Japan’s yen surges after US jobs data amid intervention concerns

The US economy was supposed to add 80,000 jobs in July. Instead, it lost 23,000. That kind of miss doesn’t just move markets. It detonates them. The Japanese yen rallied sharply against the US dollar on August 7, with the greenback dropping as much as 1.1% to 156.68 yen during the session. The move came on the heels of a nonfarm payrolls report that was so far below expectations it immediately rewired trader assumptions about the Federal Reserve’s next move. The numbers behind the yen’s rally July’s employment report showed the US economy shed 23,000 nonfarm payroll positions, a result that wasn’t just below consensus. It was on the wrong side of zero. Economists had projected a gain of 80,000 jobs, making the actual figure a swing of more than 100,000 from expectations. The unemployment rate ticked up to 4.1%, adding another data point to a picture of cooling labor demand. Before the report, the dollar had been hovering comfortably above 158 yen. Within hours, it had been shoved down to 156.68 before finding a shaky floor just above that level. In currency markets, where a fraction of a percent can represent billions in portfolio value, a 1.1% intraday move is significant. Interve...