Tokyo prepares new $100 billion stimulus plan

Japan is preparing its third stimulus package since last autumn, this time to the tune of 100 billion dollars, Prime Minister Taro Aso announced on Monday. This latest cash injection would be the country's biggest ever supplementary budget.Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso on Monday ordered fresh stimulus spending of at least 100 billion dollars to rescue Asia's biggest economy from its worst slump since World War II.It would be Japan's biggest ever supplementary budget, highlighting mounting fears in Tokyo about the tanking economy, which has been battered by a plunge in worldwide demand for Japanese cars and high-tech goods."Japan's economic growth rate is expected to fall the most among advanced nations," Aso told reporters.He said world leaders, who met recently in London for a Group of 20 summit on the crisis, were determined to cooperate by boosting public spending.Aso, facing key elections this year, instructed his finance minister to draw up an extra budget of at least two percent of gross domestic product (GDP) for the 2009 financial year starting this month.That would make the package worth 10 trillion yen (100 billion dollars) or more.The prospect of a fresh economic boost helped the Tokyo stock market continue its recent recovery, with the Nikkei rising 1.2 percent to a three-month high. The index has gained about one quarter in less than a month.The package comes on top of stimulus measures approved by parliament since October that were worth a combined 75 trillion yen, of which actual fiscal spending was about 12 trillion yen.Japan's economy logged its worst performance in almost 35 years in the last quarter of 2008, contracting at an annualised pace of 12.1 percent. The government has described the financial crisis as the worst since World War II.