At 4:32 p.m. (JST) in Tokyo, it was reported that the Japanese Yen lost early gains in trading, and dropped broadly today as stock futures in the United States and share prices in Japan turned back into positive territory, reporting gains of .8% and 1.4% respectively, encouraging the buy-back of high yielding currencies. Banking sector concerns continue to emerge, following a disappointing earnings report from Morgan Stanley, which was released yesterday.
According to one analyst, the Japanese Yen may also be coming under selling pressure from Japanese investment trust funds which are to be launched at month’s end. Several of the funds invest in foreign assets, or allow the investor, at his or her option, to take on forex risk.
The U.S. Dollar remained steady versus the Japanese Yen, trading at 98.05 Yen, a slight drop from the earlier 97.73 Yen trade on the EBS platform. The Euro was able to make gains versus the U.S. Dollar, rising .2% to $1.3030; trading against the Japanese Yen, the Euro gained .3% to 127.78 Yen, a rebound from 126.10 Yen, a 1-month low touched on earlier this week.