The Bank of Japan decided in its meeting, which ended on Friday morning, July 28, to keep monetary policy unchanged an expectations by maintaining the current negative short-term interest rates at -0.10%, in addition to leaving the range of movement of the ten-year yield to move plus or minus 0.5%.
The bank buys ETFs (12 trillion yen) and Japanese real estate investment J-REITs (180 billion yen).
The statement indicated that consumer price inflation rose higher than the expectations that were in the forecast report for April, wage growth rose, some difficult expectations appeared in prices, and high inflation is expected to slow growth.
The bank’s quarterly forecast for the fiscal year 2023 came on a rise in core inflation expectations, excluding the prices of food and energy, to 3.2%, compared to 2.5% in April forecasts and at 1.7% for next year, while the economy is expected to grow by 1.3% this year compared to 1.3% in April’s forecasts, and maintained its growth forecast next year at 1.2%.