Friday, July 18, 2008

Fannie, Freddie and USA Inc..owes foreigners big time..

This is from the Telegraph in the USA.
Fortunately for the U.S. most of these countries also profit from selling goods to the U.S. and certainly do not want to see the U.S. economy collapse. However, the US dollar does seem to be losing some of its influence and many foreign investors may decide to hold more of other currencies and invest in other countries.


Roughly $1.5 trillion of Fannie and Freddie AAA-rated debt - as well as other US "government-sponsored enterprises" - is now in foreign hands. The great unknown is whether foreign patience will snap as losses mount and the dollar slides.Hiroshi Watanabe, Japan's chief regulator, rattled the markets yesterday when he urged Japanese banks and life insurance companies to treat US agency debt with caution. The two sets of institutions hold an estimated $56bn of these bonds. Mitsubishi UFJ holds $3bn. Nippon Life has $2.5bn.But the lion's share is held by the central banks of China, Russia and petro-powers. These countries could all too easily precipitate a run on the dollar in the current climate and bring the United States to its knees, should they decide that it is in their strategic interest to do so.

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