Yen rises after results of Japanese elections, dollar weakens
The yen surged on Monday after Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba promised to remain in charge of the government despite his coalition losing the majority in the Upper House elections on Sunday.
* Investors were preparing for market unrest ahead of the deadline for tariff negotiations with the United States.
* Japanese markets remained closed for a holiday, leaving the yen as the main indicator of potential investor distress.
* The dollar, for its part, fell against most currencies, in line with the decline in U.S. Treasury bond yields, analysts said.
* In afternoon trading in New York, the Japanese currency USDJPY gained 1% to 147.315 yen per dollar, although not far from the 3 and a half month low of 149.19 units reached last week amid investor concern over Japan's political and fiscal outlook.
* The yen also rose 0.4% against the euro EURJPY to 172.27 and against the British pound GBPJPY to 198.64, also up 0.4%.
* Ishiba's Liberal Democratic Party obtained 47 seats, below the 50 needed to secure a majority in the Japanese Upper House, which has 248 seats, of which half were at stake.
* He committed to remain in his position, even as some members of his own party discussed his future and the opposition weighed a motion of censure.
* "The elections were not such a terrible result for Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba as analysts had predicted. The Prime Minister's party managed to minimize the loss of seats, and Ishiba was not forced to resign from his position," said Juan Pérez, trading director of Monex USA in Washington.