The Coming Week Could Be Critical for the Dollar

 

There are a lot of conflicting forces expected to impact currency markets this week. The first was the meeting of oil-producing nations in Doha that analysts believe ended in failure. Beforehand, there was talk of a production cut that would have supported oil prices. Instead, there was no agreement and oil prices fell immediately. If oil weakness holds, the dollar should strengthen reflexively. Amazingly, however, that may not be the largest story of the week.

There is a rumor that China is planning to move on the dollar on the 19th, supported by Russia. There have been similar rumors with date-certain outcomes that came and went without incident. This one could be similar.

China Dumps Record $143 Billion In US Treasurys In Three Months Via Belgium

 

When the latest Treasury International Capital data was released yesterday, many were quick to conclude that not only had China’s selling of US Treasury ceased, but that with the addition of $7 billion in US government paper, China’s latest total holdings of $1270.3 billion were the highest since May of 2014. And if one was merely looking at the “China” line item in the major foreign holders table, that would be correct.

However, as we have shown before, when looking at China’s Treasury holdings, one also has to add the “Belgian” Treasuries, which is where China had been anonymously engaging in a record buying spree via the local Euroclear, starting in late 2013, which however concluded with a bang in early 2015.

China Sold Second-Largest Amount Ever Of US Treasurys In December: And Guess Who Comes To The Rescue

Combine this with Bank of America’s warning that “the US Dollar is in trouble” and you can see that the cliff America is heading towards without brakes isn’t too far away.

While we will have more to say about the disastrous December TIC data shortly, which was released early today, and which showed a dramatic plunge in foreign purchases of US securities in December – the month when the S&P soared to all time highs and when everyone was panicking about the 3% barrier in the 10 Year being breached and resulting in a selloff in Tsy paper – one thing stands out. The chart below shows holdings of Chinese Treasurys (pending revision of course, as the Treasury department is quite fond of ajdusting this data series with annual regularity): in a nutshell, Chinese Treasury holdings plunged by the most in two years, after China offloaded some $48 billion in paper, bringing its total to only $1268.9 billion, down from $1316.7 billion, and back to a level last seen in March 2013!