Japan posts first annual trade deficit since 1980; Dec. trade gap wider than forecast

LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch)
Japan posted its first annual trade deficit since 1980, with the Ministry of Finance reporting Wednesday a 205.1 billion yen ($2.63 billion) trade gap for December, wider than a ¥150.5 billion forecast from a Dow Jones Newswires survey
Exports for December fell 8% from a year earlier, a larger drop than forecast falls of 7.9% and 7.5% from Reuters and Dow Jones Newswires, respectively
Imports rose 8.1% year-on-year
For all of 2011, Japan's trade deficit total ¥2.49 trillion
The Japanese yen slipped following the data, with the dollar rising to ¥77.68 from ¥77.64 ahead of the numbers.