BoJ sticks to its steady stance – UOB

Alvin Liew, Senior Economist at UOB Group, assessed the latest BoJ monetary policy meeting.

Key Quotes

“In its scheduled Monetary Policy Meeting (MPM) on Thursday (17 Sep), the Bank of Japan (BOJ) as widely expected, kept all of its existing monetary policy easing measures unchanged.”

“The BOJ will also maintain the existing fund-provisioning measures to support financing mainly of small and medium-sized firms/enterprises (SME)…”

“The BOJ did have a better outlook of the economy as it noted the economy ‘started to pick up with economic activity resuming gradually, although it has remained in a severe situation due to the impact of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) at home and abroad’.”

“We have not changed our view and we still expect the BOJ to do more and enhance its monetary easing stance further in 2H20, most likely through increasing its JGB purchases and expanding its lending facilities to Japanese corporates and SMEs while the ETF and corporate bond buying program may be enhanced (at a later date). However, we no longer expect the BOJ to cut policy rate further into the negative territory.”