Ella 
In Asia on Thursday, USD/JPY pulled back after hitting a new high for the year near 148.45, but lacked follow-through and managed to stay above the daily low. USD/JPY is currently trading around 148.25, down less than 0.10% for the day, and appears poised for further appreciation.
Continued overnight strength in USD/JPY and a daily close above the 148.00 mark could be seen as new triggers for bullish traders, following the recent strong break above the 146.50-146.60 horizontal barrier. Supported by the Federal Reserve’s hawkish outlook, the dollar maintains underlying bullish sentiment, reinforcing the outlook for USD/JPY gains.
That said, Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said he would not rule out taking measures to respond to foreign exchange trends, which increases the risk of authorities intervening to support the local currency. In addition to this, speculation that the Bank of Japan (BoJ) may exit its negative interest rate policy also benefits the Japanese yen (JPY) and prevents USD/JPY from rising higher.
Meanwhile, technical indicators on the daily chart remain in positive territory and are still far from overbought territory. This, in turn, favors the bulls and suggests that USD/JPY has a path of least resistance to the upside. Therefore, as long as USD/JPY clearly falls below the 148.00 integer level, the area close to 147.70-147.65 can still be regarded as a long opportunity.
Support is around the 147.70-147.65 area, and then around the mid-147.00 level at the weekly low. A clear break below these levels could trigger some technical selling and push USD/JPY back towards a retest of the 147.00 level. USD/JPY may then slide towards horizontal support at 146.50 and ultimately below last week’s swing low at 146.00.
On the other hand, bulls may now wait for some follow-through buying above the daily high at the 148.45 area before placing any bets. Subsequent USD/JPY gains are likely to push USD/JPY towards the next relevant resistance near the 148.80-148.85 area, followed by the 149.00 round figure. The bullish momentum could extend further towards the 149.70 area, a break of which could see USD/JPY reclaim the psychological 150.00 mark for the first time since October 2022.
