Japanese private institutions sold more than 20 billion US dollars of foreign bonds in two weeks, setting a record high in nearly twenty years.

The preliminary data released by Japan's Ministry of Finance shows:

In the week ended April 4, Japanese private institutions sold $17.5 billion worth of long-term foreign bonds.

In the following week, they sold another $3.6 billion. The total sales of more than $20 billion over two weeks were the largest since records began in 2005.

Nomura's senior interest rate strategist analyzed that a large part of the selling may be U.S. Treasury or U.S. agency bonds. The selling could be due to Japanese pension funds rebalancing their asset allocation or banks and life insurance companies reducing interest rate risk.

Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/1830143361579210/

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