surplus widened by 30 percent from a year earlier in February after exports soared by a hefty 47 percent. Looking past the impressive percent gain reading, however, overseas sales remained well below the levels seen before the outbreak of the global economic downturn in 2008. Interestingly, the financial account deficit ballooned by nearly a trillion yen from the previous month as foreign investors piled into Japanese bonds, boosting the price of the benchmark10-year note on expectations that an increasingly dovish central bank preoccupied with deflation will translate into lower yields in the future even as the Ministry of Finance issues new debt to to finance Japan’s massive budget deficit. Lower domestic yields coupled with Japanese investors’ penchant for relatively safe long-term investments is likely to steer them toward US Treasuries, sending the US Dollar higher against the Japanese Yen in the process.