If the Treasury market is robust, as it is now, China might be able to sell its Treasuries without disrupting the market, but it would also then have to sell dollars to diversify into other assets in constructing a portfolio. This might show up in the value of the dollar if not in the bonds.
I wonder how much of that BIS / IMF gold is being diverted to China in private sales in order to allow confidence to remain high in the fiat, and to not disrupt the public markets with large price fluctuations. The US banking system has a significant risk exposure to the gold and silver markets through a few of its banks who are leverage short to the hilt.
This same story prompted Max Keiser to write the following in Game Theory and Gold: Countdown to Meltup
"Soon enough, a G20 nation will announce a full or partial gold backed currency forcing every other country to either reply with their own gold backed currency – or equivalence – or risk 100% capital flight."
Reuters
China should cut U.S. Treasury holdings: economist
by Langi Chiang and Alan Wheatley
BEIJING Sun Jul 18, 2010 9:24pm EDT
(Reuters) - China should cut its holdings of U.S. Treasury securities when market demand is strong, a prominent economist said in remarks published on Monday.
Beijing reduced its Treasury holdings in May by $32.5 billion to $867.7 billion, but it actually bought a net $3 billion in long-term Treasuries and remained the largest single holder of U.S. government debt, the Treasury reported on Friday.
Yu Yongding, a former academic adviser to the central bank and now a professor with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said Beijing should invest in assets denominated in other currencies as well as other financial instruments and real goods.
"Although assets in other currencies and forms are not an ideal replacement for U.S. Treasury bonds, diversification should be a basic principle," Yu wrote in the China Securities Journal.
"When demand for U.S. Treasury securities is strong, it's a rare opportunity for us to gradually pull back. That way, it will not have a big impact on prices and China will not suffer too much," he said.
Zhang Monan, a researcher with the State Information Center, a think tank under the powerful National Development and Reform Commission, told the paper that China should invest more of its $2.5 trillion of foreign exchange reserves, the world's largest stockpile, in hard assets such as gold.
