TOKYO: Japan's national wealth grew for the third straight year in 2018, thanks to brisk infrastructure investment and land price rises, the Cabinet Office has said.

The value of overall assets in the country including cash, deposits and shares minus that of loans and other debts is estimated to have come to 3,457.4 trillion yen at the end of 2018, up 2.2 percent from a year earlier, according to the agency's report released Monday.

The net asset figure was also pushed up by a fall in domestic share prices in the reporting year that led to a fall in the value of foreigners' shareholdings, which are counted as debt for Japan.

On the Tokyo Stock Exchange, the benchmark Nikkei average logged a 12 percent drop in 2018.

Reflecting the lower share prices, households' net assets fell 1.3 percent to 2,623.3 trillion yen.

The general government sector posted a net asset of 29.9 trillion yen, down 37 percent.

Meanwhile, non-financial companies enjoyed net asset growth of 32.5 percent to 550.2 trillion yen, as the value of their outstanding shares, calculated as debt, decreased.

JIJI Press