DOLLAR/YEN INTERVENTION RESPONDS TO PRESSURE
  The Bank of France intervened to buy
  small amounts of dollars and sell yen in Paris today to
  stabilise the exchange rates agreed at last month's meeting of
  Finance Ministers of the Group of Five and Canada, foreign
  exchange dealers said.
      But they said recent central bank intervention in the
  foreign exchange markets appeared to be a limited reaction to
  temporary pressures rather than a major defence operation.
      A Bank of France spokesman declined all comment but sources
  close to the central bank said it had also intervened
  yesterday.
      Dealers said the earlier intervention was in concert with
  the Bundesbank and Bank of Japan.
      The sources said the French central bank could have been in
  the market again today in two-way operations, not necessarily
  on its own account, but to counter short-term pressures arising
  from the end of the Japanese financial year on March 31.
      One major French bank said it bought between five and 15
  mln dlrs for the central bank and sold yen at 149.28 to the
  dollar.
      Another bank said it had been asked by the Bank of France
  to say it was in the market, a departure from the central
  bank's usual insistence on confidentiality.
      But other banks said they had seen no sign of intervention,
  which they said appeared to be on a very limited scale.
      "Even if 10 banks were buying five to 15 mln dlrs, you would
  still be talking of a small overall amount," said one dealer.
      Recent intervention by the Bank of Japan appeared mainly to
  have been required to meet year-end window dressing demand for
  yen. "This is a specific short term phenomenon rather than a
  wider trend," the dealer said.
      Operators have been extremely cautious about testing the
  dollar's trading ranges against the West German mark and
  Japanese yen.
      These ranges were set in February's stabilisation agreement
  reached here by U.S. Treasury Secretary James Baker and the
  Finance Ministers of Japan, Germany, France, Britain and
  Canada.
      But speculative pressures started to build again this week
  after Baker was quoted on British television at the weekend as
  repeating earlier statements that Washington had no target for
  the dollar.
      Baker yesterday moved to defuse speculation he was talking
  the dollar down, telling a Cable News Network interviewer and a
  Senate committee he stood by the Paris agreement. Foreign
  exchange markets had been misreading his comments, he said.
  

