“The yen has been the weakest major currency so far in 2022,” noted Carol Kong, a currency strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia. “There are two key reasons behind its rapid weakness. The first is the growing divergence in monetary policy between the US and Japan,” she told AFP. “The Bank of Japan continues to keep monetary policy easy because inflation and wages remain relatively low” in the country. Kong said the yen had been hit hard also by a collapse in Japan’s current account balance after oil prices surged following the invasion of Ukraine by key energy producer Russia. With Japan relying on oil imports ... (full story)