> America was in practice running an empire that collected tribute from the rest of planet earth in exchange for entries in a database denominated in a currency they controlled and that was accepted everywhere. Really the only way it could go wrong is putting it under the control of someone who doesn't understand the kayfabe...
The U.S. was growing at the same rate or faster as the UK from 1830 to 1930, when the UK had an empire and the U.S. didn’t. Then, in the second half of the 20th century when the U.S. had an empire and the UK didn’t, the growth rates were more or less the same in both places in the long run trend (ignoring the UK’s step change hit from WWII).
There are other backers to that as well. The main ones being oil trades being settled largely in USD and the need to acquire USD to pay for US goods/services. It's not all military might there's a lot of economic might in there too.
This is the important point. Oil was settled in dollars. The world is rapidly moving away from oil. China is 1/3rd of global manufacturing capacity. If you're leaving oil behind, and buying solar, batteries, and EVs from China, your need for dollars declines, and need for yuan goes up.
This is nonsense. The rest of the world holds 9.7 Trillion in Treasuries and this amount increased by $500 billion over the last year.
So the opposite of this article is true. You can get all the data from the Z.1 release.
Please don't take these types of flame bait articles seriously or try to spin up an entire world view based on them as you will end up not only directionally wrong, but believe in the exact opposite of reality.
FYI, that $500B increase in treasury holdings is not the whole picture, there are also the agencies (housing mortage backed securities guaranteed by the govt) and foreign holdings of those also increased by $70 billion over the last year, and are about 1.5 Trillion.
You are using the wrong metric. The supply of t-bills is increasing rapidly because of the massive deficit. That is sufficient to explain the increased number of holdings.
The correct metric is price. If there is decreased demand, it will show up in the yield. And it does.
Institutional investors are very slow to adapt, so I wouldn't take their continued investment as a positive signal. The sentiment shift is real, and a lot of goodwill has been spent.
It's basically divide and conquer on a national scale tearing down the democratic world police and the democratic systems it supported.
The point is that the entire article is wrong, factually.
In terms of institutional investors and sentiment, I think you are fundamentally not understanding why the rest of the world holds US debt, it is to support running trade surpluses. That is a core economic need of much of the world, and as long as there is that need, you will see foreign government accumulation of dollar denominated assets.
For some reason people either refuse to understand simple balance of payment accounting constraints or they are deeply offended by them, and want to live in a world in which moral outrage determines things like global capital flows.
But we do not live in that world. The reason why the rest of the world accumulated a trillion of dollar denominated assets last year, split roughly 50/50 between private and public, is solely because China needed to run a trillion dollar trade surplus. And next year it will also need to run an even bigger surplus. That forces everything else.
Yep. The flow has to balance out somehow. If the US buys more then it sells (all in, including services, which trump ignores for no clear reason) the sellers have to end up owning USD denominated assets.
There are an excess of dollars floating around internationally and only so many ‘risk free’ dollar-denominated assets. US Treasuries will continue to be purchased. There are plenty of buyers who are obligated to buy risk-free assets and US Treasuries are the vehicle of choice.
The article couldn't be less true. Treasuries are the deepest and most liquid market by far. Foreign CBs hold them so that they can liquidate them when it becomes hard to find dollars. Why else do foreign CBs want to constantly open up swap lines to us when they are hurting?
I think the more interesting story is the long-term decline in the quality of virtually all sovereign debt. Many things are anchored to the assumption that high-quality sovereign debt is widely available.
I was dismissive when I saw the title, but they have real statistics: foreign holdings are at 2012 levels while total treasuries outstanding are 3x larger.
Holdings have increased by $500 billion over the last year. Why cherry pick 2012? Because that was in the aftermath of QE from the great recession and foreign holdings of treasuries were enormous as they rotated out of US private debt and sought the safety of treasuries. Today it is risk on, relatively speaking.
These go up and down based on cash management needs and portfolio allocation choices between public and private debt, and so you can pick one year when cash management needs were high or appetite for riskier were low. And then count on people being dupes, LOL.
The trouble is the US never paid down the debt for those years, they just rolled it over and incurred new debt. If foreign holdings decrease further, it doesn't matter if it is simply for cash management reasons -- the US will be rolling over historic debt at historic interest rates.
By paying down the debt, you mean issuing less debt over time? The US government is not an uncle that pays off his debt so he can retire and move to Florida. An individual does that, but the household sector as a whole does not pay down debt, because for every uncle moving to Florida, there is an Aunt borrowing for a new house. So instead, we talk about things like sectoral debt ratios and do not use language like "when will people in Maine finally pay down debt, I'm sick of seeing people in Maine owing debt".
The government is a sector of the economy. You can argue that we are borrowing too much, and I would agree, but you are not gonna fix that until you address the foreign capital inflows. That means rolling back the investor rights agreements. As long as foreign nations can print money and use it to buy dollars in order to stimulate their exports, the US is going to have a problem with excessive debt loads.
treasuries are the same as cash. All that means is there is still too much USD Money supply from QE and rates will continue to go higher to reduce the supply.
The issue (real issue?) is that it’s unclear whether these governments reduced their holdings or switched them to these opaque structures (tether can be considered one). The idea is, it would be hard for the US to untangle true ownership. I wonder if UBO was getting undone blue or red because it’s a real threat for such a system but the US needs this “second” lifeline.
Yes, that's called Quantitative Easing after the Global Financial Crisis. The peak in the graph was 2008 after which the US issues a shit ton of debt which was bought by the Fed. China used to be the biggest holder of US Treasuries but now it's the Federal Reserve and Japan.
But the idea that you look at that graph as say it's "unappetizing" is dumb. Most foreign governments besides China have INCREASED their UST holdings. The only reason why the % is dropping is because of the massive amount bought by the Fed which messed up the %.
Basically the article linked above is dumb, and they either are stupid and don't understand what they're talking about or trying to cast a false narrative
China also has not gone down, they are merely shifting their ownership structures. China accumulated over a trillion in dollar denominated assets last year, but rumors are the big players have been Chinese regional banks. It's a byzantine mess of hidden ownership structures over there.
If true, this would change the narrative. But I wouldn’t base anything on rumors. China is also rapidly building its supply of bullion and is attempting to shift trade away from the USD, so it would make sense for it to be drawing down on USD reserves. (Not that it will ever eliminate those reserves completely.)
It doesn't matter whether it is Chinese regional banks, or SAFE, or any other instrument. Brad Setzer tries to do a heroic job decoding this stuff at his CFR blog (https://www.cfr.org/blogs/follow-the-money) but at the end of the day, all that matters is total foreign holdings of dollar denominated assets - that measures their exposure to the dollar.
Everything else is portfolio allocation choices between treasuries or agencies or BAA corporates or AAA corporates, there are so many different instruments to invest in, you can shift your holdings back and forth however you like, all while keeping your dollar exposure exactly the same. And you can set up a fund in the Caymans and hold your assets there. And China does all of that. So really it is all fungible once you are in the "foreign ownership" bucket.
Your point about dollar exposure is true, we just have limited insight into foreign private ownership, as the article points out. If nations are using these vehicles to conceal their dollar exposure (or for some other purpose that results in the same effect), then we will have trouble understanding the functioning of the global economy and the risks present in the system. That seems important.
Also, equities and treasuries are not equivalent. If foreign holdings are moving to equities over treasuries, the added risk will be a serious problem in a crisis. It could also be a sign that some nations are being “encouraged” to prop up equity markets, which is a rumor that I’ve come across.
Exactly. Same as when Bessent wanted to buy 6B in long bonds but only bought 5.XB, people said that it failed but anyone who understands knows that it's the opposite. The oversubscription rate is normally 3X or more but this time it was 2X which means that people would rather keep their long bonds, which shows confidence in them.
I've been hesitant to talk about this too much, because it's such a bad joke, but personally I'm waging a War On Acronyms (WOA). They really don't save much time or effort, but make communication much more opaque. They can be a way of in-group signaling, which just makes it harder for newcomers / outsiders to come up to speed. And so many collisions.
I thought so.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exorbitant_privilege
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47635834 covers this succinctly:
> America was in practice running an empire that collected tribute from the rest of planet earth in exchange for entries in a database denominated in a currency they controlled and that was accepted everywhere. Really the only way it could go wrong is putting it under the control of someone who doesn't understand the kayfabe...
from
Gold overtakes U.S. Treasuries as the largest foreign reserve asset - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47635056 - April 2026 (250 comments)
The U.S. was growing at the same rate or faster as the UK from 1830 to 1930, when the UK had an empire and the U.S. didn’t. Then, in the second half of the 20th century when the U.S. had an empire and the UK didn’t, the growth rates were more or less the same in both places in the long run trend (ignoring the UK’s step change hit from WWII).
The the war on Iran (and many years of war on terror) showed we have anything but
China Adds Currencies to Central Clearing in Yuan's Global Push - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49736124 - September 2026
So the opposite of this article is true. You can get all the data from the Z.1 release.
Please don't take these types of flame bait articles seriously or try to spin up an entire world view based on them as you will end up not only directionally wrong, but believe in the exact opposite of reality.
FYI, that $500B increase in treasury holdings is not the whole picture, there are also the agencies (housing mortage backed securities guaranteed by the govt) and foreign holdings of those also increased by $70 billion over the last year, and are about 1.5 Trillion.
The correct metric is price. If there is decreased demand, it will show up in the yield. And it does.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VBex8zbDRs
It's basically divide and conquer on a national scale tearing down the democratic world police and the democratic systems it supported.
In terms of institutional investors and sentiment, I think you are fundamentally not understanding why the rest of the world holds US debt, it is to support running trade surpluses. That is a core economic need of much of the world, and as long as there is that need, you will see foreign government accumulation of dollar denominated assets.
For some reason people either refuse to understand simple balance of payment accounting constraints or they are deeply offended by them, and want to live in a world in which moral outrage determines things like global capital flows.
But we do not live in that world. The reason why the rest of the world accumulated a trillion of dollar denominated assets last year, split roughly 50/50 between private and public, is solely because China needed to run a trillion dollar trade surplus. And next year it will also need to run an even bigger surplus. That forces everything else.
The headline specifically refers to central bank and government holdings.
These go up and down based on cash management needs and portfolio allocation choices between public and private debt, and so you can pick one year when cash management needs were high or appetite for riskier were low. And then count on people being dupes, LOL.
The government is a sector of the economy. You can argue that we are borrowing too much, and I would agree, but you are not gonna fix that until you address the foreign capital inflows. That means rolling back the investor rights agreements. As long as foreign nations can print money and use it to buy dollars in order to stimulate their exports, the US is going to have a problem with excessive debt loads.
They are bracing us for Taiwan situation where a standoff will probably lead to China making an aggressive financial move.
Cheers :)
1. print money
2. suppress wages by shipping in cheap labor
3. reassure the population you arent doing the above
But the idea that you look at that graph as say it's "unappetizing" is dumb. Most foreign governments besides China have INCREASED their UST holdings. The only reason why the % is dropping is because of the massive amount bought by the Fed which messed up the %.
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/foreign-treasury-...
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/foreign-treasury-...
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/foreign-treasury-...
Only China has gone down:
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/foreign-treasury-...
I stand corrected about Japan it looks like they've been flat over the last 10+ YEARS
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/foreign-treasury-...
Basically the article linked above is dumb, and they either are stupid and don't understand what they're talking about or trying to cast a false narrative
Everything else is portfolio allocation choices between treasuries or agencies or BAA corporates or AAA corporates, there are so many different instruments to invest in, you can shift your holdings back and forth however you like, all while keeping your dollar exposure exactly the same. And you can set up a fund in the Caymans and hold your assets there. And China does all of that. So really it is all fungible once you are in the "foreign ownership" bucket.
Also, equities and treasuries are not equivalent. If foreign holdings are moving to equities over treasuries, the added risk will be a serious problem in a crisis. It could also be a sign that some nations are being “encouraged” to prop up equity markets, which is a rumor that I’ve come across.
If so, those constituencies are immune to facts and common sense.