The Bank of Japan will release new inflation indicators monthly, potentially to provide a basis for its stance on interest rate hikes.

According to Mars Finance, on March 26th, the Bank of Japan (BOJ) announced that it will begin releasing monthly data to assess core CPI starting this month. This data will be published under the name "Core CPI Reference Indicator" and will be released at 14:00 on the second working day after the official CPI release. Investinglive analyst Justin Low stated that, in the context of this announcement, the BOJ has faced considerable criticism due to the somewhat confusing inflation data in Japan. While Japan's core CPI annual rate fell below the crucial 2% level in February, the BOJ seems determined to continue its tight monetary policy. The BOJ wants to provide evidence that underlying inflationary pressures remain strong. The bank believes that government measures such as energy subsidies have artificially suppressed CPI data. Therefore, the BOJ's newly released "Core CPI Reference Indicator" will be a "de-noiseed" interpretation of the inflation figures. This is more about demonstrating to the public and the market that they are still on the right track regarding monetary policy. If there is any difference, it can also be interpreted as a slight resistance from the BOJ to the government's wishes, as Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi wants the BOJ to maintain current interest rates.