Former Bank of Japan executive Kazuo Momma said the BoJ could raise its policy rate at the October meeting for a second consecutive month, sooner than many economists expect. He put the chance of back-to-back hikes at roughly 20-30%, saying the move would signal the pace of tightening could accelerate versus a baseline quarterly tempo. Momma warned the risk of underlying inflation rising above 2% is unlikely to weaken and is more likely to increase over the next three months. His base case is a

Former Bank of Japan executive Kazuo Momma said the BoJ could raise its policy rate at the October meeting for a second consecutive month, sooner than many economists expect. He put the chance of back-to-back hikes at roughly 20-30%, saying the move would signal the pace of tightening could accelerate versus a baseline quarterly tempo. Momma warned the risk of underlying inflation rising above 2% is unlikely to weaken and is more likely to increase over the next three months. His base case is a terminal policy rate of about 2% by June or July next year, implying roughly three additional 25bp increases by the policy board.