Yen continues decline against dollar, hits lowest point since May 2002
Tokyo, Apr 19 (EFE).- The Japanese yen continued its devaluation trend against the United States dollar Tuesday and stood at a new low since May 2002, an evolution again branded as “undesirable” by Japan’s government in the context of global inflation.
The dollar was bought Tuesday in the Tokyo market in the upper-middle zone of 127 yen, which had not happened for almost two decades and maintains the sustained fall in the Japanese currency since the beginning of March.
Japanese Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki reaffirmed the importance of “stability” in the foreign exchange market and said Japanese authorities “would be in close communication with those of the US to “respond appropriately,” in statements to the media before traveling to Washington to participate in the G20 meeting of industry leaders.
In a previous intervention in the Japanese Parliament Finance Committee, Suzuki said the depreciation of the yen “is accelerating,” which has “a positive aspect” for the Japanese economy but can also lead to “a strong negative impact” for companies that have to bear the rising costs of imported products and raw materials.
The Japanese currency has been falling for weeks in the context of the monetary easing policy applied by the Japanese central bank for almost a decade, which contrasts with a strengthened dollar after the interest rate hikes announced by the Federal Reserve American.
The increase in yields on US Treasury bonds has deepened this trend, which makes imported raw materials even more expensive, on which the world’s third largest economy is highly dependent and which have skyrocketed globally as a result of supply problems and of the Ukrainian war.
The Tokyo Stock Exchange has also been divided in recent days by the double effect of a cheap yen for Japanese companies, and after falling the day before, its main indicator, the Nikkei, reached the mid-session break Tuesday with an advance of 31.11 or 0.12, to 26,830.82 points. EFE
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