Tuesday, April 8, 2014

When Foreign Countries Buy U.S. Treasury Bonds



When the U.S. has a trade deficit, that is, it buys more from overseas than it sells, it has to settle accounts. Foreigners don’t eat our dollars, but they can buy U.S. Treasury bonds with them. Fortunately, they have taken them though the bonds are not necessarily an investment bargain.

Foreign central banks now own over one-third of Treasury bonds. Only about one-quarter is held by individuals and investing institutions. Much will be employed in the future as margin backing for trading derivatives und regulatory law.

Unfortunately, those bonds pay very little and keep losing purchasing power. Our problem is, there may be a time when foreigners no longer will accept what is referred to as dollar convertibility, or world recognition as a standard of value. (See the Earl J. Weinreb NewsHole® comments and @BusinessNewshole at Twitter.)
   

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