NEW YORK – The United States Treasury stepped into the currency market on July 31 to back the battered yen, the Financial Times (FT) reported, marking Washington’s first intervention along with Tokyo to support Japan’s currency in more than a decade as it languishes near 40-year lows.The Federal Reserve Bank of New York conducted a sale of euros to buy yen on behalf of the Treasury through Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, the FT said, citing people familiar with the matter.The report did not indicate any amounts of yen purchased.The reported action would be the US Treasury’s first direct support for the yen since 2011, when it coordinated with fellow Group of Seven nations to stabilise markets after Japan’s earthquake and tsunami disaster.Earlier on July 31, the US Treasury informed a number of banks that it might intervene in the yen market and that they should “stand ready for future action”, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters.A Reuters photo of US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s notepad during a Cabinet meeting at Camp David in Maryland showed that he was contemplating US purchases of US$5 billion (S$6.4 billion) to US$10 billion worth of Japanese yen.The notepad in the photo, taken over Bessent’s shoulder during an on-the-record portion of the meeting, bears the underscored words: “To Do” followed by “Buy Japanese Yen (JPY) $5-10 bil”.The Treasury did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the FT report and the Bessent notepad photo.The New York Fed and Morgan Stanley also did not immediately respond to request for comment outside regular business hours.Goldman Sachs declined to comment.News of the potential intervention by the Treasury helped push the yen higher against the dollar on July 31 from near 40-year lows earlier this week, with a notable jump during late afternoon trading on July 31.Data from LSEG showed that the US dollar dropped from about 158.9 yen at around 4.14pm EDT (4.14am on Aug 1, Singapore time) to about 157.6 yen just before 5pm EDT – a drop of about 0.8 per cent.Japan may have sold as much as US$58.97 billion to buy yen on July 30, central bank data indicated on July 31, signalling repeated efforts to stem the yen’s weakness. REUTERS