* Yen tumbles as rising stocks, weak data weigh
* Dollar hits more than three-week high above 99 yen
* Euro rises vs dollar, but gains limited ahead of ECB
(Updates prices; adds details, comments, changes byline)
By Wanfeng Zhou
NEW YORK, March 31 (Reuters) - The U.S. dollar rose to a
more than three-week high versus the yen on Tuesday as gains in
stock markets worldwide and weak economic data out of Japan
dampened safe-haven flows into the Japanese currency.
The yen, which advanced a day earlier as risk aversion and
year-end pressure prompted Japanese investors to bring money
home, reversed course as traders closed the books on the fiscal
year.
"It seems yesterday's (stock market) sell-off was quite
short-lived and investors are once again loading up on riskier
assets and currencies," said Robert Blake, senior currency
strategist at State Street Global Markets in Boston.
A spike in Japanese unemployment also put pressure on the
currency, analysts said. For details, see []
The dollar rose to as much as 99.36 yen <JPY=>, the highest
level since early March, according to Reuters data. It was last
up 2 percent at 99.21 yen, putting it on track for a 9.5
percent gain in the first three months of the year, the yen's
worst quarter since 2001.
Ahead of a closely watched G20 meeting in London on
Thursday, data showed the global financial crisis has
devastated Japanese exports and led to a sharp economic
contraction in the fourth quarter, leaving Prime Minister Taro
Aso's government vulnerable to collapse.
"Fiscal year-end had been holding people back from selling
yen. But the fundamentals are absolutely horrendous, there's
policy gridlock, and this lets Japanese investors continue to
invest money abroad in droves," said Samarjit Shankar, global
FX strategy director at The Bank of New York-Mellon in Boston.
Wall Street clawed back some losses in the previous session
caused by bankruptcy fears for General Motors <GM.N> and
Chrysler.
The euro also jumped 2.3 percent to 131.42 yen <EURJPY=>,
off Monday's two-month low beneath 127 yen. It rose a modest
0.3 percent to $1.3244 <EUR=>, and was on track for a loss of
5.2 percent this quarter.
Gains in the euro were limited as investors awaited the
European Central Bank policy meeting on Thursday.
"There's a lot of uncertainty about what the outcome of
that might be and how it will affect the euro, maybe limiting
flows into the euro today," Blake said.
The ECB is expected to cut rates half a percentage point to
1 percent and possibly signal plans for some form of
unconventional policy such as buying bonds to boost the money
supply. []
(Additional reporting by Steven C. Johnson; Editing by Andrea
Ricci))
