10-year JGB yield hits 2-week high after BoJ decides reduction in frequency of debt-buying operations

The Japanese 10-year government bond yield hit a 2-week high on the last trading day of the week after the Bank of Japan (BoJ) said that it would adopt a reduction in the frequency of debt-buying operations in March.

Further, JGBs tracked an overnight slide in the United States Treasuries amid a rally in the Tokyo equities market.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year JGB note, which moves inversely to its price, rose nearly 1-1/2 basis points to -0.013 percent, the yield on the long-term 30-year also surged 1-1/2 basis points to 0.619 percent while the yield on short-term 2-year hovered around -0.145 percent by 06:50GMT.

According to a report from Reuters, "the central bank said on Thursday it would buy JGBs with over 5-10 years to maturity in four instalments in March, compared to five purchases a month in the previous six months. The BoJ has been gradually slowing the pace of its bond buying as its holdings near almost half of the entire market."

Asian markets are trading higher especially China’s CSI300 jumped more than 1 percent after MSCI announced to quadruple weighting of China mainland shares. Nikkei has recovered more than 350 points from low of 21,288.

Meanwhile, the Nikkei 225 index closed over 1 percent higher at 21,602.70, while at 06:00GMT, the FxWirePro's Hourly JPY Strength Index remained highly bearish at -110.62 (a reading above +75 indicates a bullish trend, while that below -75 a bearish trend). For more details, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex