Foreign central banks and governments have sharply reduced Treasury holdings to $3.77 trillion in July, down from 34% of marketable Treasuries in 2012 to just 12.8% in July—the lowest share since 1993. Meanwhile, opaque foreign financial centers now hold substantial Treasury amounts, including US hedge funds in the Cayman Islands and US companies with entities in Ireland. Japan notably shed $135 billion in Treasury holdings from February through July to finance yen-support currency interventions.
Hedge funds purchased U.S. tech stocks at the fastest pace since mid-2025, with semiconductor and semicap companies leading net long additions. This buying spree explains September gains in stocks like INTC, BE, and NBIS, though the timing coincided with an essay release that may have caused incorrect repricing of AI infrastructure and capex growth in a supply-tight computing environment.