USD/JPY hung up near 150.50 after Greenback gains for a second day

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• The USD/JPY is edging higher, retesting chart space above 150.00.
• Bullish momentum appears to be weakening as the pair struggles to reclaim 151.70.
• Fed Chair Powell makes an appearance on Wednesday, Japan Current Account early Thursday.

The USD/JPY is trading into the 150.50 neighborhood after the pair eked out a second straight day of gains following last week’s three-day decline into 149.20.

The US Dollar (USD) bulled into 151.72 last Tuesday, a mere 20 pips away from hitting a new 31-year high against the Japanese Yen (JPY) as a stubbornly-dovish Bank of Japan (BoJ) continues to hang the JPY out to dry in favor of maintaining hyper-easy monetary policy, and broad-market risk-off flows continue to prop up the Greenback in safe haven flights.

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Wednesday sees an appearance from Federal Reserve (Fed) Chairman Jerome Powell, who will be speaking at the Division of Research and Statistics Centennial Conference in Washington, DC, and investors will be keeping a close eye on the Fed head looking for hints about the Fed’s perspective following last Friday’s 30-month low print for the US Nonfarm Payrolls (NFP) jobs report.

Japanese Trade Balance figures will be printing in the early Asia market session for Thursday, and markets are expecting the headline non-seasonally-adjusted Current Account for September to continue growing. The MoM figure is forecast to print at ¥3,000.8 billion compared to August’s ¥2,279.7 billion.

USD/JPY Technical Outlook

The USD/JPY continues to grind higher on the daily candlesticks, and the pair is catching some technical lift in a bounce off of a rising trendline from July’s swing lows into the 138.00 handle.

Downside pressure sees rising support from the 50-day Simple Moving Average (SMA) currently rising into the 149.00 region.

On the top side, technical resistance is mounting after last week’s peak just south of 152.00, and bidders appear to be running out of gas in the near-term, though the long-term trend remains firmly bullish with the 200-day SMA far below chart action near 141.00.

USD/JPY Daily Chart

USD/JPY Technical Levels