Method

Every piece follows the same six rules.

• One document. A single page, table or filing from a Japanese ministry, the Bank of Japan or a listed company. It is linked at the foot of the piece.
• A ledger of figures. Before publication, each number in the piece is logged against the original document as fetched, with its unit and date.
• Arithmetic is labelled. When we divide, subtract or convert units, we say "by our arithmetic" and show the sum.
• A second pass that tries to break it. A separate review re-fetches the source and looks for figures that do not match. A piece is published only after that pass.
• What the document does not say, we do not say. No reasons, no forecasts, no views on value.
• Corrections are visible. If a published figure turns out to be wrong, we fix it and add a dated note at the foot of the piece saying what changed.

We use software, including AI tools, to fetch, draft and cross-check. Translations of Japanese terms are our own and are marked as such where a term has no settled English name.