transactions executed this week and more scheduled for Monday, including planned repurchases by Koito Manufacturing and Sato Foods Industries; off-auction trades are done outside the main auction, typically in larger blocks. 6
JPX does not need a blockbuster headline to move when markets are busy. Traders tend to treat it as a toll-road stock for Japan’s equity boom: when turnover rises, fee income can follow, and the shares often react before the results do.
But the linkage cuts both ways. If the BOJ leans more hawkish at its March 18-19 meeting — with its policy statement due March 19 — the yen could snap higher and sap risk appetite, pulling down volumes along with the broader market. 7
Bond demand is another tripwire on the calendar. Japan’s finance ministry will auction about 2.6 trillion yen ($17 billion) of 10-year government bonds on March 3, a test of appetite as rate expectations keep shifting. 8
JPX itself is not due to report full-year earnings until late April, according to its investor calendar, leaving the stock tied to macro and turnover headlines in the near term. 9
For the week ahead, traders will also focus on the U.S. employment report for February, due on March 6, a key marker for global rate expectations that can spill into Japan’s currency and equity trade. 10
