Potential for earlier BOJ rate hike rises amid hawkish signals, weak yen

TOKYO -- When the Bank of Japan ended the world's only negative interest policy in March, it emphasized that financial conditions would be kept easy and interest rates would slowly increase. 

That was before the yen traded at multidecade lows even after two suspected government interventions to boost the currency and the BOJ reduced its purchases of Japanese government bonds. It was also before U.S. Federal Reserve officials held onto their outlook of just three rate cuts this year, down from the six that markets expected.