LONDON: The U.S. dollar declined against the yen on Friday, after the Bank of Japan left its monetary policy unchanged and as the previous session’s U.S. data continued to dampen demand for the greenback.
USD/JPY hit 120.67 during late Asian trade, the pair’s lowest since May 20; the pair subsequently consolidated at 120.69, shedding 0.29%.
The pair was likely to find support at 119.80, the low of May 19 and resistance at 121.48, the high of May 20.
At its monthly policy meeting, the BoJ kept its monetary policy on hold and signaled growing confidence in the strength of the economy.
“Private consumption has been resilient against the background of steady improvement in the employment and income situation,” the BoJ said.
In April, the central bank had said that”recovery in some areas has been sluggish”.
Meanwhile, the dollar remained under pressure after a string of downbeat U.S. economic reports on Thursday fuelled fresh uncertainty over the strength of the recovery.
The U.S. Department of Labor said the number of individuals filing for initial jobless benefits in the week ending May 16 rose more than expected by 10,000 to 274,000 from the previous week’s total of 264,000.
Separately, the National Association of Realtors said that existing home sales fell unexpectedly by 3.3% in April to 5.04 million units from the previous month’s revised total of 5.21 million units.
In addition, the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia said that its manufacturing index declined to 6.7 this month from a reading of 7.5 in April, confounding expectations for a rise to 8.0.
The yen was lower against the euro, with EUR/JPY adding 0.18% to 134.72.
Later in the day, the U.S. was to release a report on consumer inflation.
