The government can prepare a 500 billion yen supplementary budget for fiscal 1999 by mid-July if everything goes well, Vice Finance Minister Koji Tanami said Monday.

But Tanami did not specify how an extra budget would be funded, saying it remains unclear.

The package, unveiled Friday, is aimed at tackling the nation's unprecedented unemployment rate and reviving the competitiveness of Japanese companies.

On the yen's recent movements, Tanami admitted that monetary authorities stepped in earlier in the day to curb the yen's rise against the U.S. dollar and reiterated authorities' readiness to do so again.