Bank Of Japan Assets Zoom To $6.3 Trillion Via Asset Purchases

Total assets held by the Bank of Japan climbed to a record 724.06 trillion yen ($6.3 trillion) in the six months to September, buoyed by asset purchases and funding support amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the central bank said.

Photo Insert: Bank of Japan Osaka branch and Shin-Daibiru in the Nakanoshima district

The BOJ's assets, up 4.9 percent from a year earlier, are larger than the size of Japan's economy whose nominal gross domestic product is around 540 trillion yen. The Japanese central bank has been pumping liquidity to support economic growth and accelerate inflation toward its elusive 2 percent inflation target, Kyodo News reported.

Under its yield curve control program, the BOJ keeps short- and long-term interest rates low by buying Japanese government bonds. It also buys exchange-traded funds, commercial paper, and corporate bonds.

Years of bold monetary easing pushed up the BOJ's holdings of Japanese government bonds to 528.03 trillion yen, down 0.4 percent from a year earlier.

Exchange-Traded Funds (ETF) holdings increased 5.9 percent to 36.21 trillion yen with an appraisal profit of 16.62 trillion yen, the largest on record, according to the BOJ data.

The pace of increase, however, slowed sharply from the 24.5 percent seen in the same period last year. In March, the BOJ fine-tuned its policy kit to brace for protracted monetary easing while addressing its side effects.

It removed an annual purchase target for ETFs to make their buying more flexible and timely.

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