I am writing this from Japan. My family and I are here for a few weeks, moving between Osaka, Kyoto and Nara, and the weak yen is impossible to ignore. I was here more than a decade ago, and the difference this time shows up within the first day. Meals that would feel properly expensive back in Ontario come out costing a fraction of that once I convert. Local trains barely register as an expense. Even convenience store snacks, the onigiri and canned coffee that quietly add up on any trip, feel almost free.

I have already looked at Japan from the other direction in Living in Japan as a Canadian: what it costs to live here, how residency works, and where the country fits as an expat destination. This is a different question entirely.

Anyone who has glanced at CAD/JPY over the last couple of years already knows the yen has been weak. But standing in a train station doing currency math in my head, a different question kept nagging at me. If my Canadian dollar buys an unusual amount of Japan at the restaurant, the convenience store and the ticket machine, does it also buy an unusual amount of value on the Tokyo Stock Exchange?

The answer, after spending real time on this, is not necessarily.