vs Yesterday
−0.45
USD/JPY moves a yen on a busy day are not unusual.
Dollar–Yen · Daily
USD / JPY Exchange Rate
000.00
-0.45 vs. yesterday (−0.30%)
Past 12 months
142.10 – 158.40
vs Last Year-6.40
5-Yr Avg138.50
$100 =¥14,865
The dollar buys ¥148.65 — down from the 2024 peak of ¥161.95, but still extraordinarily weak yen by any historical standard. Americans traveling to Japan are still finding the yen pricing they remember from 2010 has effectively been cut in half.
Historical trend
Daily ECB reference rate (4:00 PM CET).
Source: Frankfurter API (ECB reference data)
The long view: 35+ years of the yen
From a peak yen at 75 in 2011 to today's 148. The Abenomics era reset the entire range.
Peak USD 161.95 · July 2024
Peak Yen 75.35 · Oct 2011
Today 148.65
How today stacks up
vs Last Year
−6.40
Yen +4.3% stronger vs the dollar YoY.
5-Year Average
138.50
Today is 10 yen above the 5-yr average — yen still historically weak.
All-Time Range
75–162
Today sits in the upper third of the post-1990 range.
Use this rate
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About the USD/JPY Exchange Rate
USD/JPY is the world's second-most traded currency pair behind EUR/USD, accounting for roughly 13% of global FX volume. It's quoted as the number of Japanese yen one U.S. dollar buys: today's 148.65 means $1 = ¥148.65, or one yen costs $0.0067. Because the yen is quoted in larger numbers, "small" daily moves in USD/JPY (say, 0.50 yen) are actually meaningful percentage shifts — that's about 0.34%, comparable to a 30-pip move in EUR/USD.
What moves the yen
USD/JPY is the world's classic carry-trade pair. For decades, traders borrowed in yen (at near-zero Japanese rates) and bought higher-yielding dollar assets, mechanically pushing USD/JPY higher. The trade unwinds violently when U.S. rates fall or Japanese rates rise — a 2024 episode in early August saw USD/JPY drop 7% in two days as the Bank of Japan finally hiked. The pair is also extremely sensitive to 10-year Treasury yields: roughly a 1:1 relationship with the U.S.–Japan yield gap.
Reading this chart
The long view shows two huge regimes. From 1985–2012, the yen strengthened almost monotonically, reaching an all-time high of 75.35 yen per dollar in October 2011. From 2013 onward, "Abenomics" — Bank of Japan quantitative easing on a massive scale — drove the yen back down, culminating in the July 2024 multi-decade low at 161.95. Today's 148.65 is well off that low as the BoJ gradually normalizes policy, but still extraordinarily weak by historical standards.
Related trackers
Other live numbers that move with — or against — this one.
Frequently asked
What this number means, and what it doesn't.
Historical accident — when Japan reformed its currency after WWII, the yen was pegged at 360 to the dollar. By the time it floated freely in 1973 it was around 280 per dollar, and the convention stuck. The yen has no "cents" subdivision (officially it does, but they're never used in practice), so all consumer prices in Japan use larger yen numbers (a ¥1,000 bento box = roughly $6.70).
For decades, Japanese interest rates were near zero while U.S. rates were 2–5%. Traders borrowed yen cheaply, sold them for dollars, and invested in higher-yielding U.S. assets, pocketing the rate differential as profit. This pushed USD/JPY structurally higher. When the BoJ unexpectedly hiked rates in August 2024, the carry trade unwound and the pair fell from 161 to 142 in a week — one of the most violent moves in modern FX history.
Yes — USD/JPY hit 161.95 on July 3, 2024, the weakest yen reading since 1986. The move prompted multiple suspected Bank of Japan currency interventions through 2024–25 and ultimately drove the BoJ to start raising rates after nearly two decades of zero-rate policy. The pair has rangetraded 140–155 since.
Because the carry trade is built on the U.S.–Japan yield gap. When 10-year Treasury yields rise relative to Japanese 10-year JGBs, holding dollars becomes more attractive and USD/JPY climbs. When U.S. yields fall, the relative attractiveness of yen-denominated assets rises and USD/JPY drops. The correlation is one of the tightest in modern FX.
At today's 148.65, $100 USD buys ¥14,865 — enough for two solid dinners or a couple of nights in a budget hotel. At the 2011 low of 75, the same $100 only got ¥7,535. The weak yen has made Japan one of the cheapest major travel destinations for Americans in 2024–26 — a primary driver behind record-breaking tourist arrival numbers in Tokyo and Kyoto.
Methodology
Source
Pulled from Frankfurter (ECB) and cached on the EvvyTools server.
Update schedule
Refreshed automatically by our cron whenever the upstream source publishes a new value. Historical values are not revised after publication.
How we compute
Display value is the raw published number, unrounded. Comparison stats use the closest available reference date. We never edit the underlying data.