* Yen up vs euro, sterling as ECB, BoE seen cutting rates
* U.S., Japanese investors trim overseas assets
By Rika Otsuka
TOKYO, Dec 3 (Reuters) - The yen edged up against the euro and sterling on Wednesday, supported by expectations that central banks in Europe will cut interest rates aggressively later in the week to support their deteriorating economies.
Trading was subdued as investors awaited interest rate decisions from the European Central Bank, the Bank of England and the Reserve Bank of New Zealand on Thursday.
The market expects all of them to slash rates as the global financial crisis continues to take a toll on their economies, while investors believe the Federal Reserve and the Bank of Japan have only limited scope for further cut rates.
"The interest rate outlook for currencies is underpinning the dollar and the yen while keeping higher-yielding currencies under selling pressure," said Tsutomu Soma, senior manager of foreign assets at Okasan Securities.
The dollar slipped 0.2 percent from late U.S. trading on Tuesday to 92.97 yen, hovering near a five-week low of 92.63 yen hit on trading platform EBS the previous day.
The euro fell 0.4 percent to 118.05 yen. Against the dollar, the single European currency eased 0.1 percent to $1.2695.
Sterling slid 0.5 percent to 138.32 yen, crawling towards 13-year lows hit just above 137 yen the previous day.
Japan's central bank said on Tuesday it would expand lending by about 3 trillion yen ($32.2 billion) to help companies tide over a credit squeeze but left rates steady at 0.3 percent at an emergency meeting.
In addition to rate expectations, the dollar and the yen drew some support as investors further trimmed exposure to riskier assets amid little sign of the financial crisis coming to an end.
Traders said U.S. and Japanese investors were likely to sell more overseas assets ahead of the year-end to repatriate funds. (Reporting by Rika Otsuka; Editing by Chris Gallagher)