Oil Spike Making Policy Response Difficult: BOJ Ueda

Washington, April 16 (Jiji Press)–Bank of Japan Governor Kazuo Ueda said Thursday that soaring crude oil prices complicate the central bank’s monetary policy. The surge in crude oil prices “poses both upside risks to prices and downside risks to the economy, making policy responses difficult,” he said at a press conference in Washington after a meeting of Group of 20 finance ministers and central bank heads. With the BOJ set to hold a policy meeting April 27-28, Ueda said, “We will make a policy decision while gathering data and information, assessing the probability of the (BOJ’s economic and price) scenario coming true, and examining risks (to the economy),” signaling the bank’s stance of deciding whether to raise interest rates after carefully monitoring the situation until the last moment. “Developments in the Middle East will be a crucial factor (for the BOJ’s policy decision), but the outlook remains quite uncertain,” Ueda said. “We will take the most appropriate response to achieve our 2 pct price target in a sustainable and stable way,” based on the bank’s assessment on how long the impacts of the current Middle East tensions will last and on broader economic conditions, he added. Ueda declined to comment on growing market expectations that the central bank will forgo a rate hike at the upcoming policymaking meeting. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]