“Japan said it will provide $60 billion to the International Monetary Fund’s effort to expand its resources and shield the global economy against any deepening of Europe’s debt crisis.
Finance Minister Jun Azumi unveiled the commitment in speaking to reporters in Tokyo today before semiannual meetings of the IMF and World Bank in Washington April 20-22. Azumi said he hopes for an early agreement among Group of 20 members, who will also gather in Washington, on contributions to the IMF.
Japan, the world’s third-largest economy, becomes the largest donor yet outside of Europe to IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde’s campaign to bolster the fund’s resources for the second time in three years. Azumi said that the stance ofChina, the world’s largest holder of foreign-exchange reserves, is in the same direction as Japan’s and that he hopes Japan’s pledge will accelerate the commitments of others.
“It’s in everyone’s best interest that Europe gets back on its feet as soon as possible,” said Matthew Circosta, an economist at Moody’s Analytics in Sydney. The announcement may “add stability to financial markets that had been weakening over the last few weeks as the crisis flared up again, particularly in Spain.”
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Why not make it a trillion?
Tis but a mere moving of le decimal point.
(end sarcasm)
Good on Japan for getting ahead of the curve.
Put a drop in the bucket and move on, claiming you’ve done your part. Let everyone else fight over how many hundreds of billions extra needs to be added.
I suspect this is more self serving than anything. Japan gets to weaken the yen while looking like a knight in shining armor.