Britain’s Financial Times says the US Treasury Department intervened in the currency market on Friday by selling euros and buying yen.
The Japanese government and the Bank of Japan intervened on Thursday to prop up the yen, which had plunged to historic lows against the dollar. If Japan and the US coordinated to intervene in the market, the move would be deemed extremely uncommon.
The yen was bought intermittently toward Saturday morning, Japan time, driving up the currency to the lower 157 range at one point, the highest level in around two and a half months. This has prompted speculation that Japanese authorities intervened once again, following the yen-buying operation on Thursday.
On Friday, the Financial Times quoted sources familiar with the matter as saying the Federal Reserve Bank of New York “undertook the unusual move of conducting a sale of euros to buy yen on behalf of the Treasury.”
If Japan and the US conducted coordinated intervention this time around, it would have been the first such move since 2011, when the yen surged following the Great East Japan Earthquake.
Meanwhile, Reuters reported that a notepad placed in front of US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and photographed by Reuters during a cabinet meeting on Friday reads, “Buy Japanese Yen $5-10 bil.”
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