Today is a day filled with inflation reports from across the world, as well as a few prelim GDP releases. Japan started the day as usual, followed by their neighbors, the Aussies. Looking at the screen, the Japanese numbers seem all green, so they must be positive, right? Let´s have a look. 

The household spending and the Tokyo core CPI (consumer price index) year/year beat the expectations by 0.5% and 0.1%, respectively. The catch in these two data pieces was that they remained negative, although they beat the expectations. Therefore, we can say that on these two fronts, Japan is still a long way away from the beating deflation. Beating your own self in the previous months doesn´t count as positive, so the green color doesn´t count this time.

Additionally, the national CPI remained unchanged at -0.5%, while the BOJ (Bank of Japan) core CPI slipped 1 point to 0.2% from 0.3%. These are some very depressing numbers. The oil prices have picked up somewhat in the last few months and the global economic situation has improved as well. This has helped inflation pick up in many other developed economies, but not in Japan.

As I said in one of the market updates about a week ago, I don´t have the slightest clue where the BOJ Kuroda got the courage when he said that the BOJ will let inflation overshoot above 2%. I remember saying this phrase, "Get to 0.2% first, then aim for the starts". Today proved me right. 

The trend is clearly up in USD/JPY and the 20 moving average in grey is providing support.

After all they have done with the trillion Yen economic stimulus package and the negative rates, there is still nothing in sight, unlike in the Eurozone. The Japanese Yen continues to suffer among USD strengths, as my colleague Eric mentioned in his article last evening. 

USD/JPY continues to march higher, but that´s mainly due to risk appetite as the global economic sentiment improves. This forex pair is about 200 pips higher from the lows this week, but strong long term resistance levels are just above our head here. So let´s see if the buyers hold enough power with them to push past these resistance levels.

By the way, we are going to have a technical look at this forex pair in a while, so check it out to see the broad technical picture of USD/JPY.