BOJ announces to expand its bond lending scheme to deal with possible shortage

As Reuters reports, the Bank of Japan (BOJ) announced on Wednesday that it would expand its bond lending scheme to overcome possible shortages of government bonds in the market, in light of the new negative interest rates policy adopted by the central bank.

The BOJ said it will increase the amount of JGBs it can lend to brokers and banks to 1 trillion yen per each issue, compared to 400 billion yen now.

The announcement came after yields on JGBs of up to 10 years to maturity turned negative for the first time on record this week.

Feb 10, 2016

JPY: Monetary policy limits being tested - MUFG

Derek Halpenny, European Head of GMR at MUFG, suggests that there is another reason why Yellen will thread carefully on the subject of negative interest rates – the evidence on its impact has become a little less clear since the BOJ joined the club at the end of January.

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