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China has steadily accumulated U.S. Treasury securities over the last few decades. As of Q3 2022, the Asian nation owns nearly $1 trillion, or about 3.2%, of the $31.1 trillion U.S. national debt at the time. That was more than any other foreign country except Japan. U.S. debt to China comes mainly in the form of U.S. Treasury securities (bonds issued by the federal government).
Some analysts and investors fear China could dump these Treasuries in retaliation and that this weaponization of its holdings would send interest rates higher, potentially hurting economic growth. This article discusses the business behind the continuous Chinese buying of U.S. debt.
Key Takeaways
- China invests heavily in U.S. Treasury bonds to keep its export prices lower.
- China focuses on export-led growth to help generate jobs.
- To keep its export prices low, China must keep its currency—the renminbi (RMB)—low compared to the U.S. dollar.
- U.S. debt to China comes in the form of U.S. Treasuries, largely due to their safety and stability.
- Although there are worries about China selling off U.S. debt, which would hamper economic growth, doing so in large amounts poses risks for China as well, making it unlikely to happen.
Chinese Economics
China is primarily a manufacturing hub and an export-driven economy. Trade data from the U.S. Census Bureau shows that China has been running a big trade surplus with the U.S. since 1985. This means that China sells more goods and services to the U.S. than the U.S. sells to China.
Chinese exporters receive U.S. dollars (USD) for their goods sold to the U.S., but they need renminbi (RMB or yuan) to pay their workers and store money locally. They sell the dollars they receive through exports to get RMB, which increases the USD supply and raises the demand for RMB.
China’s central bank, the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), carried out active interventions to prevent this imbalance between the U.S. dollar and yuan in local markets. It buys the available excess U.S. dollars from the exporters and gives them the required yuan. The PBOC can print yuan as needed. Effectively, this intervention by the PBOC creates a scarcity of U.S. dollars, which keeps the USD rates higher. China hence accumulates USD as forex reserves.
Self-Correcting Currency Flow
International trading which involves two currencies has a self-correcting mechanism. Assume Australia is running a current account deficit (i.e., Australia is importing more than it is exporting, as in scenario 1). The other countries which are sending goods to Australia are getting paid Australian dollars (AUD), so there is a huge supply of AUD in the international market, leading the AUD to depreciate in value against other currencies.
However, this decline in AUD will make Australian exports cheaper and imports costlier. Gradually, Australia will start exporting more and importing less, due to its lower-valued currency. This will ultimately reverse the initial scenario (scenario 1 above). This is the self-correcting mechanism that occurs in the international trade and forex markets regularly, with little or no intervention from any authority.
China’s Need for a Weak Renminbi
China’s strategy is to maintain export-led growth, which aids in generating jobs and enables it, through such continued growth, to keep its large population productively engaged. Since this strategy is dependent on exports (18% of which went to the U.S. in 2021), China requires RMB in order to continue to have a lower currency than the USD, and thus offer cheaper prices.
If the PBOC stops interfering—in the previously described manner—the RMB would self-correct and appreciate in value, thus making Chinese exports costlier. It would lead to a major crisis of unemployment due to the loss of export business.
China wants to keep its goods competitive in the international markets, and that cannot happen if the RMB appreciates. It thus keeps the RMB low compared to the USD using the mechanism that’s been described. However, this leads to a huge pileup of USD as forex reserves for China.
PBOC Strategy and Chinese Inflation
Though other labor-intensive, export-driven countries such as India carry out similar measures, they do so only to a limited extent. One of the major challenges resulting from the approach that’s been outlined is that it leads to high inflation.
China has tight, state-dominated control over its economy and is able to manage inflation through other measures like subsidies and price controls. Other countries don’t have such a high level of control and have to give in to the market pressures of a free or partially free economy.
China’s Use of USD Reserves
China has approximately $3 trillion in total foreign exchange reserves as of Q3 2022. Like the U.S., it also exports to other regions like Europe. The euro forms the second biggest tranche of Chinese forex reserves. China needs to invest in such huge stockpiles to earn at least the risk-free rate. With trillions of U.S. dollars, China has found the U.S. Treasury securities to offer the safest investment destination for Chinese forex reserves. With euro stockpiles, China can consider investing in European debt. Possibly, even U.S. dollar stockpiles can be invested to obtain comparatively better returns from euro debt.
However, China acknowledges that the stability and safety of investment take priority over everything else. Though the Eurozone has been in existence for about two decades now, it still remains unstable. It is not even certain whether the Eurozone (and Euro) will continue to exist in the mid-to-long term. An asset swap (U.S. debt to Euro debt) is thus not recommended, especially in cases where the other asset is considered riskier.
Other asset classes like real estate, stocks, and other countries’ treasuries are far riskier compared to U.S. debt. Forex reserve money is not spare cash to be gambled away in risky securities for want of higher returns.
Another option for China is to use the dollars elsewhere. For example, the dollars can be used to pay Middle East countries for oil supplies. However, those countries too will need to invest the dollars they receive. Effectively, owing to the acceptance of the dollar as the international trade currency, any dollar supply eventually resides in the forex reserve of a nation, or in the safest investment—U.S. Treasury securities.
U.S. Debt to China and the Trade Deficit
One more reason for China to continuously buy U.S. Treasuries is the gigantic size of the U.S. trade deficit with China. The monthly deficit is around $37 billion, and with that large amount of money involved, Treasuries are probably the best available option for China. Buying U.S. Treasuries enhances China’s money supply and creditworthiness. Selling or swapping such Treasuries would reverse these advantages.
Impact of China Buying U.S. Debt
U.S. debt offers the safest heaven for Chinese forex reserves, which effectively means that China offers loans to the U.S. so that the U.S. can keep buying the goods China produces.
Hence, as long as China continues to have an export-driven economy with a huge trade surplus with the U.S., it will keep piling up U.S. dollars and U.S. debt. Chinese loans to the U.S., through the purchase of U.S. debt, enable the U.S. to buy Chinese products. It’s a win-win situation for both nations, with both benefiting mutually. China gets a huge market for its products, and the U.S. benefits from the economical prices of Chinese goods. Beyond their well-known political rivalry, both nations (willingly or unwillingly) are locked in a state of inter-dependency from which both benefit, and which is likely to continue.
The U.S. national debt as of October, 2022, stands at over $31.1 trillion.
USD as a Reserve Currency
Effectively, China is buying the present-day reserve currency. Until the 19th century, gold was the global standard for reserves. It was replaced by the British pound sterling. Today, U.S. Treasuries are considered virtually the safest.
Apart from the long history of the use of gold by multiple nations, history also provides instances where many countries had huge reserves of pounds sterling (GBP) in the post-World War II era. These countries did not intend to spend their GBP reserves or to invest in the U.K. but were retaining the pounds sterling purely as safe reserves.
When those reserves were sold off, however, the U.K. faced a currency crisis. Its economy deteriorated due to the excess supply of its currency, leading to high-interest rates. Will the same happen to the U.S. if China decides to offload its U.S. debt holdings?
It’s worth noting that the prevailing economic system after the WW-II era required the U.K. to maintain a fixed exchange rate. Due to those restraints and the absence of a flexible exchange rate system, the selling off of the GBP reserves by other countries caused severe economic consequences for the U.K.
Since the U.S. dollar has a variable exchange rate, however, any sale by any nation holding huge U.S. debt or dollar reserves will trigger the adjustment of the trade balance at the international level. The offloaded U.S. reserves by China will either end up with another nation or will return back to the U.S.
Repercussions
The repercussions for China of such an offloading would be worse. An excess supply of U.S. dollars would lead to a decline in USD rates, making RMB valuations higher. It would increase the cost of Chinese products, making them lose their competitive price advantage. China may not be willing to do that, as it makes little economic sense.
If China (or any other nation having a trade surplus with the U.S.) stops buying U.S. Treasuries or even starts dumping its U.S. forex reserves, its trade surplus would become a trade deficit—something which no export-oriented economy would want, as they would be worse off as a result.
The ongoing worries about China’s increased holding of U.S. Treasuries or the fear of Beijing dumping them are uncalled for. Even if such a thing were to happen, the dollars and debt securities would not vanish. They would reach other vaults.
U.S. Debt to China: Risk Perspective for America
Although this ongoing activity has led to China becoming a creditor to the U.S., the situation for the U.S. may not be that bad. Considering the consequences that China would suffer from selling off its U.S. reserves, China (or any other nation) will likely refrain from such actions.
Even if China were to proceed with the selling of these reserves, the U.S., being a free economy, can print any amount of dollars as needed. It can also take other measures like quantitative easing (QE). Although printing dollars would reduce the value of its currency, thereby increasing inflation, it would actually work in favor of U.S. debt. Real repayment value will fall proportionately to inflation—something good for the debtor (U.S.), but bad for the creditor (China).
Although the U.S. budget deficit has been rising, the risk of the U.S. defaulting on its debt practically remains nil (unless a political decision to do so is made). Effectively, the U.S. may not need China to continuously purchase its debt; rather China needs the U.S. more, to ensure its continued economic prosperity.
U.S. Debt to China: Risk Perspective for China
China, on the other hand, needs to be concerned about loaning money to a nation that also has the limitless authority to print it in any amount. High inflation in the U.S. would have adverse effects on China, as the real repayment value to China would be reduced in the case of high inflation in the U.S.
Willingly or unwillingly, China will have to continue to purchase U.S. debt to ensure price competitiveness for its exports at the international level.
Is China Increasing or Decreasing Its U.S. Treasuries Holdings?
China’s holdings of U.S. Treasuries peaked between 2012-2013, with a value of over $1.3 trillion. Since then, its size has been slowly declining. It dipped below $1 trillion in mid-2022 for the first time since 2010. As of Q3 2022, it stands just below $1 trillion at around $980 billion.
Is China the Largest Foreign Holder of U.S. Debt?
No, China is currently the second-largest holder of U.S. Treasuries, behind Japan (which holds around $1.2 trillion as of Q3 2022).
Why Does China Buy U.S. Treasuries?
There are several good reasons that China buys U.S. Treasuries. First, Treasuries are among the world’s safest assets, making them secure and stable. Second, the U.S. dollar remains the world’s reserve currency in international trade, so it allows the Chinese central bank to effectively hold dollar-denominated assets. China pegs its currency to the dollar, so it needs such assets as a way to maintain the peg.
Most importantly, though, is that China receives a surplus of U.S. dollars due to the trade imbalance between the two countries, where China exports more to the U.S. than imports. But, Chinese companies and their workers need to be paid in local currency, the yuan (or renminbi). As a result, the Chinese banking system must convert dollars with the central bank, which must then do something with them. The central bank then uses those dollars to purchase Treasuries, which earn a stable return.
What Would Happen If China Sold All of Its Treasuries?
First, it is unlikely that China would sell its U.S. Treasuries all at once, because this would be economically painful for China and leave it holding dollars that it would need to spend or invest elsewhere.
The most immediate effect would be an increase in interest rates on Treasuries, since selling so many at once would artificially depress their prices in the bond market – thus increasing their yields. If the Fed were not to react at all to such an event, it is estimated that it would increase long-term Treasury yields by 30 to 60 basis points.
The Bottom Line
Geopolitical realities and economic dependencies often lead to interesting situations in the global arena. China’s continuous purchase of U.S. debt is one such interesting scenario. It continues to raise concerns about the U.S. becoming a net debtor nation, susceptible to the demands of a creditor nation. The reality, however, is not as bleak as it may seem, for this type of economic arrangement is actually a win-win for both nations.