Hiroshi Nakamura
(Translated by Mariko Wada)

The Nikkei (Japan Economic Newspaper) reported the following on September 8th about euro/yen market, which is getting unsettled from the subprime mortgage financial crisis since August.
The situation is so different from criticisms of (one-sidedly) Euro’s raising until July.
But 1 euro is about 157~160 yen (TTS) in the recent week, compare with last year (about 150 yen), the yen has been very weak against the euro.

Euro cannot go up easily in foreign exchange market. ECB held interest rates steady on September 6th, and ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet stressed, “Market volatility is increasing.” It is difficult to predict when EBC will raise rate again, so market cannot buy euro easily because of the future higher rate.
Now 1euro=about 157yen,it is not going up easily. “ECB will keep rates steady while financial market turmoil does not influence the actual economic widely.”(Reiko Sera as a strategist in the Sumitomo Trust&Banking Co., Ltd), and most of expectations are that to buy euro is difficult for the moment.
But ECB is still monitoring inflation very closer, and if the market were settled, they should raise the interest rate, so it may be difficult to continue selling euro on one-sidedly.