Chart of the Day: Private consumption surged by 2% in 4Q12

A big improvement from 3Q's 0.5%.

According to Nomura, on the demand side, private consumption grew by 2.0% y-o-y in Q4 from 0.5% in Q3, consistent with improving wage growth and tight labour markets, while investment spending increased 5.8% y-o-y from -3.8% in Q3. 

Government spending continued to decline, falling by 4.6% y-o-y in Q4 from -2.4% in Q3, in line with expectations.

Here's more from Nomura:

Given inventories‟ large contribution of 10.3 percentage points (pp), total domestic demand‟s contribution to headline GDP growth increased to 12.8pp.

Unsurprisingly, export growth continued to decline in Q4 in light of the weak global backdrop, while imports rose by 3.5% y-o-y. As a result, net exports reduced headline GDP growth by 11.4pp.