[raincole]

You got the relationship between currency value and export prices upside down. Usually when your local currency devalues, it will make your exported goods cheaper in other countries.

This is why the US always accuses (justified or not) other countries artificially keeping their currencies undervalued, by the way.

[somenameforme]

He may have just fumbled into an accuracy, but the nuance here is that what you're saying is mostly true for domestically produced things, which is why the other country you're mostly referring to is China - they have domestic production facilities for just about everything.

Something like the Switch is going to rely heavily on imported parts, and so when your currency plummets relative to others, that forces you to increase prices just to stay in the black. And yeah in looking it up, then yen has dropped about 50% against the yuan just over the past 5 years. Seems like Japan didn't learn much from the US about picking 'print money' as your economic policy. It doesn't last long when you're an economic hegemon able to export your inflation, but it's a far worse idea when you're a lesser economic power.

[ageitgey]

> it's a far worse idea when you're a lesser economic power

Exactly. Japan has held its interest rates at almost zero for years (currently 0.75%) while the US is at 3.5% and has been roughly there or higher since late 2022. Having a negative 3% interest rate gap with the world's largest economy for over 3 years is going to cause currency weakness.

[ageitgey]

First, Japan doesn't make the Switch in Japan. They are made in Vietnam and China. So having a weak local currency isn't super helpful.

Second, the largest price increase is for the local Japanese market (and they are increasing the already-underpriced special 'Japan-only' model that they won't allow to be sold in other markets).