<span style="line-height: 20.8px;">Japan was in the news this week mostly for the upside surprise in first-quarter GDP; at 1.7 percent, the real growth rate was well ahead of expectations and a reversal of the 4Q 2015 contraction. Will better-than-expected growth temper some of the recent chatter about more aggressive foreign currency intervention to bring down the yen? Will Prime Minister Abe go ahead with a second consumption tax hike next April, despite the negative fallout of the previous increase in the tax two years ago? Is domestic consumption, which drove the improved GDP numbers, here to stay, or will these numbers prove as fleeting as April cherry blossoms when the first revision comes out?</span>