The yen slid against the dollar on Thursday, reversing direction after a sudden surge overnight that traders and analysts were quick to attribute to intervention by Japanese authorities. The dollar was already on the back foot as Fed Chair Jerome Powell confirmed the central bank's easing bias, even as he reiterated that sticky inflation meant interest rate cuts may be a while in coming. Japan's vice finance minister for international affairs, Masato Kanda, who oversees currency policy at the MOF, told Reuters he had no comment on whether Japan had intervened in the market.
Japanese government bond (JGB) yields inched up on Thursday amid the absence of market-moving catalysts, with the market reacting to a result of a liquidity-enhancing auction suggesting weak demand for debt. The five-year bond yield edged up 0.5 basis point (bp) to 0.490% and the 10-year JGB yield rose 1 bp to 0.9%. "There was no major market moving cue today so the market reacted to the outcome of the auction which was seen weak," Katsutoshi Inadome, a senior strategist at Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Asset Management said.
South Korea's National Assembly voted on Thursday to approve a bill backed by the ruling and opposition parties to launch a fresh probe into the deadly Halloween crowd crush in the capital Seoul in 2022. An earlier bill, which was backed the opposition-led parliament without the support of the ruling People Power Party (PPP), was vetoed by President Yoon Suk-yeol in January. The latest bill is a compromise that removes granting investigative power to the panel which Yoon had objected to, according to his office.