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Re:Tether is now the 17th largest holder of US debt by buyucu on Wednesday October 29, 2025 @11:29AM (#45748151)
The bigger news here is that China is rapidly winding down its holdings of US debt. This is very bad for America. We'll see American standards of living decline without the Chinese financing American extravagance.
Re:Tether is now the 17th largest holder of US debt by kolanos on Wednesday October 29, 2025 @11:45AM (#45748412)
China currently only holds about 2% of U.S. debt. What is the risk exactly?
Re:Tether is now the 17th largest holder of US debt by pixl97 on Wednesday October 29, 2025 @11:34AM (#45748230)
Which will cause great unrest in the US and further allow authoritarian takeover. Fun times.
Re:Tether is now the 17th largest holder of US debt by delabay on Wednesday October 29, 2025 @11:42AM (#45748362)
Stablecoins offer a relentless price insensitive buyer of US debt. This is good for America, good for democracy, and good for property rights globally.

However, stablecoins WILL cause unrest in Nigeria, Venezuela, Lebanon, and Turkey as their corrupt local currency completely erodes and the ruling class can no longer extract from their citizens.

Re:Tether is now the 17th largest holder of US debt by vlovich123 on Wednesday October 29, 2025 @12:03PM (#45748704)
That sounds like a perpetual motion machine that the US can get addicted to and then come apart once stable coins suddenly become price sensitive.
Re:Tether is now the 17th largest holder of US debt by delabay on Wednesday October 29, 2025 @12:04PM (#45748728)
Or, an alternative, and hear me out, maybe this could also be called "an economy"
Re:Tether is now the 17th largest holder of US debt by daveguy on Wednesday October 29, 2025 @12:20PM (#45749004)
Confidence in crypto will go poof when there's a big enough run that the measly 7 transactions per second can't keep up with demand. We just haven't seen a crypto bank run yet. The $100 / transaction is nothing compared to what it could be. When that happens "stable" coins will lose their stability and the smoke and mirrors behind audit-free coins will collapse. You couldn't pay me to hold crypto.
Re:Tether is now the 17th largest holder of US debt by strictnein on Wednesday October 29, 2025 @12:23PM (#45749039)
Japan holds more US debt than China. The UK has also surpassed China.

China had $776.5B a year ago and has $730.7B now, a roughly 5% drop. They don't seem to "rapidly winding down", unless there's some additional data I'm missing.

Look at the other holders. Belgium and Luxembourg combined have more US debt than China.

If the goal was to crash the US economy by selling their small amount of debt (which likely isn't possible for them to do, despite the rhetoric, they have less than 2% of the total debt), they would also significantly impact of all the countries listed here, which would make them very unpopular indeed:

https://ticdata.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-cent...