We were just shopping online and punching in a coupon code … which got us thinking how (1) paper coupons don’t seem to exist in Japan, and (2) even when shopping online, instead of coupon codes for discounts, there’s often a point system instead (the same as often found in-store), which effectively serves the same [...]

Wall Street rallied big on Thursday, led by better-than-expected retail sales figures, especially from Wal-Mart (WMT) in spite of sustained high gasoline prices. That leads us to wonder just how strong the U.S. consumer is and if there is not merely more debt being piled up. The difference between retail in Japan and the U.S., [...]