Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda said Wednesday that one-sided moves in the yen can hurt growth as the currency strengthened against the dollar to close to the level where authorities intervened last week.
"Recent one-sided movements in the currency market risk hurting the economy's recovery from the earthquake," Noda said during a Diet committee session, reiterating remarks made Aug. 4, when authorities sold the yen. The government may include measures to help companies combat the strong yen in its next reconstruction package, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said.
A global stock rout that has erased more than $6 trillion off equities in the past two weeks has bolstered the yen's appeal as a safe haven, undoing intervention that helped the currency weaken past ¥80 last week. Policymakers may struggle to reverse the trend with more unilateral yen sales after last week's action prompted criticism from the European Central Bank, according to economist Naoki Iizuka.