Japanese authorities are prepared to respond if currency market movements become disorderly, Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama said one day before the U.S. holds its midterm elections,\u00a0and act in accordance with a standing pact with her U.S. counterpart.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf there are disorderly movements or excessively speculative moves, we will take action,\u201d Katayama told reporters Monday. \u201cWe have also been coordinating and holding discussions with the U.S. quite frequently, and I expect we will continue to respond in that way,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Katayama was speaking ahead of the U.S. elections Tuesday that will determine leadership of both chambers of Congress, with polls and prediction markets pointing to a likely Democratic takeover of the House of Representatives.<\/p>\n
Control of the Senate remains less certain.<\/p>\n
A Democratic sweep of Congress could constrain U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s fiscal agenda, potentially pushing down U.S. Treasury yields and the dollar while supporting the yen.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut the president and his Cabinet members won\u2019t change immediately. My counterpart will probably stay the same as well,\u201d Katayama said. \u201cWe have issued a joint statement, and we will continue to act in line with it. That applies even at this very moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asian equities, particularly artificial intelligence-related stocks, could also come under pressure if Democrats tighten scrutiny of AI investment, data-center development and energy costs. That could weigh on semiconductor companies in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan amid growing concerns over the sustainability of the AI boom.<\/p>\n
Geopolitical risks could further complicate the market reaction. A Republican defeat could prompt Trump to rely more heavily on executive powers, potentially taking a tougher stance on tariffs, Iran and Ukraine. Renewed tensions with Iran could drive up oil prices, weighing on Japanese equities and the broader economy.<\/p>\n
The U.S. president has hinted at stepping up U.S. attacks against Iran after the election, though U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Saturday that no decision had been made on fresh strikes and that Trump prefers a diplomatic resolution.<\/p>\n
Katayama reiterated that concerns over the yen\u2019s weakness were shared between Trump and Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, citing their communication at a leader\u2019s summit in September. Katayama added market conditions had improved compared with when the yen slid past \u00a5160 per dollar, while refraining from commenting on specific levels.<\/p>\n
The yen was trading around \u00a5157.84 per dollar Monday morning in Tokyo.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat matters is firmly preventing excessive volatility, speculative moves and disorderly market movements,\u201d Katayama said. \u201cI believe both authorities remain absolutely committed to that in pursuit of our respective policy objectives.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Japanese authorities are prepared to respond if currency market movements become disorderly, Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama said one…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":902882,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,12,28167,3,271035,2830,47515,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-902881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-donald-trump","tag-japanese-economy","tag-news","tag-satsuki-katayama","tag-u-s","tag-u-s-japan-relations","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/902881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=902881"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/902881\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/902882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=902881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=902881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=902881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}