Japan had around $1.31 trillion USD worth of US Treasury securities as of Sep 2022. Making Japan the top country in the list of US debt to foreign countries


US debt to foreign countries ( Foreign investors in American government bonds )

The Federal Reserve and U.S. Department of the Treasury estimate that as of May 2022, foreign nations had 7.42 trillion dollars’ worth of U.S. treasury securities. Japan and the Mainland own the majority of the 7.42 trillion controlled by foreign nations. China had the largest holdings. China possessed U.S. securities worth $980.8 billion. Japan possessed assets of 1.21 trillion dollars. Oil-exporting nations and Caribbean banking hubs were among the other foreign holders.

U.S. Public debt

The entire public national debt of the United States was 28.43 trillion dollars in 2021. This sum has been gradually increasing, especially after 2008. The total interest paid on debt held by the American public in 2021 was 392 billion dollars, with intragovernmental debt holdings accounting for 183 billion dollars of the total. In 2021, the U.S. government spent a total of 6.82 trillion dollars. Spending will be 7.05 trillion USD by 2027.

US debt to foreign countries No. 2 is it’s biggest rival , China

Because it holds a sizable portion of the U.S. government’s debt, China attracts a lot of attention. Considering how quickly its economy had grown in recent decades, perhaps this shouldn’t be shocking. As of Sep 2022, China ranked second among foreign holders of US debt, after Japan, with $1 trillion in Treasury holdings.

Even though Chinese debt is usually used as a political talking point, investing in Treasury bonds by an export-oriented economy is not particularly nefarious. In actuality, Treasuries make sense as an investment for a nation with substantial foreign exchange reserves. Currently, China owns around 13.79% of American foreign debt.

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