There are growing expectations that Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi will call a snap election to bolster her position. Bloomberg's Sakura Murakami reports on the latest.

Tokyo

Japanese Prime Minister Takahichi is the subject of speculation regarding a potential snap election, with her popularity ratings currently high but concerns about the timing and political risks involved. Calling an election could delay the national budget and may be perceived as deprioritizing inflation, while reports indicate Takahichi has not fully consolidated her power within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party.

Diplomatic engagements are ongoing, including meetings with South Korea's President Lee and an upcoming visit from Italy's Prime Minister Maloney. Expectations are that any announcement about a snap election would come after these meetings, with parliament likely to be called into session soon, possibly paving the way for an election in early February.

Could Japan's Takaichi call a snap election?

Sakura, there's a lot of speculation, but maybe talk to us first about what's at stake for Takahichi if she does indeed call a snap election. So this would be a bit of a political gambit for Takahichi. She does have very high popularity ratings. Sometimes they even touch up to 80%, they kind of are around the 70% mark recently. And it would be a kind of a bit of a gambit for her. But on the risky side of things, it would be a bit of a difficulty because it would be seen that she's putting inflation on the back burner. If she does call an election, the budget will probably be passed at a later date and that could be seen as a bit of a problem. Also, there are reports that seem to say that she's not quite solidified her power within the LDP. So there are pros, there are cons, and she's trying to call a gambit at this point. Yeah, and to your point, I mean, we only have reports that she intends to call an election that hasn't actually been called yet. So what's the state of play? What are the variables? So at the moment, Prime Minister Takahichi is hosting South Korean President Lee in Japan. There are also plans for Prime Minister Maloney of Italy to visit later this week as well. So the expectation is that she's not going to mention a snap election. She's not going to really talk about a potential dissolving of the parliament quite yet until later this week. But after that, the expectation is that the parliament will be called into session next Friday and that could be an opportunity for her to test the waters, possibly call the election and in that case, the election will probably come sometime around early February.

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