Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

ft.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 218 posts

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#151

Post by dredmorbius »

fnordpiglet wrote: post #138
dredmorbius wrote: post #44

Historic, yes. Unprecedented, no. The Treasury’s intervention to bolster the yen is the first since 1998, when it bought the currency in order to strengthen Japan’s economy after the yen had dropped to eight-year lows. The US intervened in Japan’s currency in 2011 to weaken it as part of a co-ordinated international effort to prevent a dangerous currency appreciation after the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. (From TFA…

The start of the dot com boom I would mark at August 1995 when Netscape’s IPO was the most successful IPO to that date. But really I mark it with the IETF RFC 1290 “There’s Gold In Them Thar Networks” in 1991. But yes, the 21st century was defined in 1990’s. Everything since is derivative. I feel sad for those born after everything worth doing had been done already.

If you look at NASDAQ and investment trends, it was markedly shorter. I had charts of both up whilst writing my earlier comment.

Though yes, I'd agree that NSCP launched the mania.

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#152

Post by iamnothere »

estearum wrote: post #149
iamnothere wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that winning (and retaining political advantage over time) is probably a prerequisite for enacting any punishments, much less correcting other issues.

Uhhhh... sure...? Are you implying that "the other side" will never again hold power? Because that's a very silly view, if so. I'm quite sure the single most popular platform someone could run on today is simply "aggressively prosecute every single crime committed by the MAGA apparatus."

Punitive campaigns seem to work best with the right wing base. There’s a large squishy center (and a sizable segment of the left) that doesn’t vote when things go too negative.

If you want to contrast with a real world example, Obama won as an unknown candidate running on “hope and change” despite racial bias.

But it’s probably better to lose if presenting a positive message would make you feel icky.

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#153

Post by renegade-otter »

eigenspace wrote: post #5

Japan holds a huge amount of US treasuries, and I guess was considering a mass sell off to raise cash to defend the Yen. US treasury bond yields are already dangerously high for the US and Japan selling treasuries would push yields up even higher, and could trigger more panic selling from others. I guess this is Bessent's scheme to try and kick that can down the road.

It's kind of ironic how Stephen Miran's strategy of "to hell with the rest of the world, we do what we want" keeps running into electric fences. They want to devalue and inflate the dollar, but the Horse in the Hospital keeps ruining the plan.

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#154

Post by duxup »

renegade-otter wrote: post #153
eigenspace wrote: post #5

Japan holds a huge amount of US treasuries, and I guess was considering a mass sell off to raise cash to defend the Yen. US treasury bond yields are already dangerously high for the US and Japan selling treasuries would push yields up even higher, and could trigger more panic selling from others. I guess this is Bessent's scheme to try and kick that can down the road.

It's kind of ironic how Stephen Miran's strategy of "to hell with the rest of the world, we do what we want" keeps running into electric fences. They want to devalue and inflate the dollar, but the Horse in the Hospital keeps ruining the plan.

It’s all just a bunch of childish short term thinking. Granted this administration doesn’t care as long as they get theirs. They just blame anyone else as things come and go.

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#155

Post by estearum »

iamnothere wrote: post #152
estearum wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uhhhh... sure...? Are you implying that "the other side" will never again hold power? Because that's a very silly view, if so. I'm quite sure the single most popular platform someone could run on today is simply "aggressively prosecute every single crime committed by the MAGA apparatus."

Punitive campaigns seem to work best with the right wing base. There’s a large squishy center (and a sizable segment of the left) that doesn’t vote when things go too negative. If you want to contrast with a real world example, Obama won as an unknown candidate running on “hope and change” despite racial bias. But it’s probably better to lose if presenting a positive message would make you feel icky.

All available evidence points toward my claim: Americans don't really agree on how they want the future to look.

However, they do agree on how they don't want it to look.

The rampant corruption, state brutality, and criminality of MAGA is unpopular across the board.

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#156

Post by Projectiboga »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #101
koito17 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The devaluation didn't really get out of control until 2022 IME. In 2021 you were still able to divide by 100 and not be far off in conversion. Typically traded between 105 ~ 115. Nowadays the Yen is so weak that I unconditionally convert my whole paycheck to USD after paying rent. Even if risk-free interest rates between Japan and United States converge, there's just not much reason to hold Yen if you want to avoid…

As someone who hasn't followed this closely, when/why did things switch? Japan had the opposite deflation problem for years (decades?) and IIRC tried battling that with "money printer go brrrr" for a long time. How did inflation become their primary problem?

The "Yen Carry Trade" has been a popular way to fund speculative plays in the financial markets.

https://www.stonex.com/en-us/insights/the-yen-carry-trade-is...

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#157

Post by iamnothere »

estearum wrote: post #155
iamnothere wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Punitive campaigns seem to work best with the right wing base. There’s a large squishy center (and a sizable segment of the left) that doesn’t vote when things go too negative. If you want to contrast with a real world example, Obama won as an unknown candidate running on “hope and change” despite racial bias. But it’s probably better to lose if presenting a positive message would make you feel icky.

All available evidence points toward my claim: Americans don't really agree on how they want the future to look. However, they do agree on how they don't want it to look. The rampant corruption, state brutality, and criminality of MAGA is unpopular across the board.

Two things can be true at the same time: Americans dislike the status quo, and they don’t support angry/negative Democratic politicians for President.

See also: claims that Sanders was “too angry” (lmao), the “Dean scream” smear campaign, characterizing Clinton as a cackling witch, etc.

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#158

Post by orwin »

CraigJPerry wrote: post #109
Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currency interventions never work. They buy a bit of time maybe, but without any fixes to the underlying causes that made the intervention necessary, its a temporary solution.

>> Currency interventions never work Where did you learn that? It doesn't reflect the structural volumes present. Central banks make interventions all the time in line with little stabilisation programs. Those are almost always deemed success. Maybe you deduced it by yourself? If so, fx is weird despite traditionally being seen as the simplest area in finance. E.g. It's counter-intuitive but we tend to think trade ma…

It works very well in rich countries, but it is expensive, especially if the volume of exchanged currency is low. This is one of the reason behind the Euro, countries realised it would be way less expensive to defend the currency if they banded together. This is also a big why ex french colonies keeps colonial money, because that currency is pegged to the Euro and that peg protect it (the only way to get out cheaply is to do a West African Union or something similar, which is why anti-colonialists are big on the subject. They are right).

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#159

Post by mono442 »

inigyou wrote: post #143
blitzar wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think they saved the human race by selling some EURJPY on Friday?

Impossible to know. The US sits on the precipice of a bond interest death spiral.

the fed can bring the bond yields down, it's not really a problem

Re: US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market

#160

Post by inigyou »

mono442 wrote: post #159
inigyou wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Impossible to know. The US sits on the precipice of a bond interest death spiral.

the fed can bring the bond yields down, it's not really a problem

How will the fed do that? What will the side effects be? Why didn't it do that at the latest FOMC?
Post reply on HN