At the beginning of 2024, the US Treasury Department released a report that shocked the world because it revealed a staggering fact: the total US national debt has reached an unprecedented $34 trillion, a record high, and five years ahead of the expected $34 trillion in 2029.
What does it mean that the U.S. national debt has exceeded $34 trillion? This figure means that the U.S. has exceeded the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling. The so-called debt ceiling is a "red line" set by the U.S. Congress for the federal government to borrow money, and once this red line is reached, the U.S. Treasury Department's borrowing authority will be exhausted, and the government will face the risk of default. Just as a cup full of water can't hold any more, the U.S. government can't continue borrowing under the debt ceiling unless Congress raises it.
So what is the concept of a $34 trillion U.S. debt? The total population of the United States is 340 million, and on average, every American is burdened with a debt of $100,000. If you are asked to repay $1,000 per month per household in the United States, it will take 22 years to pay it off.
Therefore, it is appalling that the United States owes such a huge debt.
Despite such a huge debt, the U.S. government has not stopped borrowing. The Biden administration also plans to borrow another $1 trillion by the end of March 2024. Year after year, the United States has increased its debt by 1 trillion and 1 trillion yuan, and has run one "red light warning" after another.
In order to get out of the debt crisis, the US government has plundered the wealth of other countries by any means, like cutting leeks without mercy. They mainly resorted to the following methods: manipulating interest rates, manipulating exchange rate fluctuations, using monetary policy to stir up the US stock market, and printing large amounts of dollars to cause them to depreciate.
The United States uses such shameless means to frantically harvest the wealth of other countries, making the credibility of the dollar worse and worse. Many countries have woken up and have expressed their desire to "de-dollarize". As a result, many countries continue to sell US debt.
As a wise eastern power, China has long been prepared for this situation. Since 2017, China has gradually shown an apathy to U.S. bonds and gradually reduced its holdings.
And in 2023, this trend is becoming more and more obvious, as if it is a major reform of China's US debt. In 2023, China has sold off U.S. bonds for seven consecutive months, and now holds $776.4 billion in U.S. bonds, the lowest in 14 years. Compared with the peak of $1.32 trillion in 2013, China has sold a whopping $550 billion of US bonds, a rate as high as 40%.
Not only China, but also European countries are throwing out US debt, which makes the United States face a serious debt crisis.
However, after China threw out 550 billion U.S. bonds, it unexpectedly forced out the receiver behind it. While China is selling US bonds, Japan and the United Kingdom are increasing their holdings. Especially in Japan, China threw out, and Japan increased its holdings, and in October last year alone, Japan increased its holdings of 11.8 billion U.S. bonds. So far, Japan has held 1.1 trillion U.S. bonds, surpassing China to become the largest creditor of the United States.
After the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, Russia also frantically sold US bonds, and now there are almost no US bonds left in Russia. When Japan revealed its identity as the behind-the-scenes operator, Russia also expressed its expected attitude, bluntly saying that it had long expected that Japan had been secretly supporting the United States.
Of course, Japan also wants to sell a large amount of US debt, but Japan is not at all able able to be its own master economically, politically.
After World War II, Japanese Emperor Hirohito was willing to let Japan become a puppet of the United States in order to survive in the world. With the support of the United States, Japan not only did not have to pay reparations, but its economy also developed rapidly, and its GDP once surpassed that of the United States.
At this time, the U.S. fiscal deficit was growing sharply, and in order to improve its fiscal situation, the U.S. forced Japan to sign the Plaza Accord, and reaped Japan's wealth by dwindling the dollar and appreciating the yen. Japan's GDP was $4.45 trillion in 1992 and $4.3 trillion in 2022. It can be seen that the harvest of Japan's wealth by the United States has directly set the Japanese economy back by 30 years.
As a puppet of the United States, Japan's fate can only be at the mercy of others, and it is destined to become the receiver of US debt. The hegemony of the dollar wantonly harvests the wealth of other countries, and more and more countries are waking up and deciding to "de-dollarize". As China's prestige in the world grows, the day when "the renminbi replaces the dollar" will also be just around the corner.