Kuroda Stresses Speed Important in Achieving 2 Percent Inflation Target

The Japan government’s choice to lead the country’s central bank promised on Monday to move quickly to implement fresh monetary stimulus to lift the struggling economy, a case underlined by a surprisingly sharp drop in a gauge of capital investment.

Declaring that “speed is important”, Haruhiko Kuroda said he would do what ever it takes to hit the Bank of Japan’s inflation target of 2 percent – even though the economy has rarely seen that level of inflation since the early 1990s.

“I want to debate policy steps with the monetary policy committee and implement these steps as soon as possible,” he told lawmakers in an upper house confirmation hearing.

Kuroda is expected to be approved by parliament later this week because opposition parties, whose support is needed in the upper house, have indicated they would back him.

Supporters of the more aggressive monetary policy advocated by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe can point to a 13.1 percent drop in core machinery orders in January from December as highlighting the need for urgent action.

Analysts and government officials suggested the much weaker than expected figures were a blip in a typically volatile data series, but they did show companies remained cautious in their spending plans. Analysts had expected a fall of just 2 percent.

via CNBC

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