Japanese Easing Measures Causing Speculation

By: Hillel Fuld

The EUR hit a nine-year low point versus the Japanese currency on Tuesday as the loss of key technical support led speculators to sell the currency in the hope of forcing stop-loss sales against both the JPY and the USD.

Falls in Asian equities helped buoy the yen VS the euro and broadly on crosses. There was also some talk of macro hedge-fund selling in the euro against the dollar.

"Some stops can be seen in the euro starting from a little above 107.00 yen. If those are hit, things could get a bit nasty," said a trader for a major Japanese broker

The EUR declined to as low as 107.21 yen on trading platform EBS, its lowest since November 2001. After trimming some losses, the euro last stood at 107.36 JPY, down 0.4 percent on the day.

Against the Greenback, the EUR hit a six-week low of $1.2620 on EBS.

Bears were targeting $1.2605, the 50 percent retracement of the euro's increase from a four-year low of $1.1876 in June to its August peak of $1.3334. A break here would open the way to at least $1.2522 and then $1.2479, daily lows from July.

YEN BROADLY HIGHER

The Japanese Yen was broadly higher and edged back up towards a 15-year record against the dollar hit earlier in August.

The greenback decreased 0.2 percent vs the yen to 85.02 yen, slipping back towards a 15-year low of 84.72 yen hit on EBS earlier this month.

A trader for a large Japanese brokerage house said there was talk of bids in the USD at levels near 85.00 yen to 84.80 yen, but added that stop-loss offers were hovering underneath.

The low-yielding yen is a funding currency for carry trades and can increase in times of market stress or when equities slide and are seen as denting investor risk appetite.

A trader for a major Japanese bank said that the Nikkei's drop to a 15-month trough suggests that some Japanese investors will likely be skeptical about taking on additional risk, such as conducting unhedged international investment.

"I don't think they can move ... Their risk tolerance will not rise," the trader said.

With the yen having hit a 9-year record vs the EUR and nearing a 15-year high against the Greenback, traders were cautious about the potential for some kind of actions on the part of Japanese authorities to stem the yen's increase.

A drop in the USD towards 84.00 yen might prompt the BOJ to take monetary easing actions even before its next monetary policy meeting in early September, said a trader for a Japanese bank.

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan and Bank of Japan Governor Masaaki Shirakawa discussed the yen and had agreed to work closely in a phone conversation held on Monday, but Kan did not ask the central bank to ease monetary policy any further, and the two did not discuss on currency intervention either.

Market players say the most likely response from Japanese authorities may be for the BOJ to enlarge the size or extend the duration of its three-month fixed rate fund supply initiative.