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Sylvia Ma

While US Treasuries remain at the centre of a global bond sell-off despite efforts by US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to calm the market, investors in China are rushing to buy domestic government debt.
After China’s Ministry of Finance issued a fresh batch of savings bonds worth up to 55 billion yuan (US$8.2 billion) on Thursday, domestic buyers took to social media to share tips on how to secure them and voice frustration at how quickly the allocations had run out.
“Those government bonds went so fast,” one user wrote on China’s popular lifestyle social media platform RedNote on Thursday.
“I even set an alarm specifically to get them, but they were completely sold out within two minutes. The speed caught me by surprise.”
Another user shared a screenshot showing the bonds had sold out within just five minutes of their launch, commenting: “The savings bonds were gone in seconds. Who am I competing with to get them?”
The buying frenzy also spilled over into bank branches. The state-run Shanghai Securities News reported on Thursday that a Bank of China outlet had sold out of its three- and five-year savings bonds by about 10am amid long queues.
Cliff Zhao, chief economist at CCB International in Hong Kong, noted that several overlapping factors were driving the demand.
He cited declining bank deposit rates, which have made savings bonds more attractive; a shortage of alternative investments offering safe and predictable returns; and a broader shift among households towards wealth preservation and securing a steady income stream.
This strong domestic appetite contrasts sharply with conditions in major developed bond markets, as the sell-off in US Treasuries ripples through global markets. Yields on sovereign debt have climbed amid persistent anxiety over US fiscal sustainability and persistent inflation, with the 30-year US Treasury yield reaching its highest level since 2007 and the 10-year yield nearing 5 per cent.
Yields continued to rise even after the US Treasury Department said on Wednesday it would buy back up to US$6 billion of long-dated debt – a move widely seen as an effort to support the market and ease pressure on longer-term yields.
Against this backdrop of global market strain, Zhao offered a measured assessment of the potential role of Chinese government debt in international portfolios. “As volatility in US Treasuries increases, Chinese government bonds can offer diversification benefits in global portfolios, but they should not be directly compared with US Treasuries,” he said.
Zhao explained that while US Treasuries remained a core global reserve asset backed by deeper liquidity and a wide range of investment instruments, Chinese government bonds faced structural hurdles. In the near term, he said, currency-hedging costs and lower secondary-market liquidity would limit their role to supplementary assets rather than a direct substitute for US government bonds.
Despite these constraints, data released by the People’s Bank of China’s Shanghai branch last month showed that overseas institutions held 2.02 trillion yuan (US$301 billion) in government bonds at the end of July, marking a third consecutive monthly increase.


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From social media tips to long queues at banks, buyers in China are rushing to secure government debt amid a global sell-off of US Treasuries


From social media tips to long queues at banks, buyers in China are rushing to secure government debt amid a global sell-off of US Treasuries.


Chinese investors snap up government bonds amid global market jitters over US Treasuries

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}From social media tips to long queues at banks, buyers in China are rushing to secure government debt amid a global sell-off of US Treasuries

From social media tips to long queues at banks, buyers in China are rushing to secure government debt amid a global sell-off of US Treasuries