BOJ maintains ultra-loose monetary policy, economic assessment

The Bank of Japan (BOJ) decided Tuesday to keep its ultra-loose monetary policy and economic assessment unchanged, local media reported.

The Japanese economy "has kept recovering," the BOJ said in a statement after a two-day policy meeting, maintaining its basic assessment of the world's third largest economy for the sixth straight month.

Its nine-member policy board decided unanimously that the ultra- loose monetary policy introduced in April 2013 to stimulate economic recovery would stay on.

The BOJ revised down its assessment on exports, saying they " have recently leveled off more or less" from last month's assessment that they had "generally been picking up."

But Governor Haruhiko Kuroda stressed that the slowdown in exports may be temporary, saying "exports are projected to increase moderately."

Meanwhile, the bank upgraded its view on capital investment and industrial output, saying the investment "has become increasingly evident" backed by improvement in corporate profits, and production "has been increasing at a somewhat accelerated pace."

It also projected that Japan's consumer prices, excluding the impact of the consumption tax hike from 5 percent to 8 percent, will gain 1.9 percent in fiscal 2015.