> Already the BOJ has begun to run out of eligible bonds to buy - or swap really - for reserves at the central bank. Ben Bernanke noted in late 2016 that “…cons

> Already the BOJ has begun to run out of eligible bonds to buy - or swap really - for reserves at the central bank. Ben Bernanke noted in late 2016 that “…constraints on the availability of JGBs [Japanese Government Bonds] were seen in many quarters as limiting the BOJ’s ability to maintain its easy policies beyond the next year or two.” Japan is very close to purchasing all of the outstanding JGBs - at which point it will not be able to continue its QE program. Japan has truly been the pioneer here. Its stock market went supernova first. It experienced deflation first. It implemented QE first. At each stage, Japan showed the rest of the world how this descent from free markets into something else works. Japan was also the first industrialized country to realize the vast potential of direct stock purchases by the central bank. Today, the BOJ is a major shareholder of Japanese stocks: > The BOJ held over 28 trillion yen ($250 billion) in exchange-traded funds as of the end of March [2019] -- 4.7% of the total market capitalization of the first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange. > ... > The BOJ has likely also become the top shareholder in 23 companies, including Nidec, Fanuc and Omron, through its ETF holdings. It was among the top 10 for 49.7% of all Tokyo-listed enterprises at the end of March. https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Markets/Bank-of-Japan-to-be-top-shareholder-of-Japan-stocks https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Markets/Bank-of-Japan-to-be... There's always money in the banana stand.