Abe’s print and spend plan buoys markets but reform also needed

Even before Japanese voters returned Shinzo Abe’s party to power, he had already won over financial markets with an economic revival plan as seductively simple as economists say it is risky: print money and spend it.

Lots of it.

The Liberal Democratic Party’s landslide yesterday is likely to sustain a market rally fuelled by economic stimulus hopes, but Abe’s economic legacy will probably be defined by how he tackles chronic ills that easy money alone cannot fix and that were largely ignored during the campaign.