Going against a central bank is an investment strategy fraught with peril, but some bond market analysts think the Bank of Japan will fail to steepen the yield curve.
The analysts argue that the BOJ's toolkit is designed to push down yields, rather than lift them. And even if the central bank succeeds for a time, as it did this week, a tide of money seeking yields in a slowing global economy will prove stronger.
"We usually say, 'Don't fight the BOJ!,' but this time I think it works to go against them," said Koichi Sugisaki, a strategist at Morgan Stanley MUFG Securities Co. in Tokyo. Sugisaki points to how Japanese institutions are waiting to snap up bonds with maturities of 20 years or more whenever yields climb.