SINGAPORE, July 17 Reuters The yen rose broadly on Wednesday though traders and analysts were unsure of what was behind the move, while sterling scaled a oneyear top after hotterthanexpected UK inflation data.

The dollar fell more than 0.8 against the yen to a sessionlow of 157.01, putting traders on alert for signs of another intervention from Japanese authorities to prop up the currency.

Tokyo was thought to have intervened in the market last week to shore up the battered yen, with Bank of Japan BOJ data released on Tuesday suggesting 2.14 trillion yen 13.5 billion may have been spent last Friday.

Combined with the estimated amount spent on Thursday, Japan is suspected to have bought nearly 6 trillion yen via intervention last week.

I39;m not exactly sure why it suddenly dropped, said Khoon Goh, head of Asia research for ANZ, referring to the dollaryen currency pair.

First and foremost, I think people might suspect intervention after what happened last week, but to be honest, as far as I know, there wasn39;t any news or anything like that has happened to drive this move.

The yen similarly eked out gains against other major currencies, with the euro last down 0.64 to 171.44 yen , while sterling fell 0.45 to 204.37 yen .

Elsewhere, the British pound rose roughly 0.3 to 1.3013, its strongest level since July 19, 2023, after data on Wednesday showed UK inflation rose slightly more than expected.

Headline inflation held at 2 on an annual basis in June against…