Japan's monetary base hits record high by end of 2016

Japan's monetary base reached a fresh record high by the end of 2016, as the Bank of Japan (BOJ) continued its efforts to combat deflation by pumping the markets with liquidity, the central bank said Thursday.

According to the latest BOJ data, the monetary base at the end of 2016 stood at 437.43 trillion yen (3.76 trillion U.S. dollars), up for the tenth consecutive year to a record high.

Balance of financial institutions' current account deposits at the BOJ, the biggest component of the monetary base, stood at 330.23 trillion yen, up by 30.5 percent on year.

Cash in circulation, another component of the monetary base, stood at 107.2 trillion yen, up by 4 percent compared to the end of 2015.

The Japanese central bank has been bolstering liquidity as part of its ongoing efforts to achieve its inflation target of 2 percent, though falling consumer prices keep hampering the achievement of the target.

Japan's core consumer prices dropped 0.4 percent year-on-year in November 2016, marking the ninth successive month of decline, as a result of falling prices of energy.

The BOJ has decided to keep its monetary policy unchanged following a two-day policy meeting last month, including continuing expanding the monetary base until the year-on-year rate of increase in the observed CPI exceeds 2 percent and stays above the target in a stable manner. Endit