Daal, Excellent suggestion. I used to trade NOK 2yrs back, surprised that it escaped me. Just one note though - NOK is much less liquid compared to CHF. Which means the movements in EURNOK both ways could be much bigger than EURCHF. So please size your position accordingly.
Short term tactical trade call: Long USDCHF for a 3-5 big figure move. Stop 1 big figure. Will attempt this trade again, if stopped out. Long at 0.852.
This move could be a game changer for the JPY. Because now the BOJ and MoF wont have their excuses for their inaction and incompetency. Essentially the SNB showed the entire world 'thats how you do it morons'. For Japan a move like this would be a double whammy because it would both solve their FX issue but would also help a ton with ending deflation. I cut back my exposure to the JPY materially today even though I think it might take forever for the BOJ to do this
Difference is the following: Switzerland - three guys in a room (with the main one being a former HF punter) Japan - a byzantine bureaucracy with all sorts of govt branches involved
also the size of the economy matters. BOJ would have hard times to get away with explicitly stating the level vis-a-vis USD (or a basket). on top of that CHF was clearly becoming a crazy speculative bubble which you can hardly say about JPY. i hope many people/funds got killed on this move.
So we have the usual suspects being bid in the mkt now... SEK and NOK are bullet bid, so EURNOK getting mullered.
There is one more key point to note. Noda is now the prime minister - in absolute power. I know Japan is all about groupism and collective action. However, still when Noda put in 45 Bn $ as finance minister, I wonder what he can do as Prime Minister. More and more it seems to me that for the short run (1week or so), the currency that will come out on top after all this will be none other than 'US Dollar'.
You have a good point. I was in two minds about the effect on JPY - will it become more of safe haven or will it sell off due to fear that Japan might also do something like this. I stopped myself out of long JPY and am currently in short EURUSD and long USDCHF trade.