Bank of Japan board members turned overwhelmingly hawkish at their April policy meeting, with many calling for the need to raise interest rates steadily to forestall risks of an inflation overshoot, a summary of opinions at the meeting showed.
Some members saw the chance of a faster-than-expected pace of interest rate hikes on heightening prospects of inflation durably staying, or even exceeding, the BOJ's 2% target, the summary showed Thursday.
"If underlying inflation continues to deviate upward from the baseline scenario against the backdrop of a weaker yen, it is quite possible that the pace of monetary policy normalization will accelerate," one member was quoted as saying.