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About 40% of our debt is owned by the Federal Reserve. That number is increasing every year. China has been dumping our bonds as fast as they can. Our bonds ar

About 40% of our debt is owned by the Federal Reserve. That number is increasing every year. China has been dumping our bonds as fast as they can. Our bonds are cheap because we can offload them onto the Fed.

MR4D 5y ago
According to the US Treasury, the Chinese are not dumping bonds at all. [0] [1] Side-note: The Chinese have to own treasuries because the US buys so much stuff from them. If they hurt the US currency relative to their own, then Chinese goods would become more expensive for Americans, and the US would buy less. That would not be good for an economy like China's that has a trade surplus with the US in the range of hundreds of billions of dollars per year. [2] [0] - https://ticdata.treasury.gov/Publish/mfh.txt https://ticdata.treasury.gov/Publish/mfh.txt [1] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-15/china-s-holdings-of-u-s-treasuries-hit-highest-since-july-2019 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-15/china-s-h... [2] - https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/china-mongolia-taiwan/peoples-republic-china https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/china-mongolia-taiwan/peo...
throw0101a 5y ago
> About 40% of our debt is owned by the Federal Reserve. AFAICT: * US federal debt held by Fed Reserve Banks: $5.6T * US debt held by foreign and international investors: 7T * Debt held by private private investors: 17T See, which while having a "2018" URL, has an up-to-date embedded graph: * https://fredblog.stlouisfed.org/2018/04/whos-buying-treasuries/ https://fredblog.stlouisfed.org/2018/04/whos-buying-treasuri... 17+7+5.6=29.6. 5.6/29.6 = 19%. > That number is increasing every year. It was rising up to 2014, then held fairly steady between 2014 and 2018, and then started decreasing until the drama of 2020 kicked in: * https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TREAST https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TREAST

MR4D 5y ago

According to the US Treasury, the Chinese are not dumping bonds at all. [0] [1] Side-note: The Chinese have to own treasuries because the US buys so much stuff from them. If they hurt the US currency relative to their own, then Chinese goods would become more expensive for Americans, and the US would buy less. That would not be good for an economy like China's that has a trade surplus with the US in the range of hundreds of billions of dollars per year. [2] [0] - https://ticdata.treasury.gov/Publish/mfh.txt https://ticdata.treasury.gov/Publish/mfh.txt [1] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-15/china-s-holdings-of-u-s-treasuries-hit-highest-since-july-2019 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-15/china-s-h... [2] - https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/china-mongolia-taiwan/peoples-republic-china https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/china-mongolia-taiwan/peo...

throw0101a 5y ago

> About 40% of our debt is owned by the Federal Reserve. AFAICT: * US federal debt held by Fed Reserve Banks: $5.6T * US debt held by foreign and international investors: 7T * Debt held by private private investors: 17T See, which while having a "2018" URL, has an up-to-date embedded graph: * https://fredblog.stlouisfed.org/2018/04/whos-buying-treasuries/ https://fredblog.stlouisfed.org/2018/04/whos-buying-treasuri... 17+7+5.6=29.6. 5.6/29.6 = 19%. > That number is increasing every year. It was rising up to 2014, then held fairly steady between 2014 and 2018, and then started decreasing until the drama of 2020 kicked in: * https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TREAST https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TREAST