USDJPY Movement
For the 24 hours to 23:00 GMT, the USD declined 0.53% against the JPY and closed at 113.73.
In the Asian session, at GMT0400, the pair is trading at 113.52, with the USD trading 0.18% lower from yesterday’s close.
The Japanese Yen gained ground against the USD, after the Bank of Japan (BoJ), in its latest monetary policy meeting, raised Japan’s growth forecast for 2017 and 2018.
Earlier today, the BoJ held the benchmark interest rate steady at -0.1%, as widely anticipated. The central bank also pledged to continue with its yield curve control programme for “as long as it is necessary” to achieve its inflation target of 2.0% in a stable manner. Further, policymakers also boosted their growth-outlook for fiscal year 2016 to 1.4% from a prior estimate of 1.0% made in October, while fiscal 2017 growth was also upwardly revised to 1.5% from 1.3% in October. For fiscal 2018, it raised its forecast to 1.1%, from 0.9%. However, the central bank left its forecasts for core consumer price inflation unchanged.
In other economic news, data showed that Japan’s unemployment rate remained steady at 3.1% in December, meeting market expectations. Additionally, the nation’s preliminary industrial production advanced 0.5% on a monthly basis in December, more than market expectations for an advance of 0.3% and following a rise of 1.5% in the prior month. On the other hand, the nation’s small business confidence eased to a level of 48.3 in January, from a level of 48.8 in the previous month.
The pair is expected to find support at 112.84, and a fall through could take it to the next support level of 112.17. The pair is expected to find its first resistance at 114.56, and a rise through could take it to the next resistance level of 115.61.
The currency pair is trading below its 20 Hr and 50 Hr moving averages.
