Behind the daily headlines that scream doom, gloom and crisis, Japan is actually doing quite well; many firms are booming, investment abroad has soared and living standards are better than ever, experts said.
Grim economic data churned out by the government and constant bad press reports serve to deflect worries by trading partners such as the US about Japan's technological prowess and its strong exports, they noted.
Many foreign companies are consequently also deterred from venturing into the market.
"All the grim news you hear gives you a bad perception, however it is more of a perception than a reality," said Ian Robertson, chairman and chief executive of Sony Victor Interactive Communications (S-Vic), a Japanese-British joint venture company in Tokyo.
"The real opportunities for companies are phenomenal, unfortunately the press reports keep people away from exploring these opportunities," he said.
Print media have dedicated thousands of column inches to describing the collapse of Japan's economic bubble at the end of the 1980s and the subsequent "lost decade."
Analysts never tire of alluding to a mountain of bad loans clogging the banking system, a deflationary spiral that restricts economic growth, record-high personal bankruptcies and the government's exploding debt.
"We have economic statistics saying there has been very little growth and we are getting told constantly by the press that the place is collapsing, yet the consumer is doing better than ever," said Eamonn Fingleton, a former journalist himself and now an author and Japan commentator.
"Meanwhile, the country as a whole is boosting its foreign assets very, very rapidly," he said.
Japan's net foreign assets -- the largest in the world -- have more than quadrupled over the past 12 years despite the economic stagnation, demonstrating the country's enormous power overseas, experts said.
"The media ... tend to just write about the gloom and often get it wrong frankly," said Ian de Stains, executive director of the British Chamber of Commerce in Japan.
"What is lacking is perspective. It is not that we are saying there are not problems -- there are problems, but they are the sort of problems that many countries would be quite happy to live with," he said.
Rating agencies often cite Japan's swollen national debt -- at around 140 percent of gross domestic product it is the highest of all industrialised nations -- as proof the economy is in serious trouble.
"But unbeknown to most Western observers, it is a gross figure that should be properly netted for the Japanese government's huge and continually increasing financial assets," Fingleton wrote in a recent article.
On a net basis Japan's national debt was just 51 percent of GDP at the last count, higher that the US's 43 percent but lower than many other developed countries, he said.
Japan may have the second largest economy in the world, but in technology terms it is number one in many areas such as laser diodes -- a key component in most high-tech products -- according to Fingleton.
Japan snatched the title of developing the world's most powerful computer from the US earlier this year when NEC Corp produced the Earth Simulator, which is five times faster than the previous leader.
The nation's financial woes often cast a shadow over any good news, but some people argue there is a huge disparity between the data released and reality.
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