Japan's Finance Minister Katayama says important to appropriately gauge tax revenues and will do best to estimate tax revenue accurately with higher transparency, adds constantly improving the way to gauge tax revenues

• Won't comment on specific FX levels.
• PM Takaichi has said yen's undervaluation is problematic.
• It's important to ensure stable FX markets.
• Can't say current levels are good or bad.
• Conditions have improved from before and need to avoid disorderly movements.

This is the standard opening rung of the Japanese verbal intervention ladder. The Ministry of Finance, not the Bank of Japan, owns currency policy, and its rhetoric has historically escalated through a familiar sequence: references to stable markets and disorderly moves, then warnings against excessive or speculative moves, then readiness to take decisive action, with actual yen-buying intervention typically reserved for rapid, one-sided depreciation rather than any particular level. The refusal to comment on specific levels is itself boilerplate and signals the Ministry is not yet at the stage of drawing a line. The reference to the Prime Minister having flagged yen undervaluation as problematic is the more notable element, since political-level commentary of that kind has in past episodes raised the perceived threshold tolerance for weakness and shifted the burden of response toward the MOF. The tax revenue remarks sit in the context of budget compilation, where stronger nominal growth and import-price-driven revenue outperformance have repeatedly allowed supplementary spending without fresh issuance, a dynamic relevant to JGB supply expectations. The tells from here are whether the language hardens toward speculation and excess volatility, whether the pace of yen moves rather than the level becomes the stated concern, and any coordination signals with foreign counterparts, which have historically preceded intervention episodes.