China keeps buying U.S. Treasuries

I had expected that China wouldn't buy as much U.S. treasuries in November 2012 because they bought a lot of gold (62 tonnes or $3.2 billion). But they did increase their U.S. treasuries by $200 million to $1.17 trillion.

Though, I think that China hasn't bought a lot of treasuries in December 2012 as yields were rising that month. But no worries, Japan is going to buy all the leftovers from China. Japan is almost overtaking China with its $1.133 trillion in U.S. treasuries, supposedly to devalue the yen to increase exports.

Chart 1: China U.S. treasury holdings