USDJPY Movement
For the 24 hours to 23:00 GMT, USD strengthened 0.98% against the JPY and closed at 81.31, as the speculation of more quantitative easing in the US faded after the Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke failed to mention it in his bi-annual testimony to Congress.
Separately, the Bank of Japan Governor, Masaaki Shirakawa, reiterated that the central bank is committed to implement “powerful” monetary easing measures in order to end the nation’s long-running battle with deflation. He added that the central bank’s recently-introduced “price goal” of a 1% rise in the consumer price index “is a policy with an active stance”.
On the data front, housing starts in Japan declined 1.1% (YoY) in January, from a 7.3% drop in December. Additionally, this morning, capital spending in Japan surged 7.6% (YoY) to ¥9.944 trillion in the fourth quarter of 2011.
In the Asian session, at GMT0400, the pair is trading at 81.03, with the USD trading 0.34% lower from yesterday’s close.
The pair is expected to find support at 80.39, and a fall through could take it to the next support level of 79.75. The pair is expected to find its first resistance at 81.54, and a rise through could take it to the next resistance level of 82.04.
With a series of Japan economic releases today, including jobless rate and consumer prices, trading in the pair is expected to be influenced by the resulting cues from these releases.
The currency pair is trading above its 20 Hr and 50 Hr moving averages.
