Japan stocks rally, yen resumes fall after G20
that the BOJ's monetary easing is aimed at beating deflation, not at manipulating the forex market and weakening the yen, and said correcting excessive yen rises would be an appropriate policy direction. Previously, Japanese officials have noted that the current yen selling was a correction to the past excessive yen strength.
The yen's weakness weighed on emerging Asian currencies while South Korean shares eased 0.3 percent on concerns about the eroding competitive edge for the country's exporters.
"Japan will keep seeking the current policy. The rest of Asia will not just wait and see. That will put more pressure on Asian currencies," said Yuna Park, a currency and bond analyst at Dongbu Securities in Seoul.
A weaker yen would make other currencies relatively stronger against the dollar and fuel speculation that other Asian countries could step in to curb the strength of their currencies, Ikeda said.
The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan eased 0.2 percent. The pan-Asian index briefly hit a 18-1/2-month high on Friday and had its best performance since the week of Jan. 6 with a 1.2 percent weekly gain.
On Friday, MSCI's all-country world index, a measure of global equity activity, traded down 0.26 percent, while European shares closed lower and U.S. stocks ended flat.
Australian shares rose 0.5 percent as miners gained on hopes that top customer China might start buying after the Lunar New Year holidays, while blue chips Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Telstra Corp Ltd dropped after trading ex-dividend.
Markets in China and Taiwan resumed trading
Be the first to comment.
