Japanese Stock Market Surpasses 37,000 Intraday for the First Time in 34 Years... Yen-Dollar Exchange Rate Approaches 150 Yen

The Nikkei 225 average price (Nikkei index) in Japan briefly surpassed the 37,000 mark during trading on the 9th.

An employee is organizing Japanese yen at the Counterfeit Response Center of Hana Bank Headquarters in Euljiro, Jung-gu, Seoul.
[Image source=Yonhap News]

The continued weakness of the yen, along with the S&P 500 index, a representative stock index of the U.S. New York Stock Exchange, surpassing the 5,000 mark intraday for the first time on the 8th (local time), is interpreted as leading to continued buying orders for Japanese stocks. The Nihon Keizai Shimbun also analyzed that the strong performance of Japanese companies from April to December last year seems to have influenced the stock prices.

It has been about 34 years since the Nikkei index, the representative stock index of the Japanese stock market, surpassed the 37,000 mark, last seen during the 'bubble economy' period in 1990. The Nikkei index closed at 36,863, up 2.06% from the previous day.

Meanwhile, as the yen's value declined, the yen-dollar exchange rate approached 150 yen. On the morning of that day, the yen was trading in the 149 yen range per dollar. The yen-dollar exchange rate rose to 151.89 yen in mid-November last year but then fell to the low 140 yen range before recently turning upward again.