Japanese Ministry Of Finance Condemns Fake Account Masato Kanda On X, Requests To Be Removed

Masato Kanda, deputy finance minister of Japan (photo: twitter @Svyrydenko_Y)

The Japanese Ministry of Finance (MOF) warned on Thursday August 3 about the existence of fake accounts for their leading currency official, Masato Kanda, on social media X, formerly known as Twitter. This makes the market worried about currency interventions given the weakening of yen to its lowest level in a month.

In a rare English post on X, the ministry stated, "Please don't follow fake accounts and/or comment on the post", saying that the X account allegedly belonging to Kanda or staff does not exist.

"Saati ini, MOF sedang meminta X (sebelumnya bernama Twitter) untuk menutup akun palsu ini. Terima kasih atas kerjasamanya," demikian pernyataan tersebut, melalui akun resmi mereka di https://twitter.com/MOF_Japan.

The account, under the name "Masato Kanda" and user ID "@Jgghkj_", appears to have been made in March and to date only made five shipments, including three Kanda photos posted on March 1. The latest shipment, made at 3:56 p.m. (06:56 GMT), appears to have falsified Kanda's latest trip to Ukraine.

Kanda was in Ukraine on Wednesday, August 2 to explain Japan's support for the country, the MOF also announced.

The fake account, which follows about 5,000 users and is only followed by a few more than 550 users, has not made any comments about the yen or financial market.

Kanda, who has served as Japan's deputy finance minister in international affairs, has been a central figure in his country's efforts to stop a sharp decline in yen value since last year, overseeing yen purchase operations and large dollar sales late last year.

Prior to the final Bank of Japan policy meeting on July 27-28, Kanda provided a rare statement on possible changes to the BOJ policy, in addition to warning the market that authorities would consider all options to address excess volatility on yen.

The Bank of Japan surprised the market by updating its bond yield control program last week, allowing interest rates to rise more freely.

Yen weakened on Thursday and hit 143.89 against the US dollar, the lowest level since July 7, as BOJ announced purchases of emergency bonds to control the increase in bond yields by 10 years.

The market is closely monitoring the next move from MOF as yen approaches the level of 145 per dollar again, a level that sparked Japan's yen purchase intervention for the first time since 1998 in September last year.