Japanese Finance Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki said he will tell a meeting of G7 finance ministers and central bankers in Florida this weekend that Japan is ready to keep selling yen if needed.
"Foreign exchange rates should move in a stable manner by reflecting economic fundamentals and we are ready to take action if currencies show movements which are not in line with them," Tanigaki said at a press conference in Tokyo.
"I will say these things" at the G7 meeting, he added.
Tanigaki's comments came after the ministry announced today that Japan sold a total of ?5.88 trillion (US$55.6 billion) in the three months ended Dec. 31.
It sold as much as ?1.3 trillion on Dec. 10, the fourth biggest amount of yen sold in a single day, the ministry said.
HOLDING ACTION
Japan is trying to slow the yen's advance against the dollar by selling its own currency to protect an export-led recovery from the country's third recession since 1991.
Exports made up two-thirds of Japan's 1.4 percent annualized third-quarter economic growth.
The yen's 12 percent gain against the dollar over the past year threatens to cut the sales and earnings of exporters including Sharp Corp and Honda Motor Co.
The Bank of Japan at the behest of the finance ministry sold a record ?20.4 trillion last year. Japan's central bank also sold ?7.15 trillion from Dec. 27 through Jan. 28, a record amount for a single month.
Those yen sales drove up Japan's official foreign reserves to a record US$741.25 billion last month, up US$67.72 billion from December, the Finance Ministry said yesterday.
The figure is about the same as the size of Japan's general account budget of US$774 billion for the fiscal 2004 draft.
US Treasury Secretary John Snow and fellow finance chiefs from wealthy nations were to gather in luxury yesterday to mull how to boost global expansion while keeping a lid on tensions among themselves.
The first meeting this year of G7 finance ministers and central bankers -- which opens formally yesterday with a dinner and wraps up late today with a closing statement -- will play out against a backdrop of rising worries over the slumping value of the US dollar.
There is enough divergence among the G7 members -- the US, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Japan -- that no substantive deal on slowing the dollar's decline is likely.
Instead, US officials have said they want to talk about strategies to boost global growth, so the US would no longer be the sole source of consumer demand.
"The agenda for growth, which is a very important initiative launched in Dubai back in September, will be the focus of the policy discussions at the G7 meetings," Treasury Undersecretary John Taylor said this week.
Another topic they were to touch on at the plush 80-year-old resort was how to encourage development in emerging economies.
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