@Bank_of_Japan_e @MOF_Japan
英語で失礼します。
Keeping USD/JPY around 160 is not "Japan First."
Right now your policy is simple and predictable: wait until the yen weakens too much, do a limited intervention, then go back to saying you are monitoring. This has become so predictable that markets treat every intervention as temporary. Any time you say “closely monitoring,” you are effectively giving a trade signal to short the yen.
Judging by recent price action, BoJ and MOF policies are not only ineffective, but market participants have largely stopped taking them seriously.
The result is higher energy and import costs for Japanese households. Normal people are paying the price while the yen stays weak. At the same time, geopolitical tensions in the Middle East have pushed oil prices higher. Large moves in both oil and USD/JPY around these events have raised legitimate questions about whether some market participants had advance information or moved early into positions that later proved highly profitable.
Japan has real power. It holds the world’s largest net foreign assets and is one of the biggest foreign holders of US Treasuries. Yet this power is not being used to protect Japan as much as it could.
A better approach would be to buy yen more steadily instead of reacting only after the damage is done, while gradually reducing new purchases of US government bonds. This would provide stronger support for the yen and signal that Japan is no longer willing to keep financing other countries while its own currency remains weak.
If this is done together with faster rate hikes, the yen could move to a stronger level in a more lasting way. USD/JPY at 160 time and time again is not protecting Japan. It is the opposite of Japan First.
A stronger yen would also bring meaningful relief to Japanese households, which rely heavily on imports and have historically enjoyed traveling abroad.
I would like to invite you to actually fight back instead of letting a lack of decisiveness continue harming the Japanese economy. This is not 仕方ない, and you know it.
#FX #Forex #円安 #BoJ #MOF #JapanFirst