The Japanese yen underperformed the world's major currencies in the first quarter of the year, with the exception of the Russian rouble.

Based on the nominal effective exchange rate, the Japanese currency lost 5.7 percent in value from the end of December to the end of March, according to a calculation by the business newspaper “Nikkei”.

Only the ruble performed worse, falling 11.7 percent in the wake of the Ukraine war.

But the ugly monetary community leaves the Bank of Japan cold.

Patrick Welter

Correspondent for business and politics in Japan based in Tokyo.

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"Recent movements in exchange rates seem a bit rapid," commented Haruhiko Kuroda, the governor of Japan's central bank, in Tokyo's parliament this week.

But Kuroda is not really worried.

He also stressed that the depreciation of the yen was net positive for the Japanese economy.

The country is still a long way from a possible intervention in the foreign exchange market, which would have to be carried out in Japan by the Ministry of Finance.

Kuroda shows no signs of changing monetary policy.

Kuroda fighting the speculators

The reason for the devaluation of the yen is that the Bank of Japan is unwaveringly sticking to its expansive monetary policy, while large central banks such as the American Federal Reserve have started raising interest rates and are signaling an acceleration of monetary tightening.

The discrepancy became clear last week when the Japanese central bank bought unlimited long-term government bonds at fixed interest rates for the first time for several days in a row in order not to let the ten-year interest rate rise above the 0.25 percent mark.

Within three days, the central bank bought government bonds worth 2.9 trillion yen (21.5 billion euros).

At least for the time being, Kuroda has thus won the battle against the speculators who are betting on higher interest rates in the global trend.

At times, the yen broke the mark of 125 yen per dollar, which the central bank governor had informally set as a red line in 2015.

The yen traded just below 124 yen per dollar on Thursday.

The rate was around 135 yen per euro against the euro.

But the central bank is currently more interested in the low interest rates than in a higher valued yen.

Analysts are looking for the reason for this in the inflation process.

As in the West, businessmen and consumers are moaning about higher prices for commodities and gasoline, for food and other products.

The depreciating yen amplifies this pain.

But the price pressure is far less than in the West.

Wages are growing too slowly

According to the statisticians, the inflation rate in Germany will probably have reached 7.3 percent in March, while in Japan it was just 0.9 percent in February.

Due to the absence of a special effect, the inflation rate will jump to around 2 percent from April.

So far, however, the Bank of Japan has seen this as a temporary development that does not require a correction in monetary policy.

Kuroda also argues that the price pressure comes from the cost side, from rising commodity and food prices.

However, Kuroda does not yet see the demand-driven inflation that the Bank of Japan has been trying to achieve for a long time.

The central bank governor argues that wages in particular are growing too slowly.