The FT News Briefing is supported by Equinole, the UK's energy partner.

Learn more at equinole.co.uk

Good morning from the Financial Times.

Today is Wednesday, December 21st, and this is your FT News Briefing.

Japan Central Bank finally cabed and markets trembled.

A group of FTX customers is trying to get to the front of the line for refunds,

and the FT's Tom Wilson looks back on a dramatic year in energy markets.

I mean, there in this chapter would really be called Russia, wouldn't it?

I'm Jess Smith, in from ArcFilippino, and here's the news you need to start your day.

The Bank of Japan rattled markets with a surprising shift in monetary policy.

Japan's central bankers had long stuck to an ultra-luse policy,

and they refused to join other central banks in raising interest rates.

But yesterday, B.O.J. officials, led by Governor Haruhiko Karota,

said they'll allow 10-year bond yields to fluctuate by half a percent

instead of a quarter of a percent.

The FT's Jennifer Hughes says Japan's move amplified the hawkish message that markets have been hearing.

It's likely it was a sort of hold my beer competition among the

biggest central bankers in the world.

Last Wednesday, we had the Fed's Jerome Powell sort of stressing that we still have a long way

to go before regaining price stability.

Then the next day, Christine Lagarde from the ECB, the European Central Bank,

kind of did her hold my beer moment as she was even more hawkish.

...