JPMorgan Chase & Co. has hired Takuma Kitajima from Merrill Lynch & Co. to start trading yen inflation swaps as Japan emerges from a decade-long bout of deflation.
Consumer prices rose at their fastest pace since 1998 in March as gas stations and food retailers increased prices to compensate for rising fuel and food costs.
Kitajima worked on Japan's first inflation swaps in 2004 at BNP Paribas SA. The contracts are used to prevent rising prices from eroding the value of the fixed payments from debt.