Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said he was not making any assessment on nominal yen levels or predicting its future moves when he described the yen as being “very weak” in comments to parliament last week. The yen jumped against the dollar when the central bank chief said the yen’s real, effective level was already very weak and was unlikely to weaken further.
Speaking again in parliament on Tuesday, Kuroda said he made the remark to explain the yen’s historical trend on a real, effective basis and was not signaling that the currency’s nominal levels were too weak. “I didn’t say I do not want a weak yen,” Kuroda said.
He repeated that while a weak yen boosts exports and revenues at companies operating overseas, it hurts households and non-manufacturers by pushing up import costs. “As long as exchange rates move stably in a way reflecting economic fundamentals, they won’t do any harm to the economy,” he said.
Content is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc. or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. If you would like to reproduce or redistribute any of the content found on MarketPulse, an award winning forex, commodities and global indices analysis and news site service produced by OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc., please access the RSS feed or contact us at info@marketpulse.com. Visit https://www.marketpulse.com/ to find out more about the beat of the global markets. © 2023 OANDA Business Information & Services Inc.