Yen Is Cheapest Ever After Tumble, JPMorgan Index Shows

(Bloomberg) -- The yen's slump to a five-year low against the dollar this week has seized the attention of financial markets, and the dramatic headlines didn't even capture the full extent of its weakness.

The currency also slid to a record low based on a JPMorgan Chase & Co. index that measures it against those of Japan's major trading partners and is adjusted for inflation. The decline in the so-called real effective exchange rate has been driven by the yen's falling nominal exchange rates, and the fact inflation is slower in Japan than in most other economies.

The yen has fallen out of favor over the past year on signs the Bank of Japan is lagging behind its global peers in normalizing monetary policy due to a sluggish economic recovery. The currency has also dropped as the global recovery from the pandemic -- though uneven -- has sapped demand for haven assets.

While the Federal Reserve and Bank of England announced aggressive steps last month to pull back from their highly accommodative policy settings, the BOJ said it would stick to its more cautious approach due to uncertainties about Covid and the omicron variant.

The annual U.S. inflation rate jumped to a four-decade high of 6.8% in November, whereas a similar gauge of price growth in Japan has remained below 1% since late 2018. The most recent reading -- for November -- was an anemic 0.6%.

Looks Cheap

Still, Japan's falling real effective exchange rate may lead to higher goods prices locally, which will then start to boost speculation the BOJ will shift toward policy normalization and bolster the yen, said Ayako Sera, a market strategist at Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank Ltd. in Tokyo. The cheap yen may also help prompt a return of some factories to Japan from overseas, which could also underpin the currency, she said.

The yen slid to as low as 116.35 per dollar on Tuesday, the weakest level since January 2017, before trading at 115.95 on Thursday. The currency may climb back to as strong as 105 per dollar later this year, Sumitomo Mitsui's Sera said.

Others see room for deeper declines.

“We still think the interest-rate differential story will be the key driver here with U.S. yields rising further and pushing down the yen more,” said Marcel Thieliant, a senior economist at Capital Economics in Singapore. The currency is set to weaken to 120 per dollar this year even though the decline in the real effective exchange rate may limit some of its downside, he said.

JPMorgan itself is wary that further yen losses may bring about a response from Japanese policy makers.

“If oil prices and the USD/JPY exchange rate continue to rise, there is a good chance that political pressure will increase to prevent further yen depreciation in order to avoid growing public dissatisfaction ahead of the Upper House election scheduled for July,” strategists at the U.S. bank including Tohru Sasaki in Tokyo wrote in a research note on Wednesday.