concerning risks to the outlook, there have been extremely high uncertainties for japan's economy, including the following : developments in overseas economic activity and prices ; developments in the situation surrounding ukraine and in commodity prices ; and the course of covid - 19 at home and abroad and its impact. in this situation, it is necessary to pay due attention to developments in financial and foreign exchange markets and their impact on japan's economic activity and prices. meanwhile, japan's financial system has maintained stability on the whole. although attention is warranted on, for example, the impact of the tightening of global financial conditions, the financial system is likely to remain highly robust on the whole, mainly because financial institutions have sufficient capital bases. regarding financial risks from a longer - term perspective, while there is a possibility that prolonged downward pressure on financial institutions'profits may lead to a gradual pullback in financial intermediation, the vulnerability of the financial system could increase, mainly due to the search for yield behavior. although these risks are judged as not significant at this point, it is necessary to pay close attention to future developments. ii. conduct of monetary policy next, i will explain the bank's conduct of monetary policy. japan's economy is on its way to recovery from a downturn caused by covid - 19 and uncertainties for the economy have been extremely high. on the price front, the year - onyear rate of increase in the cpi is projected to decelerate to a level below 2 percent from fiscal 2023. given such developments in economic activity and prices, the bank will continue with monetary easing, aiming to firmly support japan's economy and thereby achieve the price stability target of 2 percent in a sustainable and stable manner, accompanied by wage increases. thank you. 2 / 2 bis - central bankers'speeches

prices have led to a lower volume of purchases, private consumption in real terms has continued to increase steadily, supported by so - called pent - up demand after the reclassification of covid - 19 under the infectious disease control law, and also by improvement in consumer sentiment reflecting the results of this year's annual spring labor - management wage negotiations ( chart 6 ). let me look at the developments of private consumption separately for goods and services. as for goods, consumption of durable goods has begun to pick up on the back of growth in new car sales owing to the waning of supply - side constraints for semiconductors used in automobiles. consumption of nondurable goods has been relatively weak due to the effects of high prices of beverages, food, and clothes. services consumption has increased moderately, with the impact of covid - 19 waning and fueled by pent - up demand. for example, even with the ongoing price rises, the dining - out industry has seen an increase in customer footfall across a wide range of restaurants, including izakaya ( japanese - style bars ), which had been slow to recover. domestic travel has been firm, even as the effects of the government's domestic travel discount program have waned gradually, because long - distance travel, which was at a low level during the pandemic, has been recovering. overseas travel has remained at a low level but has continued to increase moderately. the employment and income situation has improved moderately. the number of employed persons has seen moderate growth. the growth in regular employees is led by the medical, healthcare, and welfare services industry and by the information and communications industry, both of which have faced a severe labor shortage, while that in non - regular employees is led by industries such as face - to - face services. nominal wages per employee have also increased moderately ( chart 7 ). scheduled cash earnings have also been on the rise. this is because the wages of full - time employees have started to gradually reflect the results of this year's annual spring labor - management wage negotiations, which ended up with the highest wage growth rate since 1993, and also because hourly wages for part - time employees have been rising as labor market conditions have tightened. special cash earnings have increased as well, reflecting larger bonuses on the back of improvement in corporate earnings. as a result, total employee income, which is the product of the number of employees and nominal wages per employee, is also on the rise. until recently, there