STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Monday, 15 December 2014

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22. Japan’s Communist Party Doubles Diet Seats in Abe Protest Vote

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-12-14/japan-s-communist-party-seen-doubling-seats-in-abe-protest-vote.html

The Japanese Communist Party more than doubled its seats in the lower house of parliament as its pacifist, anti-nuclear platform provided the clearest opposition to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s policies.

The JCP won 21 seats in yesterday’s lower-house election, up from 8 before the vote, even as the ruling coalition maintained its two-thirds majority. The Communists won their first single-seat district in 18 years, claiming a seat in the southern Okinawa island chain. The party can now submit legislation to parliament.

The Communists have called for a sales-tax increase planned for 2017 to be scrapped and for Japan to stay out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a regional trade agreement favored by Abe. Party leader Kazuo Shii has opposed restarting nuclear power plants closed after the 2011 Fukushima disaster, as well as the reinterpretation of the U.S.-imposed pacifist constitution to allow Japan to defend other countries.

“It’s the only opposition party that really acts like one,” said Tomoaki Iwai, a professor of politics at Nihon University in Tokyo. “It will be the choice of disgruntled voters.”