good morning, ramin. tell us what you're seeing at the open. >> good morning. extending the gains yesterday from japan as well as wall street. both indexes were up 1.25%. we did see the jump in oil prices. also prospects of debt relief in greece. data out of china yesterday. let's have a look at how the nikkei and topix are kicking off. that's largely backed by a weakening yen. japan finance minister repeatedly talked about possible intervention. still, the yen has this year, in fact risen about 14%. that's up from the beginning of may. that's despite bank of japan policy trying to weaken the yen and introduce negative rates. >> absolutely. in fact, the yen is fallen significantly this week just around 1.7%. where are the key levels now? >> we have seen the yen weaken a touch from levels i was speaking about before. look at it now, 109.13-16. adding to the tensions in the currency market, according to analysts they do not expect any intervention ahead of the g7 meetings. with the euro trading it was a little bit flat. most of the focus on the greek market. the

ramin has the details on what is happening in tokyo. tell us what you see. >> u.s. market has lost a bit of steam toward the end. we had weaker than expected earnings results. we did see the reversal. investigators will be gauging the rise of the dollar. shares in nissan are down 2%. shares untraded due to a mass of sell orders. i'll keep track of that. shares will be on toyota. net profit was down. it expects a stronger yen to hit profits for 2016 by about 35%. that's based on an assumed dollar yen rate of 105 compared with an average of 120 yen in the year just ended in march. a huge difference there. officials at toyota said the impact of the recent earthquakes is not factored into the forecast. i also want to highlight another negative this time for japanese chip equipment makers and component makers due to, they've signalled slowing growth due to sluggish sales of apple's iphone as well as samsung smart phone that may slow capital investment. >> you mentioned the stronger yen opini yen. give us up to date levels. >> we have seen a shift in the dollar yen. it's

for that we'll go to ramin. he's at tokyo stock exchange. tell us what you see here in tokyo. >> thank you very much. very good morning to you. focus on the fed minutes there and a pause in the rise in crude oil prices led to hesitancy. let's have a look at how the nikkei and topix kicked off. both indexes well into the positive. we have seen a rally of close to around 80% since oil prices bottomed. a stronger dollar led to pause in crude prices. that's after we saw supply disruptions. a drop in shale oil production in the u.s. and a lot of questions on whether saudi arabia will raise output. >> we saw that rise after the fed minutes. tell us about the key pairs now. it remains to be seen what the fed may do. it looks like many policymakers were tilting, shall we say, towards the june rate hike if economic data warranted. so far labor market, housing and inflation data been heading in the right direction as far as the fed is concerned. that adds to the argument for a rate hike. i want to highlight bond yields. u.s. treasury yields closest ba

back to you. >> ramin, thanks for that update. we'll touch base with you in a few hours. >>> the race is on to develop driverless vehicles, including buses and taxis. japanese government officials say they are going to give the green light to public transport operators aiming to go driverless by 2020. that's the year tokyo hosts the olympic games. the officials say operators will be obliged to take full responsibility in the event of accidents. the companies will also need to have systems that monitor their unmanned vehicles remotely and stop them when problems arise. the officials plan to amend the road traffic law and study other measures. they'll also call on would-be operators to start test runs on roads in special zones designated by the government. >>> virtual reality may be the next big thing in video games. vr technology uses computer graphics to immerse the user in a virtual space. analysts say the market could top $10 billion by the end of the decade. and japanese companies are jockeying for position. nhk world's john le

we're going to go to ramin. he's at the nhk market office. good morning. what can you tell us? >> very good morning to you. definitely you touched on oil prices there hitting seven-month highs as u.s. inventories were seen to be falling in the world's biggest consumer of oil. also new debt deal for greece seem tolessen concerns as well heading off any further uncertainties over greece debt repayment plans. the nikkei closed high on wednesday. sony was a big focus. shares jumping to the highest level so far this year and the most actively traded on the tokyo stock exchange. the expected group operating profit to rise 2% by march, 2017. that's despite some of the negative impact that it had also mentioned due to the earthquakes where it has image sensor chip operations. more and more people using mobile technology. with greece, a deal also investors looking out for bonds. yields fell not only in greek bonds but periphereal bonds. >> tell us what's going on with the dollar. it really looks like it's pulling back a bit. that's after hitting two-month highs. >> it's below the 110 ye

ramin joins us. tell us what you're seeing. >> very good morning to you. al so to speak, for janet yellen speech later today. thael be watching out for the revised gdp data. let's have a look at how the nikkei and topix are kicking off. it did close well off the highs. the focus here today will be dominated by president obama's historic visit to hiroshima later today. many are keeping watch on prime minister abe's point about fiscal spending plans which he made some points during the g7 summit meeting. retreat if the dollar may weigh on sentiment. >> get us up to date on currencies. what's happening with the dollar in. >> the fed is really watching out for a lot of data points, durable goods a little bit weaker. yen 109.67. it's slipping against weaker currencies. fed policy makers have made it clear they'll be looking at data points and judge the timing of a rate hike based on what's appropriate. it includes the second reading of gdp later today. before bond and stock markets wrap up for a long week and janet yellen will give her speech later today. some

i am ramin mellegard from the tokyo stock exchange. >>> moving on to other markets in the asia-pacific region. let's look at shanghai. the shanghai composite down by .3%. 2,827. the index posted a fourth straight week of declines, the longest fall in two years, concerns about china's economy persist. malaysia's main index dropping by 1.3%, 1628 the closing number, lowest in three months. country's economy in the first quarter grew at the slowest pace since 2009, exports were weak. seoul's kospi down by .5%. bank of korea held its key interest rate steady. hang seng declining by almost 1% before key economic data from china over the weekend. and the philippines bucking the trend there, up by 1.5%. >>> china's latest economic indicators suggest that continuing weak demand at home is chilling hopes of recovery in the world's second biggest economy. officials at the national bureau of statistics say the producer price index declined by 3.4% year on year in the month of april. that was better than march, but producer inflation remained negative for the 50th consecutive month. that's weighed