China increased its holdings of US treasury bonds by 2.3 percent to US$906.8 billion in October, hitting an 11-month high, Shanghai Securities News reported, citing statistics from the US Treasury Department. This is the fourth consecutive month China increased its holdings of US bonds.

Japan and the United Kingdom, the second and third largest holders of US bonds after China, increased US treasury holdings by 1.5 percent and four percent, to reach US$877.4 and US$477.6 billion respectively.

China bought a net 262.5 billion yen (US$3.1 billion) of Japanese bonds in October, including 231.9 billion yen in short-term Japanese debt and 30.6 billion yen in long-term bonds, according to Japan's Ministry of Finance.

China's holdings of South Korean government bonds more than tripled to 6.14 trillion won (US$5.4 billion) as of Nov 30, compared with 1.87 trillion won at the end of 2009. The country increased 556 billion won in South Korean bonds in November.

(chinadaily.com.cn December 17, 2010)