OSAKA (Kyodo) A growing number of Japanese, including those planning to travel overseas, are converting their yen into foreign currencies, taking advantage of its relative strength of less than 90 to the dollar since last month.

For July, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group reported a 60 percent jump from a year ago in both the number of currency exchange transactions and their value at its foreign exchange shops across Japan.

The trend is continuing in August.

Money exchangers are also busy because more Japanese are traveling abroad this summer compared with a year ago, and people planning to go overseas this autumn or later are converting currencies in advance.