USD/JPY Price Analysis: Finds some support near 23.6% Fibo., rebounds to 144.00 mark

• USD/JPY plummets to over a one-week low on Thursday, albeit lacks follow-through selling.
• The sharp intraday slide stalls near the 23.6% Fibo level., warranting some caution for bears.
• A sustained strength beyond 145.00 is needed to support prospects for any further move-up.

The USD/JPY pair comes under intense selling pressure on Thursday and dives to a one-and-half-week low during the early part of the European session. Spot prices, however, manage to rebound a few pips in the last hour and currently trade around the 144.00 round-figure mark, still down nearly 0.50% for the day.

Fears of a possible intervention by Japanese authorities to prop up the domestic currency, along with the risk-off impulse, provide a goodish lift to the safe-haven Japanese Yen (JYP) and prompt aggressive selling around the USD/JPY pair. Apart from this, a modest US Dollar (USD) pullback from the weekly top further contributes to the offered tone.

That said, a big divergence in the monetary policy stance adopted by the Bank of Japan (BoJ) and other major central banks, including the Federal Reserve (Fed), caps any further gains for the JPY. Apart from this, a further rise in the US Treasury bond yields acts as a tailwind for the Greenback and limits losses for the USD/JPY pair, at least for now.

From a technical perspective, the sharp intraday slide finds support near the 143.60 region, or the 23.6% Fibonacci retracement level of the June rally, which should now act as a pivotal point. Some follow-through selling will validate a breakdown through a short-term trading range held over the past week or so and pave the way for further losses.

The USD/JPY pair might then accelerate the corrective decline towards testing the 100-period Simple Moving Average (SMA), currently pegged around the 143.00 round figure. This is closely followed by the 142.70-142.65 support or the 38.2% Fibo. level, which if broken decisively will suggest that spot prices have topped out near the 145.00 mark.

On the flip side, any recovery back above the trading range support breakpoint, around the 144.15-144.20 area, is likely to confront some resistance near the 144.70-144.75 supply zone. This is followed by the critical 145.00 psychological mark, above which the USD/JPY pair might aim to surpass the 145.35-145.40 barrier and reclaim the 146.00 round figure.

USD/JPY 4-hour chart

Key levels to watch