Next week, the new head pick for the Bank of Japan will be announced by the Japanese government. This day will decide the fate of the Japanese yen. In the run-up to this event, increased speculations in the market regarding the future head of BOJ coupled with anxiety have made USD/JPY more and more volatile.
Delayed announcementThe announcement was initially scheduled for today and was highly anticipated by USD/JPY traders. However, the Japanese government delayed it to next week.
Early on Friday, Tsuyoshi Takagi, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party's parliament affairs chief for the lower house, stated that a potential successor to governor Haruhiko Kuroda will be presented to Japanese parliament on February 14. The nominees for the posts of the governor's deputies will also be named on that day.
Both the ruling party and the opposition are expected to hold hearings for the BOJ governor and deputy governor nominees on February 24. The LDP has a majority in the National Diet, so this meeting is likely to be a formality.
Because of that, next Tuesday should be a truly decisive day for the yen. Analysts predict the Japanese currency will be highly volatile on February 14 regardless of the choice made by the Japanese government.
Worst-case scenario for JPYEarly this week, Nikkei reported that dovish policymaker Masayoshi Amamiya was chosen to be Kuroda's successor.
If this report is true and Amamiya becomes the next governor of the Bank of Japan, the Japanese yen will plummet.
Market participants are certain that Amamiya, which helped Haruhiko Kuroda develop the current ultra-dovish monetary policy, will stick to the current course.
This means that the yield curve control policy will not be abandoned in the near future, and interest rates will not be raised. Amamiya will follow his predecessor's policies.
Kuroda, who only has less than 2 months left as BOJ governor, continues to actively advocate for a dovish strategy. He issued a statement to that effect again this morning.
"The benefits of easing outweigh the costs of side effects," the BOJ governor said, adding that further easing by the Bank of Japan would be appropriate.
It was followed by similar remarks by Masayoshi Amamiya. He said that there was no need to make the yield curve control mechanism more flexible, and stressed that it was too early to discuss Japan shifting away from accommodative policy.
The dovish language from BOJ policymakers put pressure on the yen. At the start of the Asian session, the Japanese currency lost 0.12% against the dollar and slid to 131.7.
While Amamiya's nomination might seem to be the most likely scenario for conservative Japan, it is not absolutely certain to occur, as several more hawkish officials are also seen as likely contenders.
Among them are Hiroshi Nakaso and Hirohide Yamaguchi, who previously signalled that Japan should tighten its monetary policy.
A nomination of either of them appears unlikely at this point, but recent remarks by the Japanese Prime Minister suggest such a scenario cannot be ruled out.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida stated earlier that the government is taking into account the potential impact on financial markets when selecting the next BOJ governor.
Traders expect that if either Nakaso or Yamaguchi lead the Japanese central bank, the current dovish policy, including YCC, will be wound down.
Analysts predict that the announcement of any of these candidates will revive market speculation on a possible U-turn by the Japanese central bank and will provide strong support to the yen against the US dollar.
If the Japanese government makes a surprising decision next week, USD/JPY will nosedive.
This is suggested by today's performance of the pair. At the beginning of the European session, USD/JPY dropped sharply by more than 1% below 130, coming under the pressure due to renewed rumors regarding the next governor of the Bank of Japan.
According to another report by Nikkei, which was published early on Friday, the Japanese government allegedly considers a different official to lead the Bank of Japan.
The newspaper claimed that Kazuo Ueda, an economist and a former BOJ policy board member, could become the next BOJ governor, with Masayoshi Amamiya reportedly rejecting an offer to lead the central bank.
Does it mean that USD/JPY will sink? FX analysts at Bloomberg think otherwise. They expect the US dollar to continue its advance against the Japanese yen, as the new governor will still likely look like a dovish policymaker compared to heads of central banks elsewhere.
Is JPY doomed?The article by Bloomberg states that betting on a full policy U-turn by the BOJ is a big mistake.
Even the most hawkish potential candidate for the BOJ top post would not risk abandoning everything that his predecessor had built over a decade.
"Whichever way the prime minister goes, the selection will be that of a circumspect premier who neither wants nor needs a radical shift in policy, and all the market chaos that might cause," Bloomberg's opinion columnist Daniel Moss wrote. He added that Japan paid close attention to last year's bond collapse in the UK which kicked Liz Truss out of office. "After the shock that reverberated across markets that followed a relatively minor tweak in December, and considering the country's record debt pile, Japan needs to tread more carefully," Moss noted.
While the new BOJ governor may decide to change the monetary policy this year, investors should keep in mind that these changes will be slow and steady.
"The interest rate gap with other major economies will remain substantial, even if the chasm narrows slightly," Daniel Moss pointed out.
With the US not yet done with its inflation problem and with more interest rate hikes on the horizon, JPY will be under pressure from both rising US bond yields and a stronger dollar in the medium term.
Regarding the short-term performance of the yen, it will depend on the next governor of the Bank of Japan. Traders have an opportunity for raking in a massive win next week, provided that they will bet on the best candidate.