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By Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss and Alden Bentley
NEW YORK, May 1(Reuters) – The yen jumped against the dollar late on Wednesday, with traders on high alert for signs of intervention by Japanese monetary authorities to boost a currency languishing near 34-year lows.
The dollar fell sharply to 153 yen from about 157.55 yen after the U.S. stock market close. But it was not immediately clear what was behind the move. It was last at 154.47, down 2.1%.
Japan’s Ministry of Finance was not available to comment. Japan’s Vice Finance Minister for International Affairs Masato Kanda, who oversees currency policy, did not pick up the phone, when reached by Reuters.
The move came after the conclusion of the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy meeting on Wednesday afternoon.
“It looked like intervention and it caught people by surprise,” said Marc Chandler, chief market strategist, at Bannockburn Global Forex.
Wednesday’s move follows a similarly sharp rally in the yen on Monday. Money market data
suggested
Japan’s finance ministry had spent around $35 billion to prop up the sliding yen on that day.
Traders have been on watch for weeks for possible intervention by Japanese officials, as even a historic exit from negative rates has failed to lift the currency. (Reporting by Alden Bentley and Gertrude Chavez; Editing by Ira Iosebashvili)
