Nikkei 225 · June 18, 1998
The day America bought yen
+4.39%
single-day change vs previous close
Part of a longer stretch
When the banks themselves failed
near the end of it · 1996-06-26 → 1998-10-09, -43.18% over the whole period
What happened that day?
- On 18 June 1998 the Nikkei 225 rose 4.39%
- The day before, the US and Japan had intervened together to buy yen
- It was the mirror image of 1995. Then the yen was too strong; now it was too weak
- A yen that keeps falling drags other Asian currencies down with it, and the crisis could spread further
- The US stepped in to stop that chain. Joint buying carries far more weight than Japan acting alone
- That one exchange rate could move the index this much was the defining feature of Japan's market then
- In this stretch the index was 25.4% below its peak
Sources
Every figure on this page is recomputed from the original daily closing prices and checked against them at build time. The account of what happened is written from the sources listed above.