Japanese Trade data beats Forecasts

This morning, the Japanese yen held steady against its US Dollar counterpart after the release of upbeat trade data. The data showed that Japanese exports are solid and imports were also on the rise.

Overall, the Japanese trade data showed that the trade balance for March came in at a solid ¥614.7 billion. This print was well above the expected ¥605.65 billion, but below February’s ¥813.4 billion. The adjusted overall trade balance was at ¥172.2 billion.

The other news, within the headline report, was that imports were up 15.8 percent on the year in March. This was well above the 10.2 percent that the markets were expecting. Exports jumped 12 percent. Well above the market expectations for 6.2 percent. This is the largest rise was seen in quite some time.  Looking at exports to China, they rose 16.4 percent. However, shipments rose to every major economic region.

The Japanese yen ignores the Data

The trade data had very little impact on the headline UD/JPY Forex market. The yen and traders are more concerned with geopolitics than with data, right now. Looking at the above MT 4 chart, the Dollar continued to trade around the midpoint of ¥108 and seems to be holding within the low bound of its current trading range. This comes after falling from ¥114 in mid-March.

Earlier in the trading day, the country’s Finance Minister Taro Aso said that Japan must eventually raise taxes, cut healthcare and pensions. The island nation must also pursue a way to raise inflation and reduce Japan’s enormous pile of public debt. He has said such things before and markets still do not feel that such action is imminent.