The BOJ December meeting summary is not suggestive of any urgent pivot

Bank of Japan Summary of Opinions from the December Monetary Policy meeting. Full text.

• One member said must
  patiently maintain monetary easing
• One member said must confirm
  sustainable, stable achievement of price target is foreseen in order
  to end negative rate, YCC
• One member said must
  scrutinise wage, price moves under YCC given strong upward pressure
  on prices likely stabilised
• One member said even if next
  spring’s wage hikes are considerably higher than expected, risk that
  this will cause underlying inflation to significantly exceed 2% is
  small

• One member said we are not in
  situation where we would fall behind the curve in raising rates, even
  if we decided to wait after seeing wage talk outcomes next spring

I don’t want to read too much into all this ‘one member’ headline commentary. But, if I did then I’d be doubtful of any pivot from the Bank before April, perhaps even later.

USD/JPY is up a few ticks, circa 142.46 as I update, from142.35 or so just before the release.

—

Bank of Japan Governor Ueda spoke earlier this week, on 25 December:

• BOJ’s Ueda: We will consider changing policy if positive wage-inflation cycle strengthens

• BOJ Gov Ueda said we’re not there yet, prospect of achieving price target not high enough

—

From the day:

• Bank of Japan October 31 Statement – full text
• USD/JPY jumped back to 150 on the Bank of Japan statement
• Bank of Japan Monetary Policy Statement: Changes language around 1% 10year JGB cap

This article was written by Eamonn Sheridan at www.forexlive.com.



Source link