Japanese Yen

A WELL-TRAVELED geezer of our acquaintance has cashed many a U.S. dollar travelers check into pounds sterling, French francs, Greek drachmas, Italian lire, Austrian schillings, Spanish pesos and other currencies, often at out-of-the-way towns well off the beaten path.Imagine his surprise a few days ago when, waiting to transact business at the Roland Park branch of the First National Bank, he saw two women having difficulty getting cash for U.S. dollar American Express travelers checks. The first woman was obviously a patron of the bank who had transacted some business.

Tokyo again tops list of most expensive cities in the world Defying notions about Japanese deflation, Tokyo is again the most expensive city in the world. A 4 percent drop in the exchange value of the dollar against the Japanese yen helped put Tokyo in first place and Osaka in third place in an annual cost-of-living survey of 144 major world cities conducted in March by Mercer Human Resources Consulting of Geneva, a Marsh & McLennan company. With cab fares starting at $5, $10,000-a-month apartment rents not uncommon and intercity rail travel expensive, Tokyo residents notice the 1 percent annual deflation rate of prices in yen. Moscow, which has an extremely expensive housing market for foreigners, was the world's second-most-expensive city, unchanged from last year.

WASHINGTON -- U.S. worker productivity grew four times faster than first estimated in the second quarter, leading to the smallest gain in labor costs in three years and keeping the economy on its low-inflation track, government figures yesterday showed.Productivity, a measure of the time and effort needed to produce goods and services, rose at a 2.7 percent annual rate in the second quarter, according to the Labor Department. The agency initially estimated a month ago that productivity rose 0.6 percent in the quarter.

NEW YORK -- A declining belief that U.S. interest rates will be cut soon and fresh sales of German marks strengthened the dollar yesterday against the mark and helped it hold its ground against the Japanese yen.The dollar got a lift yesterday morning when the Federal Reserve failed to signal a cut in the federal funds target rate, now 3 percent, during its normal intervention period, traders said.The absence of a rate cut disappointed investors, who earlier sold the dollar on the hunch that signs of weakness in the U.S. economy -- including Friday's report of the loss of 57,000 jobs in September -- had all but ensured a rate cut of 25 or even 50 basis points, traders said.

The dollar rose to its highest level against the Japanese yen in a month yesterday, breaking back through the psychologically important 100-yen level and extending a bounce that began more than a week ago.Analysts said the main reason for the dollar's rally yesterday was a rumor that the long-standing bilateral trade dispute between the United States and Japan would be resolved by July 31, the deadline Washington has set for deciding whether to take steps...

NEW YORK -- The dollar slid against the German mark yesterday, hurt by concerns about high German interest rates and the mark's strength against other European currencies, traders said.The Bundesbank's insistence on maintaining its high interest rates continues to weaken the dollar, even though U.S. economic data point to recovery, traders said.That policy was reiterated yesterday by council member Johann Wilhelm Gaddum, who stressed the need for high rates and a strong mark, traders said.

NEW YORK -- The dollar tumbled to a new low of 119.5 Japanese yen yesterday as Japanese investors continued to repatriate overseas profits and Treasury Undersecretary David Mulford said the United States wasn't worried about the yen's rise.The dollar's previous low against the yen was 120.45 yen, set Jan. 4, 1988. The dollar closed at 119.72 yen, down from 121.04 yen Tuesday.The dollar's slide against the yen began three days ago, as investors sought protection from the turmoil in European currencies and Japanese repatriated overseas profits -- particularly from Europe -- before the end of the first half of the Japanese fiscal year on Sept.

IWO JIMA, Japan -- They traded war stories, visited battle sites and stood uneasily next to men they had tried their hardest to kill.Half a century after the battle of Iwo Jima, one of the ghastliest in World War II, American and Japanese veterans returned yesterday to commemorate the struggle for an island that had once seemed so important that it had absorbed tens of thousands of lives. These days, it has no permanent residents.Even now, there are thousands of Japanese soldiers buried in the man-made caves and tunnels of Iwo Jima.

Reuter -- OSAKA, Japan -- Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said today that the odds are rising that the U.S. economy could bounce back from the 11-month recession at a stronger rate than many expect."

* Until about 3:30 p.m. Eastern time Firday, it looked like just another week of lousy economic news accompanied by assorted fumbling in Washington over what to do about the economy. Within a half hour, the picture grew ominously darker as the stock market took an unexpected nose-dive.A drop of more than 120 points in the Dow Jones industrial average has a way of bringing matters to a head.Declining issues outpaced advancing ones during Friday's plunge by a 5-1 ratio, with volume active at 236 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange.