On Friday morning, USDJPY stopped skyrocketing; right now, it is consolidating.
The Japanese Yen is recovering against the USD at the end of the first February week. The current quote for the instrument is 109.87.
Investors’ interest in “safe haven” assets is reducing as the Chinese coronavirus frenzy is calming down. A couple of days ago, they reported some success in the process of creating a vaccine against the virus. At the same time, the number of infected stopped rising and the number of recovered started moving in the opposite direction. Risks of outbreak went down and demand for “safe haven” assets decreased as well.
The statistics published in the morning showed that the Household Spending in Japan lost 4.8% y/y in December after decreasing by 2.0% y/y the month before and against the expected reading of -1.7% y/y. this was a bad piece of news for both the Yen and the country’s economy: this decline means that the population doesn’t trust the economy; people are afraid to spend money and try to accumulate them instead.
The Average Cash Earnings showed 0.0% y/y in December after adding 0.1% y/y in November. It appears that manufacturers, alike consumers, are getting ready for a slowdown in economic growth by keeping their costs down.