The Japan Railways Group , more commonly known as the JR Group ( JRグループ , Jeiāru Gurūpu ) or simply JR , is a group of railway companies in Japan that underwent division and privatization of the government-owned Japanese National Railways (JNR) on April 1, 1987. It consists of six passenger railway companies, one freight railway company, and two non-service companies. Most of the liability of the JNR was assumed by the JNR Settlement Corporation .
24-514: Railway Technical Research Institute ( 鉄道総合技術研究所 , Tetsudō Sōgō Gijutsu Kenkyūsho ) , or RTRI ( 鉄道総研 , Tetsudō Sōken ) , is the technical research company under the Japan Railways group of companies. RTRI was established in its current form in 1986 just before Japanese National Railways (JNR) was privatised and split into separate JR group companies. It conducts research on everything related to trains, railways and their operation. It
48-461: A nationwide freight operator. Unlike some other groups of companies, the JR Group is made up of independent companies, and it does not have group headquarters or a holding company to set the overall business policy. The six passenger railways of the JR Group are separated by region. Nearly all their services are within the prescribed geographic area. However, some long-distance operations extend beyond
72-507: A steady exponential rate. During the Japanese asset price bubble , the average hit its bubble-era record high on 29 December 1989, when it reached an intraday high of 38,957.44, before closing at 38,915.87, having grown sixfold during the decade. Subsequently, it lost nearly all these gains, reaching a post-bubble intraday low of 6,994.90 on 28 October 2008 — 82% below its peak nearly 19 years earlier. The 1989 record high held for 34 years, until it
96-471: Is a price-weighted index . The index is calculated as follows: A d j P r i c e = P r i c e × A d j F a c t o r {\displaystyle AdjPrice=Price\times AdjFactor} , then ∑ A d j P r i c e D i v i s o r {\displaystyle {\frac {\sum AdjPrice}{Divisor}}} As of July 2024 ,
120-582: Is a stock market index for the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE). It is a price-weighted index , operating in the Japanese Yen (JP¥), and its components are reviewed twice a year. The Nikkei 225 measures the performance of 225 highly capitalised and liquid publicly owned companies in Japan from a wide array of industry sectors. Since 2017, the index is calculated every five seconds. It was originally launched by
144-436: Is funded by the government and private rail companies. It works both on developing new railway technology, such as magnetic levitation , and on improving the safety and economy of current technology. Its research areas include earthquake detection and alarm systems, obstacle detection on level crossings, improving adhesion between train wheels and tracks, reducing energy usage, noise barriers and preventing vibrations. RTRI
168-493: Is the main developer in the Japanese SCMaglev program. The RTRI is developing a variable gauge system, called the " Gauge Change Train ", to allow 1,435 mm ( 4 ft 8 + 1 ⁄ 2 in ) Shinkansen trains to access 1,067 mm ( 3 ft 6 in ) lines of the original rail network. Japan Railways The JR Group operates a large proportion of intercity rail service (including
192-477: The Japanese asset price bubble . On 4 March 2024, the index surpassed 40,000 (intraday and closing) for the first time in history. On 5 August 2024, amid a global stock market decline, the Nikkei dropped by more than 4,200 points, surpassing 1987's Black Monday as its biggest single-day drop in history. The following day, it bounced back by more than 3,200 points, the largest single-day gain in history. The index
216-688: The Railway Technical Research Institute and Railway Information Systems Co., Ltd. To cover various non-railway business areas, each regional operator in the JR Group has its own group of subsidiary companies with names like "JR East Group" and "JR Shikoku Group". Owned by JRTT Owned by JRTT Owned by JRTT Owned by the 7 railway companies above JR maintains a nationwide railway network as well as common ticketing rules that it inherited from JNR. Passengers may travel across several JR companies without changing trains and without purchasing separate tickets. However, trains running across
240-714: The Shinkansen high-speed rail lines) and commuter rail service. JR Hokkaido , JR Shikoku , and JR Freight ( JRF ) are governed by the Act for the Passenger Railway Companies and Japan Freight Railway Company [ ja ] , also known as the JR Companies Act , and are under the control of the public Japan Railway Construction, Transport and Technology Agency (JRTT), while JR East , JR Central , JR West , and JR Kyushu are completely floated in
264-526: The 1970s, passenger and freight business had declined, and fare increases had failed to keep up with higher labor costs. The JR Group companies were formed out of the privatization of the Japanese National Railways in 1987. In 1987, the government of Japan took steps to divide and privatize JNR. While division of operations began in April of that year, privatization was not immediate: initially,
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#1732852357318288-504: The Nikkei average breached the 30,000 benchmark, its highest level in 30 years, due to the levels of monetary stimulus and asset purchase programs executed by the Bank of Japan to mitigate the financial effects of the COVID-19 pandemic . On 22 February 2024, the Nikkei reached an intraday high of 39,156.97 and closed at 39,098.68, finally surpassing its 1989 record high, an important milestone since
312-664: The Tokyo Stock Exchange in 1950, and was taken over by the Nihon Keizai Shimbun ( The Nikkei ) newspaper in 1970 , when the Tokyo Exchange switched to the Tokyo Stock Price Index (TOPIX), which is weighed by market capitalisation rather than stock prices. The Nikkei 225 began to be calculated on 7 September 1950, retroactively calculated back to 16 May 1949, when the average price of its component stocks
336-455: The boundaries of JR companies have been reduced. JR maintains the same ticketing rules based on the JNR rules and has an integrated reservation system known as MARS (jointly developed with Hitachi ). Some types of tickets (passes), such as Japan Rail Pass and Seishun 18 Ticket , are issued as "valid for all JR lines" and accepted by all passenger JR companies. Various unions represent workers at
360-422: The boundaries. The Shirasagi train service between Nagoya and Kanazawa , for instance, uses JR West rolling stock but the segment of track between Nagoya and Maibara is owned by JR Central, whose crew manage the train on that section. Japan Freight Railway Company operates all freight service on the network previously owned by JNR. In addition, the group includes two non-operating companies. These are
384-484: The company with the largest influence on the index is Fast Retailing ( TYO : 9983 ), at about 10% weight. The Nikkei 225 is traded as a future on the Osaka exchange (OSE). The contract specifications for the Nikkei 225 (OSE ticker symbol JNK) are listed below: The following table shows the annual development of the Nikkei 225, which was calculated back to 1914. The GICS breakdown is shown here. As of October 2023 ,
408-709: The different JR Group companies, such as the National Railway Workers' Union , All Japan Construction, Transport and General Workers' Union , Doro-Chiba , and the Japan Confederation of Railway Workers' Unions . Nikkei 225 The Nikkei 225 , or the Nikkei Stock Average ( Japanese : 日経平均株価 , Hepburn : Nikkei heikin kabuka ) , more commonly called the Nikkei or the Nikkei index ( / ˈ n ɪ k eɪ , ˈ n iː -, n ɪ ˈ k eɪ / ),
432-470: The government retained ownership of the companies. Privatization of some of the companies began in the early 1990s. By October 2016, all of the shares of JR East, JR Central, JR West and JR Kyushu had been offered to the market and they are now publicly traded. On the other hand, all of the shares of JR Hokkaido, JR Shikoku and JR Freight are still owned by Japan Railway Construction, Transport and Technology Agency , an independent administrative institution of
456-457: The index finished at 8,016.70 in 1982. The Nikkei started 2013 near 10,600, hitting a peak of 15,942 in May. However, shortly afterward, it plunged by almost 10% before rebounding, making it the most volatile stock market index among the developed markets . By 2015, it had reached over 20,000 mark, marking a gain of over 10,000 in two years, making it one of the fastest growing stock market indices in
480-736: The state. All the JR Group companies operating in the Honshū region are constituents of the Nikkei 225 and TOPIX 100 indexes. [REDACTED] [REDACTED] Hokkaido [REDACTED] [REDACTED] East [REDACTED] [REDACTED] Central [REDACTED] [REDACTED] West [REDACTED] [REDACTED] Shikoku [REDACTED] [REDACTED] Kyushu The Japan Railways Group consists of seven operating companies and two other companies that do not provide rail service. The operating companies are organized into six passenger operators and
504-441: The stock market ; in addition, JR East, JR Central and JR West are constituents of the Nikkei 225 and TOPIX 100 indices. Because the railways used to be owned by the government, Japanese people generally make a distinction between JR railways (including former JR lines that are now third sector ) and other private railways , and JR railways are almost always denoted differently from other private railways when shown on maps. By
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#1732852357318528-452: The world. However, by 2018, the index growth was more moderate at around the 22,000 mark. There was concern that the rise since 2013 was artificial and due to purchases by the Bank of Japan ("BOJ"). From a start in 2013, by end 2017, the BOJ owned circa 75% of all Japanese Exchange Traded Funds ("ETFs"), and were a top 10 shareholder of 90% of the Nikkei 225 constituents. On 15 February 2021,
552-493: Was 176.21 yen. Since July 2017, the index is updated every 5 seconds during trading sessions. The Nikkei 225 Futures , introduced at Singapore Exchange (SGX) in 1986, the Osaka Securities Exchange (OSE) in 1988, Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) in 1990, is now an internationally recognized futures index . The Nikkei average has deviated sharply from the textbook model of stock averages, which grow at
576-483: Was surpassed in 2024 (see below). On 15 March 2011, the second working day after the massive earthquake in the northeast part of Japan , the index dropped over 10% to finish at 8,605.15, a loss of 1,015 points. The index continued to drop throughout 2011, bottoming out at 8,160.01 on 25 November, putting it at its lowest close since 31 March 2009. The Nikkei fell over 17% in 2011, finishing the year at 8,455.35, its lowest year-end closing value in nearly thirty years, when
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