US Treasuries, JGBs Rally As Bank Of Japan Shifts To "More Flexible" Bond-Buying Plan

After a few years of relative apathy, today's Bank of Japan statement is greeted with considerable anticipation as it may well have some significant impacts on global markets, judging by the last two weeks' action after hints at BoJ policy shifts.

But the most-watched item in today's statement will be with regard Yield Curve Control (YCC) as recent source articles have suggested that the BoJ will discuss potential policy changes to its YCC framework on the basis of sustainability, not tightening, of monetary policy which could lead to an adjustment of the yield curve target - where the 10Y JGB trades - to allow a long-term natural rise. This is said to be the cause due to the central bank's admission that it may take even longer to hit the 2% price target, and therefore would need to ensure its policy measures can be sustained, while a policy tweak could also help alleviate some of the side-effects from its prolonged ultra-loose policy which has squeezed banks' profits.

And yet, few expect that the BOJ will make an explicit YCC determination today, as an increase in the JGB yield target appears unlikely at a time when it is expected to revise downward its inflation forecast; instead in consideration of the adverse side effects of its policy, the BoJ will likely declare at the end of its statement that, based on its analysis in its quarterly Outlook Report, that it will maintain its easing policy for an extended period but will conduct financial market operations and asset purchasing operations to address the mounting cumulative side effects.

And in case there is a negative reaction to this apparent 'tightening', one likely easing measure to deal with such side effects will include an overhaul of its JPY6 billion ETF purchasing operations, a shift from Nikkei 225-linked ETF to Topix-linked ETF, which would likely spur investors to follow suit in rebalancing their portfolios should this materialize.

And finally, while 'officially' The Bank of Japan has not shifted its bond-buying program's scope, in practice it has been tapering dramatically... forced by liquidity constraints in the market.

Read the entire article

BoJ Leaves Policy Stance Unchanged, Optimistic On Global Economy

Having briefly injected some anxiety into markets over reported comments last week about paring back easing in 2019 (which were swiftly denied), Kuroda is likely to err on the dovish side in his comments after BoJ left all monetary policy levers unchanged.

Consensus expectations are that the BOJ to leave all its key policy settings unchanged:

• likely to keep the short-term rate at -0.1% and target for the 10-year JGB yield at around 0%
• also likely to maintain the current pace of purchases of exchange-traded funds and real estate investment trusts
• The BOJ is likely to retain its guideline on the annual pace of JGB accumulation at 80 trillion yen
• Post-meeting comments by Kuroda are likely to be calibrated to avoid stoking upward pressure on the yen. That means he’s likely to avoid specifics if asked again about how or when the BOJ could manage an exit from extreme stimulus.

And that is what we got. All policy levers unchanged.

There was one dissenter - same as before - this guy not only wanted more NIRP, but also more QE, clearly unaware that the BOJ already owns more than half of all Japanese govt bonds.

• BOJ Board Member Kataoka Votes Against Keeping Rates Unchanged
• BOJ Kataoka: Should Take Additional Easing if Delay in Hitting Inflation Target
• BOJ Kataoka: BOJ Should Lower Yields on JGBs of 10-Years and Longer

Language surrounding the global economy is more optimistic.

Read the entire article

BoJ Offers To Buy Unlimited Debt, Boosts POMO In Panic Response To Surging Rates

Kuroda is losing kontrol

After unexpectedly boosting its bond-buying in the 3-5Y segment of the JGB curve on Tuesday, as global bond yields break ever higher, it appears The Bank of Japan is realizing it is losing control of its yield curve and today unleashed a double-whammy to stifle the bond bears...

Whammy 1 - BoJ offers to buy unlimited 10Y notes at 11bps.

Result - a 0.5bps drop in the JGB yield!!

Let's hold back on the 'mission accomplished' celebration for now, because in a rerun of the failed attempt from Tuesday, when the BOJ boosted its 3-to-5 year bond purchase operation (aka POMO) from 300BN to 330BN yen, today it proceeded with...

Whammy 2 - BoJ increasese its usual POMO to 450 billion yen from 410 billion in the 5Y and 10Y range of the curve.

Result: a very brief weakening of the JPY followed by a 'policy error-like' drop in USDJPY as the Yen spiked now that the market demands even more.

Read the entire article

Japanese Bond Market Volume Collapses To Record Low

The Japanese bond market remains paralyzed with trading volumes hitting record lows as private bondholders no longer dare to even breathe without instructions from the central bank.

Gross purchases of JGBs by investors dropped 22% to 12.6t yen ($115.1b) in July, the least since May 2016, according to the latest data from Japan Securities Dealers Association Monday. On a rolling 12-month average basis, the volume was at an all-time low.

The Bank of Japan’s unprecedented asset purchase program has released a creeping paralysis that is freezing government bond trading, constricting the yen to the tightest range on record and braking stock-market activity. 

“All the markets have been quiet,” said Daisuke Uno, the Tokyo-based chief strategist at Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp. “We’ve already seen the BOJ dominance of JGBs since last year, but recently participants in currency and stock markets are also decreasing as those assets have traded in narrow ranges.” 

“The flows on both the buying side and selling side continue to fall,” said Takehito Yoshino, the chief fund manager at Mizuho Trust & Banking Co., a unit of Japan’s third-biggest financial group by market value. “Falling volatility is a very serious problem for traders and dealers who are unable to get capital gains.”

Read the entire article

"It Was A Deer In Headlights Moment": Japan Dumps Most US Treasuries Since May 2013

With the December monthly TIC data due out this week, bond traders will be closely watching if the selling of US Treasuries by foreign accounts, and especially central banks, which as we have repeatedly shown for the past several months has hit record levels...

... will persist, with a focus on whether China's near record selling of US paper will persist.

However, this time the surprise may not be China, but its nemesis across the East China Sea, Japan.

As UBS notes, Japanese investor appetite for developed market overseas bonds, and especially US, was a big story during the first seven months of 2016. However, since then interest has waned. Weekly flow data underscores how Japanese investors sold ~¥4 trillion of overseas bonds from the time of the US presidential election to the end of Jan-17. Last week the Japanese government released more granular data for the month of December which highlights a number of notable developments.

Most importantly, while December saw the largest overall net selling flow of overseas bonds since Jun-15, this was entirely due to offloading of US Treasuries – other developed bond markets on aggregate actually saw modest net purchases. Indeed, while Japanese investors bought German and Australian paper, US Treasuries were sold to the tune of ~¥2.4 trillion (~$21bn) in December, the largest net selling flow since May-13.

Read the entire article

Speculation Grows Japan Will Tighten Next

First it was the Fed, then the ECB (which last week tapered when it reduced the monthly amount of bond purchases under its QE program). Now attention shifts to the Bank of Japan, because as the WSJ writes, one of central banking's most aggressive easers - Kuroda's Bank of Japan - may soon have to think about tightening for the first time since 2007.

While it has yet to permeate the markets (confirmation would send the Yen soaring), the latest buzz in Japanese monetary-policy circles is that the BOJ may have to lift the 10-year government-bond target from a recently set zero, in the process tightening financial conditions even more. Indeed, as the WSJ notes, such a changed view on BOJ policy is quite a turnaround.

Just a few months back investors and economists world-wide were discussing what would be the next easing steps in the bank's 15-year fight to boost the economy and produce inflation. More certainly seems needed: Japan's economy grew more slowly than expected in the latest quarter and prices are falling.

So why switch gears now? Blame Donald Trump, stupid, whose miraculously adverse impact on the Yen has been more profound than either of Japan's recent QEs.... and that is before Trump is even inaugurated, or reveals any of the details behind his fiscal stimulus plans.

The U.S. dollar and Treasury yields have been climbing since soon after Trump was elected president on Nov. 8, triggered by expectations that his policies would boost U.S. growth, inflation and interest rates. So far, that has been good for Japan, where the weaker yen is brightening exporters’ prospects, helping send Tokyo stocks to 11-month highs. A weaker yen bolsters their bottom lines by making their products cheaper overseas and inflating the value of repatriated income. As of Friday, one dollar buys ¥114.50, 9.6% more than the day before the U.S. election.

Read the entire article

Four More Mega-Banks Join The Anti-Dollar Alliance

Yesterday I told you how a consortium of 15 Japanese banks had just signed up to implement new financial technology to clear and settle international financial transactions.

This is a huge step.

Right now, most international financial transactions must pass through the US banking system’s network of correspondent accounts.

This gives the US government an incredible amount of power… power they haven’t been shy about using over the last several years.

2014 was one of the first major watershed moments when the Obama administration fined French bank BNP Paribas $9 billion for doing business with countries that the US doesn’t like– namely Cuba and Iran.

It didn’t matter that this French bank wasn’t violating any French laws.

Nor did it matter that only months later the President of the United States inked a sweetheart nuclear deal with Iran and flew down to Cuba to attend a baseball game with his new BFFs.

BNP had to pay up. A French bank paid $9 billion because they violated US law.

And if they didn’t pay, the US government threatened to kick them out of the US banking system.

Read the entire article

"Soon" And "Really, Really Crazy": Starting Up The Helicopters

As the abject failures of the past few years’ monetary experiments became apparent, it was clear that something else would have to be tried. The only questions were when this would happen and how crazy the next iteration would be. Both answers are now coming into focus, and they’re looking like “soon” and “really, really crazy.”

Beginning with the most enthusiastic experimenter, Japan just reelected Shinzo Abe, of “Abenomics” fame, by a landslide, setting him free to turbo-charge his policy of massive government deficits fueled by unprecedented currency creation:

Abe orders drafting of new stimulus package to breathe life into Japan’s economy

(Japan Times) – Prime Minister Shinzo Abe ordered economic revitalization minister Nobuteru Ishihara on Tuesday to draft a range of economic measures to bust deflation and raise Japan’s growth potential, including with a supplementary budget for fiscal 2016.
The government will submit the budget draft for fiscal 2016 to an extraordinary Diet session this fall, Ishihara told a news conference later in the day.

Ishihara declined to comment on the size of the economic measures, saying that will be decided at the end of the month using a “bottom-up approach.”

Read the entire article

Is “Helicopter Money” About to Rain Upon the World?

Ever since the BOJ announced a new negative interest rate policy earlier this year (NIRP) the yen has stopped falling and reversed upwards. That is, despite weak Japanese growth, despite an inverted yield curve and deeply negative long bond, and despite still weak inflation, markets have bet on spectacularly easy monetary policy generating even more of all four.  This is what is know as “quantitative failure”, the notion that negative interest rates will not expand the monetary base owing to such phenomenon as crushed bank margins and the hoarding of cash under mattresses, so the currency is therefore going to rise.

CLSA has a nice little note on what this means for Japanese policy:

This is because Bank of Japan governor Haruhiko Kuroda is now looking for a new alternative form of monetary easing, given he has probably reached the practical limits of responsible JGB buying, as already discussed, while his initial move to impose negative rates in January led to the opposite market reaction than expected (ie, a stronger yen and a weaker stock market, see Figure 8) while also proving politically very unpopular. This probably explains why Kamikaze Kuroda has not expanded the negative rate policy further since January even though inflation and inflation expectations have moved in the opposite direction of what he has been targeting.

The latest data will make it harder for Kuroda to do nothing at the next BoJ policy meeting due to be held on 28-29 July given the stress he has put on monitoring inflation expectations. That is unless he just admits he has failed!

Given the unattractive options of buying still more JGBs or ETFs, or risking an undoubtedly unpopular expansion of negative rates, Kuroda and indeed Abe will be looking for a new approach. Monetisation of infrastructure stimulus may be the option.

Read the entire article

"The BoJ's NIRP Will Result In More Currency Wars And Global Growth Slowdown"

As reported previously the Bank of Japan, which not even the most optimistic central bank watchers had expected would unleash anything remotely as aggressive to prevent price discovery, stimulate asset prices and boost the exporting of deflation, became the latest central bank who, after a 5 to 4 vote, unleashed the monetary neutron bomb of Negative Interest Rates in the process pulling an anti-Draghi and shocking markets, even if admitting it can no longer boost QE due to previously discussed concerns it would run out of monetizable bonds in the very near future.

The initial market reaction was one of shocked surprise, with the Yen crashing and risk soaring, subsequently followed by disappointment that QE may be now be officially over and the BOJ will be stuck with negative rates, and then euphoria once again regaining the upper hand if only for the time being as yet another central banks does all it can to levitate asset prices at all costs, even if in the long run it means even more deflationary exports from all other banks and certainly China which will now have to retaliate against the devaluation of its "basket" of currencies.

The BOJ's excuse was simple: everyone else is doing it: as Kuroda said quickly after the NIRP announcement, the BOJ’s monetary policy is “just the same as central banks in the U.S. and Europe,” and “doesn’t target currencies.” Well, it does target currencies, but he is right: it is the same as policy in Europe and the US, where as a reminder, NIRP is coming next.

The Japanese government loved it, of course, since recent Japanese data has been ugly and getting worse, and since it allows Abe to punt all reform policies to the BOJ. Sure enough, moments ago Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga spoke to reporters in Tokyo. He said that the BOJ made the appropriate decision and that he welcomes BOJ’s new method aimed at achieving 2% inflation target, adding that he "can sense the BOJ’s strong determination." He said that a delay in hitting price target due to factors such as lower oil prices than expected.

Read the entire article