TOKYO—The Bank of Japan‘s governor, nearing the end of a decade in office, gave markets one more surprise in the form of an interest-rate increase that he said wasn’t really an increase.
It capped an event-filled year for developed-world central bankers in which the Federal Reserve lifted its benchmark rate above 4% and the European Central Bank moved up to 2%. The inflationary forces that pushed the U.S. into rapid clampdown mode proved so powerful that even Japan’s central bank, which long stuck to near-zero rates, felt it had to budge—in part to protect the value of the yen, analysts said.
