Japan

Japan likely conducted its second currency intervention this week, current account figures from the central bank suggest, in another sign of the government’s intensified battle to prop up the yen, Bloomberg News reported. Tokyo’s latest entry into the market was likely around ¥3.5 trillion ($22.5 billion), based on a comparison of Bank of Japan accounts and money broker forecasts. The BOJ reported Thursday that its current account will probably fall ¥4.36 trillion due to fiscal factors on the next business day of Tuesday.

Japan intervened to prop up the yen after it hit a multidecade low against the dollar on Monday, the Wall Street Journal reported. The currency has plummeted against the dollar this year, hurt by increasing doubts among traders about the timing of U.S. interest rate cuts. The yen weakened to around 160 per dollar on Monday, but bounced back to around 155 per dollar after Japanese authorities started buying yen and selling dollars, according to the people.

Users of the hacked cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox received another optimistic signal regarding compensation for hacked funds, with Mt. Gox trustee updating some crucial repayment data, CoinTelegraph.com reported. Multiple Mt. Gox creditors have reported that their Mt. Gox claims accounts were updated with information about Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash and fiat repayment, with many suggesting that cryptocurrency repayments are coming soon. Some of the first such reports surfaced on the Mt.

Bank of Japan Governor Kazuo Ueda reiterated monetary policy will stay accommodative for a while as policymakers continue to buy government bonds, Bloomberg News reported. The BOJ would eventually reduce its bond buying at an unspecified timing in the future, he told an audience at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington on Friday. But it judged it was “dangerous” to completely remove its bond market intervention in March, when it raised interest rates for the first time in 17 years and ended its yield curve program, he added.

Japanese financial authorities should consider conducting coordinated currency intervention with other countries to support the yen, the head of the Tokyo Chamber of Commerce and Industry said, Bloomberg News reported. Small and mid-sized Japanese companies are suffering from the rising costs of imported materials as the yen trades near a 34-year low against the dollar, TCCI Chairman Ken Kobayashi said Wednesday in a press conference, Kyodo News reported. Kobayashi’s comments came a day after Takeshi Niinami, president of Suntory Holdings Ltd.

The Bank of Japan would consider a policy response if the yen’s weakness causes inflation to rise sharply higher, Gov. Kazuo Ueda said on Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal reported. “If there is a risk that a virtuous cycle of wages and prices strengthens more than expected and underlying inflation rises above 2%, we need to consider changing monetary policy,” Ueda said in a parliamentary committee meeting, when asked by an opposition lawmaker whether the bank would act against the yen’s fall. The yen is trading around 151.75 to the dollar on Wednesday, staying near its 34-year low.

The number of corporate bankruptcies with liabilities of at least ¥10 million in fiscal 2023 rose 31.5% from the previous year to 9,053, topping 9,000 for the first time in nine years, a survey by Tokyo Shoko Research showed on Monday, the Japan Times reported. In the year through March, bankruptcies mainly rose among small and midsize companies as they struggled to raise prices to reflect higher material and other costs. Labor shortages were also behind the rise in bankruptcies.

Japan must shift its policy focus away from crisis-mode stimulus towards achieving private sector-driven economic growth, a government panel said on Tuesday in the wake of the central bank's decision to end eight years of negative interest rates, Reuters reported. In a proposal to the government's top economic council, the panel urged policy changes in the face of rising domestic prices and interest rates, as well as wage growth at a 30-year high as companies face job shortages.

Japanese Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki said on Monday there were some speculative moves in the currency market that did not reflect economic fundamentals, repeating his warning against excessive yen declines, Reuters reported. "We will watch currency market developments with a strong sense of urgency, and will respond appropriately against excessive moves without ruling out any options," Suzuki told parliament.

Japan's factory activity in March contracted for the 10th consecutive month though the downturn was the least pronounced in four months, helped by softer contractions in output and orders, a private-sector survey showed on Monday, Reuters reported. The final au Jibun Bank Japan manufacturing purchasing managers' index (PMI) was at 48.2 in March, the highest level since November. That matched the flash reading and was better than February's 47.2, which marked the fastest pace of contraction in over 3-1/2 years.