China is Selling US Gov. Debt

Chinese holdings of US government debt fell to a ten-month low in December.

According to the US treasury department, US government debt held by China – the largest offshore holder globally – fell by $18.4 billion to $1.25 trillion in December, leaving the holdings of bills, notes and bonds largely unchanged from the levels of a year earlier.

The tweet below from ANZ’s senior interest rate strategist Martin Whetton reveals the movements in US debt holdings by individual nation in December.

Chinese foreign debt holdings – fell by an even larger $22 billion, suggesting that the official reduction through direct Chinese selling may have been substantially larger than the $18.4 billion figure recorded.

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