The USD/JPY pair fluctuates upward toward year-end, but again rebounds at the long-term downtrend line

Ladies and gentlemen, Happy New Year.
I look forward to your continued support this year as well.

The market has entered the new year, but as expected, participants have not fully returned yet, so the real New Year trading will begin from next week.

In December, the USD/JPY pair rose somewhat due to seasonal demand as usual, but toward the end of the year, perhaps due to the unwinding by speculative players or tax considerations
or perhaps as preparation for dollar selling positions anticipated for the next year, in the end the trend ended with a weaker dollar in 2017.

The dollar cross rates have so far formed a clean upward trend, haven't they.
※ For reference, last year's article
Dollar crosses are moving toward dollar weakness, with a dollar-weak market likely to gain momentum from next year.

Now, as for USD/JPY, it has once again bounced off a long-term downtrend line.

I wonder if this year will see a significant trend in the USD/JPY?

Whether up or down is unclear, but 2017's USD/JPY had low volatility, so it is hard to imagine that low volatility continuing based on past markets.

The annual average volatility for USD/JPY is typically 10–15 yen.

In 2017,near 117 high,near 107 low, a range of about 10 yen.

In the early years of Abenomics, 2013,about 22 yen
In the Lehman Shock year, 2008,about 25 yen
the USD/JPY moves.

At minimum, you should estimate about a 15 yen deviation from the current rate.

Currently, around 112 yen for USD/JPY,
with 15 yen up127 yen
with 15 yen down97 yen

I think there is a fairly high possibility that one of these two rates will occur in 2018.

Up or down, no one knows.

No matter how much analysts lay out fundamental grounds to predict, the future cannot be known by anyone.

What we traders can do is adapt to price movements.

We must not forecast and cling to that forecast obsessively.

We would only walk the path to bankruptcy ourselves.