Minutes of the March 14/15 BoJ meeting noted that members “concurred” that the economy will continue to its “moderate expansion”. “domestic demand was likely to follow an uptrend”, including fixed investment and private consumption. That should offset weakness in exports and product as dragged down by overseas slowdown.
On prices, members reiterated that CPI ‘continued to show relatively weak developments compared to the economic expansion and the labor market tightening.” But CPI is still “likely to increase gradually” toward 2% target.
On monetary policy, members agreed that it was “appropriate” to persistently continue with the powerful monetary easing under the current guideline. On member warned of the “side effects” of maintaining current easing. One member warned that if downside risks were materializing, BoJ should be prepared to make policy responses. One member also noted the importance to “preemptive policy responses” in case of phase shift in developments.
