On what date did Japan’s Nikkei 225 reach its all-time closing high before the 1989 bubble collapse?

Japan’s Nikkei 225 reached its all-time closing high on December 29, 1989, at 38,915.87.

The record came near the end of Japan’s extraordinary late-1980s asset-price boom. Rising real-estate and share prices, abundant credit, and strong investor confidence pushed Japanese equities to historically high valuations. The Nikkei’s record became a symbol of the bubble’s peak.

Japanese stock prices then entered a prolonged decline as monetary conditions tightened and the asset bubble burst. The fall contributed to Japan’s extended economic stagnation during the 1990s and is why the period is often called the “Lost Decade,” although economic weakness continued beyond that decade.

The date refers to the index’s closing record, not its intraday high. The Nikkei 225 also reached an intraday peak on the same trading day, but trivia references commonly use the closing figure of 38,915.87. The index did not exceed that closing record until 2024.