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WASHINGTON: Japan looked relaxed at a meeting of world's top financial officials on Sunday as Tokyo saw eye-to-eye with Washington on currencies.

"Japan and the U.S. are basically satisfied with the current exchange rate movements ... There wasn't much need to talk about it," a senior Japanese official said, adding "We were rather relaxed this time."

This was in contrast to the situation a year ago when the dollar reached a post-World War II low of 79.75 yen that threatened to choke off Japanese exports as the relatively strong yen made them prohibitively expensive.

Last April, finance ministers and central bankers from the United States, Japan, Canada, France, Italy, Britain and Germany called for an orderly reversal in the dollar's slide. The yen now trades around 107 to the dollar.

In the runup to today's meeting of G7 economic policymakers, Japan and the United States were in marked accord on their currency stance.

Japan's Finance Minister Wataru Kubo met briefly with U.S. Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin ahead of the G7 talks and later told reporters: "Rubin and I didn't spend much time discussing currencies. We have agreed that both nations will continue to cooperate closely on currencies."

Rubin and Kubo welcomed currency moves since the last G7 meeting in Paris this January and also those since the meeting last April, a finance ministry official said.

This was also what was agreed to at the G7 meeting.-Reuter