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S&P 500 down slightly in early trading

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U.S. dollar up against the yen, at 38-year high

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Investors on alert for yen intervention

(Updates to 10:50 a.m. ET)

By Caroline Valetkevitch

NEW YORK, June 26 (Reuters) -

The dollar hit a fresh 38-year high against the Japanese yen

on Wednesday, with investor speculation high that Japanese

authorities could intervene to strengthen the currency, while

global stock indexes were mostly lower.

Japan's

top currency

diplomat, Masato Kanda, said Japanese authorities were

"seriously concerned and on high alert" about the yen's rapid

decline.

In April, a fall to 160.245 per dollar was enough to prompt

Tokyo to spend roughly 9.8 trillion yen to support the yen.

The latest slide follows the Bank of Japan's (BOJ) decision

this month to hold off on reducing bond-buying stimulus until

its July meeting.

The dollar was last up 0.6% at 160.62 yen.

The dollar index, which measures the greenback

against a basket of currencies, gained 0.27% to 105.95, with the

euro down 0.21% at $1.0689.

On Wall Street

, the Dow and S&P 500 eased as the Nasdaq gained.

Artificial intelligence

chip leader

Nvidia ( NVDA ) was down slightly. A sell-off in the

previous session wiped $430 billion off its market value.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 128.53 points,

or 0.33%, to 38,981.88, the S&P 500 lost 10.58 points, or

0.19%, to 5,458.72 and the Nasdaq Composite gained 24.56

points, or 0.13%, to 17,740.55.

MSCI's gauge of stocks across the globe

fell 1.82 points, or 0.23%, to 801.95. The STOXX 600

index fell 0.55%.

Investors are looking for clues on how soon the Federal

Reserve could begin to cut interest rates.

Fed officials have urged patience on interest rate cuts. Fed

Governor Michelle Bowman has reiterated her view that holding

the policy rate steady "for some time" would probably be enough

to bring inflation under control.

Investors await Friday's release of the U.S. personal

consumption expenditures (PCE) price index, the Fed's preferred

inflation measure, with economists polled by Reuters expecting

the annual growth to ease to 2.6% in May.

U.S. Treasury yields rose amid a pick up in inflation in

other countries.

On Wednesday, Australia consumer inflation accelerated

to a six-month high in May.

The yield on benchmark U.S. 10-year notes

rose 7.4 basis points to 4.312%, from 4.238% late on Tuesday.

U.S. crude lost 0.4% to $80.49 a barrel and Brent

fell to $84.78 per barrel, down 0.27% on the day.

(Additional reporting by Samuel Indyk and Ankur Banerjee;

Editing by Shri Navaratnam, Himani Sarkar, Alex Richardson and

Gareth Jones)