TIC update for December 2018. Given what happened in that particular month, yeah, this seems about right:
Here’s the same thing smoothed out on a 6-month basis. Plus an added reminder.
Just to refresh:
That’s a shame because TIC will tell you so much more about the global economy and the changes taking place within it than the Establishment Survey and unemployment rate could ever hope to… To begin with, very few seem to know what the data is actually telling us. Foreigners are selling their holdings of US government debt (agency paper is heavily represented, too) again, which means, what? Some say it becomes an element in the US-China trade war, others about how especially Russia (who doesn’t have many left) is leading the world to de-dollarize.
Most commentary frames it as a choice. It isn’t…
The problem, due to Economics, is that no one knows how to read these numbers. That’s not surprising; the discipline refuses to recognize offshore money so it stands to reason Economists therefore those in the media would have so much trouble interpreting what goes into, and comes out of, offshore monetary places. It’s just one of life’s little quirks how the Treasury Department puts this report together in spite of that.
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