Tokyo

JAPANESE consumers are raiding discount stores for everything from cheap shampoo to furniture. But when it comes to cars, it's the Rolls-Royces and BMWs that are moving off the dealer lots.

The number of luxury imported cars costing 10 million yen (S$133,240) or more surged 19 per cent in the first nine months to 13,605 units, reaching the highest proportion of imports in a decade. At the other end of the spectrum, deliveries of minicars such as the Nissan Dayz, which starts at about US$11,000, have slumped 11 per cent to 1.3 million units.