Japan's banks did not, as a rule, load up on toxic US mortgage debt. Yet the crisis affected the country deeply. For many years while leverage was easily available, the “carry trade” – borrowing in yen at its low rates to park cash elsewhere – kept Japan's currency cheap. Then, once the credit market turned, bringing the carry trade down with it, there was a prolonged period when the yen functioned solely as a perverse “safe haven”, gaining whenever volatility was rising, as measured by the Chicago Board Options Exchange's Vix index.
一般來(lái)說(shuō)，日本銀行并未背負(fù)大量美國(guó)問(wèn)題抵押貸款債務(wù)，但這場(chǎng)危機(jī)仍對(duì)該國(guó)造成了嚴(yán)重影響。在很容易舉債交易的許多年來(lái)，“套利交易”（Carry Trade，低息借入日元并把現(xiàn)金投向別處）使日元匯率一直保持在低位。因此，一旦信貸市場(chǎng)逆轉(zhuǎn)并對(duì)套利交易形成拖累，就會(huì)在很長(zhǎng)時(shí)間內(nèi)，讓日元充當(dāng)唯一的反向“避風(fēng)港”的角色——從芝加哥期權(quán)交易所(CBOE) VIX指數(shù)的情況來(lái)衡量，只要市場(chǎng)波動(dòng)性加大，日元就會(huì)升值。