BoJ Governor Ueda: Japan's consumer inflation likely nearing its peak

New Bank of Japan (BoJ) Governor Kazuo Ueda said on Monday, “Japan's consumer inflation, including index stripping away fuel costs, likely nearing its peak,” adding that he is “seeing it slowing ahead.”

Additional quotes

“Don't see Japan's property prices as excessively over-valued.”

“Want to carefully monitor whether monetary easing leads to excessive rise in property prices, cause bubble.“

“It's true that rising import prices are being passed on to domestic prices more than expected.”

"BoJ must maintain monetary easing as trend inflation still below 2%."

"If it can be foreseen that trend inflation will reach 2%, BoJ must head toward policy normalization."

"How to revise YCC will depend on various factors, such as economic conditions, pace of inflation at the time."

"Can't say now how specifically boj could tweak YCC."

"BoJ’s inflation forecast half-year, 1 year, 1.5 year ahead must be quite strong and close to 2%, when asked what will be the conditions for BoJ to consider tweaking YCC."

"Hope to consider whether it's possible, taking into account various thresholds that must be cleared, when asked whether BoJ can reveal exit plan from ultra-easy policy in advance.

"What to do with BoJ’s ETFs holdings will become a big issue when BoJ heads toward an exit from ultra-easy policy, YCC."

"BoJ has been conducting many internal simulations on how future exit from easy monetary policy could affect its finances."

Market reaction

USD/JPY has caught a fresh bid wave on Governor Ueda’s comments, trading near 134.35, as of writing while adding 0.16% on the day.