One feature of trading in Asia overnight has been some slight weakness in the Japanese Yen, USD/JPY is at 95.60 compared to around 94.80 in late North American trade Wednesday, while EUR/JPY is up at 119.15 from around 118.10. The weakness came as comments from Japanese Finance Minister Nakagawa increased fears that the BOJ was preparing to intervene to arrest the budgeoning strength in its’ currency. Mr Nakagawa said that rapid forex moves are undesirable for the economy and need to be avoided at all costs. Elsewhere one particularly worrying bit of economic news in Asia was the release of Chinese industrial output, which showed a gain of 8.2% in October, a sharp drop from the 11.4% seen in September, and lower than the median market forecast of 11.1%. It was the smallest gain in 7 years.