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Bank of Japan leaves interest rates unchanged
 
 
 
 
 
 
 AFP - Wednesday, April  8
TOKYO (AFP) - - Japan's central bank held its super-low interest rates steady Tuesday and widened its emergency lending programme as Asia's largest economy struggles through its worst recession in decades.
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"Our nation's economic conditions have deteriorated significantly," Bank of Japan governor Masaaki Shirakawa told a press conference following the unanimous decision by the policy board to hold rates at 0.1 percent.
The bank said it had decided to expand the range of assets it accepts from financial institutions in return for emergency credit, as part of its efforts to encourage lending during the economic crisis.
The Bank of Japan has trimmed official borrowing costs twice since October. With little room left to reduce rates further, it is turning to alternative tools to spur lending, such as purchases of bonds.
Japan's economy logged its worst performance in almost 35 years in the last quarter of 2008, contracting at an annualised pace of 12.1 percent. The government has described the financial crisis as the worst since World War II.
Japan's exports have fallen sharply while domestic demand has weakened and financial conditions remain tight, the BoJ noted.
Analysts said the outlook for Asia's largest economy remained bleak.
"The latest economic reports suggest that the impact of the slump is extending deep into the domestic economy and could well push Japan into another era of deflation," Standard Chartered analyst Simon Wong wrote in a note.
"As the deflation trend becomes more obvious, the BoJ will be under increasing pressure to revert to full-fledged quantitative easing," he said, referring to the bank's earlier policy of flooding the financial system with cash in an unprecedented attempt to rescue the economy from its 1990s slump.
Japanese inflation has evaporated recently and the central bank has said that the country faces a return to deflation, although it should escape a vicious circle of falling prices leading to weaker demand.
In a sign of lingering financial jitters, the BoJ joined a currency swap arrangement announced Monday between the Federal Reserve and other major central banks that is aimed at helping US financial institutions.
Shirakawa said, however, that at the moment there was no concrete plan to execute the swap arrangement, under which four central banks will supply foreign currency to the Fed should the need arise.
"The Bank of Japan signed the yen swap agreement as part our efforts to stabilise international financial markets," he said.
 
 
 
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