Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told the House Financial Services Committee that recent Treasury auctions ranked among the two most successful in 20 years, pointing to strong foreign demand for US bonds and stocks. Foreign holdings of Treasuries have reached $9.3 trillion as the 10-year yield climbs above 5%, its highest level since 2007.
Scott Bessent walked into the House Financial Services Committee on September 15 with a simple message: the rest of the world wants to own American assets, and the receipts back him up. The Treasury Secretary told lawmakers that recent Treasury auctions ranked among the two most successful in the past two decades, framing the result as proof that global confidence in US financial stability is accelerating.
Foreign holdings climb past $9 trillion
Foreign holdings of US Treasuries now sit at roughly $9.3 trillion, representing about 30-32% of all publicly held debt, even as the national debt itself crossed the $40 trillion threshold earlier this year. But the bond market is only part of the story. Bessent highlighted that foreign investors have been pouring into US equities at an average rate of 2.8% of GDP through June 2026. By comparison, foreign inflows into Treasuries ran at about 2% over the same period.
As a result, the yield picture has shifted too. The 10-year Treasury yield has climbed above 5%, its highest level since 2007. The 30-year yield pushed to 5.32% over the same stretch. Bessent described the US bond market as the strongest performer among developed economies under the current administration.
Why the capital keeps arriving
Bessent attributed the inflows to a combination of regulatory certainty, tax policy, trade frameworks, and energy stability, arguing that predictable policy environments attract long-term capital. The dollar itself continues to play a central role: Bessent pointed to rising volumes of dollar-denominated transactions globally as evidence that the greenback's reserve currency status remains firmly intact. This comes despite well-documented efforts by countries like Russia and China to reduce their dollar reserves over the past several years.
What higher yields mean next
For bond portfolios, a 10-year yield above 5% is generous by recent historical standards, but locking in that rate only makes sense if yields have stopped climbing. With the national debt above $40 trillion and no serious deficit reduction plan on the horizon, the supply of new Treasuries is not slowing down anytime soon. Bessent's broader point, stripped of the political framing, is that capital flows are a revealed preference: countries can talk about diversifying away from the US, yet the money keeps moving in the opposite direction.
Source: Crypto Briefing
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