China Is Buying Up Record Chunks of Japan’s Debt Mountain

  • Lower global yields, asset swaps may be drivers: JPMorgan
  • China has been rotating out of U.S. Treasuries for months
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China went on a record-buying spree of Japanese bonds over the summer months, snapping up $20.9 billion of the low-yielding debt to spur talk that it’s diversifying reserves.

The 2.2 trillion yen of purchases, made in June to August, are a record in local currency terms for a three-month period based on data from Japan’s Ministry of Finance going back to 2005. The last time Chinese buyers had gone on a similar splurge was back in 2016.