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Excess Asian savings are weighing on global interest rates

Economist Staff Economist

Date Posted:: November 22, 2019
Is Database:: Database

Asian savings have led to large current-account surpluses, averaging $525bn annually over the past five years, slightly higher than pre-2008 levels.

High savings rates in Asia have led to large current-account surpluses, averaging $525bn annually over the past five years, slightly higher than pre-2008 levels. These surpluses, representing about 0.6% of global GDP, are comparable to Europe's surplus economies. Singapore's surplus is notably high at 18% of GDP, with the IMF suggesting increased government spending to reduce precautionary savings. However, demographic shifts in countries like Singapore, China, South Korea, and Taiwan may naturally reduce surpluses as populations age and savings are drawn down. While Asian savings contribute to global financial imbalances, other factors such as America's trade policies and Europe's fiscal challenges also play significant roles.

Economist Staff, "Excess Asian savings are weighing on global interest rates,"Economist, November 23, 2019, https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2019/11/23/excess-asian-savings-are-weighing-on-global-interest-rates

"...There are certainly echoes with 15 years ago. High savings rates in Asia continue to translate into large current-account surpluses. Over the past five years East Asia’s current-account surplus has averaged about $525bn annually, a touch higher in cash terms than the average in the five years preceding the 2008 crisis. The distribution has shifted: China’s surplus peaked a decade ago, while those of South Korea and Taiwan are bigger than they used to be. The current-account surpluses in Asia’s big economies add up to about 0.6% of global gdp, roughly the same as that of Europe’s surplus economies, including Germany’s, in combination.....A broader question is whether Asia should be faulted for its predilection for saving. Take Singapore, which lies at the extreme end with a current-account surplus of 18% of gdp. The imf argues that the country’s external position is “substantially stronger” than warranted by fundamentals. It has called for the government to spend more on infrastructure and on social security, which would help reduce its citizens’ precautionary savings. But Singapore has pushed back against such criticisms. Before the mid-1980s it regularly ran a current-account deficit. Its surplus ballooned as it hit a demographic sweet spot, with lots of workers and few retired people. In the coming years, though, it expects its surplus to narrow as its population gets older. Households will draw down savings and the government will face mounting health-care costs. For China, South Korea and Taiwan, all of which are set to age rapidly, the dynamics are likely to be similar.Economists also continue to question how much blame Asian savers really deserve for the global financial turmoil of 2008. There were plenty of other culprits. They included America’s lax mortgage regulations and Europe’s rash banks, which borrowed heavily and scooped up dangerous debt products. Once again, the West is doing much on its own terms that is alarming enough, from America’s trade wars to Europe’s inability to muster a co-ordinated fiscal response to its economic woes. Surplus savings in Asia are yet another drag on a world suffering from weak demand. But of all the things to worry about, they are not top of the list...."

Economist on the chronic surplus Asian countries (Brad Setser is quoted)

Ed Comment“If China continues to be a surplus exporter to the US but it doesn’t want to buy dollar-denominated assets, then it has to run surpluses with other countries whose currency-denominated assets it wants to buy and hold. In turn, those countries have to run trade surplus with the US. For example, China could loan machinery to Mexico (by financing the purchase of Chinese machinery for pesos). Mexico then runs trade surpluses with the US. If China held pesos, Mexico would take dollar-to-peso conversion risk. Or china could own a Mexican asset directly that generates future peso cash flow (i.e. own equity instead of debt).Except they are beggaring the wages of their workers. I'm not sure we should mind their cheaper wages but for their growing military might, our growing domestic unrest, and the transfer of our IP both illigetimately and legitimately. “

Steve Comment:“Yes in and of itself I agree that is more of a problem for Chinese and German households then for the US Government. But as Pettis's points out those cheaper wages are a function of specific policy choices made by the surplus country to keep their household share low that allow savings to flow to the west. And as you point out in Upside those flows displace our domestic savings and create lower wages/unemployment. Given the resulting "domestic unrest" not sure that trade off is worth it. Perhaps you are correct that the unintended consequences of capital controls (say Buffett's Import certificates, or Pettis's MAC) are to high of a risk; and a disaster if we find ourselves capital constrained. Maybe a new Plaza Accord is needed. Sadly James Baker is likely not long for this world.”

Pettis Comment:"....Asians say their high savings rates and the resulting large trade surpluses have to do with aging populations, but this is nonsense. Their high savings rates are caused mainly by policies that directly or indirectly force households to subsidize manufacturing, some times through weaker currencies but often through repressed interest rates, consumption taxes, downward pressure on wage growth, etc. This is just the modern version of beggar-they-neighbor...."

How To Buy A Trade Surplus

Joseph Gagnon and Nishtha Agrawal Peterson Institute For International Economics

Date Posted:: July 29, 2026
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Using annual data for 146 countries from 1985 – 2024, Gagnon and Agrawal find that a $1 increase in a country’s cyclically adjusted fiscal deficit is associated with a 22–38¢ increase in its current-account deficit, with most of the estimates ~30¢.

Table 1 presents regression results. The evidence strongly suggests that governments can buy current account surpluses. Raising the fiscal balance by $1 tends to raise the current account by $0.30 [Table 1, first row]. Issuing $1 of domestic currency debt to buy foreign-currency assets (foreign exchange intervention) raises the current account anywhere from $0.20 to $1.00, with a value around $0.50 to $0.60 most plausible [Rows 2 though 5]. NOF is Net Official Flows, and NOS is the stock of net official foreign assets. The most powerful policy, as exemplified by Norway and Singapore, is to run a fiscal surplus and invest the proceeds in foreign-currency assets. In that case, $1 buys a current account surplus of around $0.80 or so. The results are supported by annual panel regressions of current accounts and cross-country stock regressions of cumulated current accounts or stocks of net foreign assets. The estimated effects in the panel regressions may be biased down slightly by incomplete modeling of lagged effects.

Honey, Who Shrunk the U.S. Income Surplus?

Matthew Higgins and Thomas Klitgaard Liberty Street Economics

Date Posted:: May 19, 2026
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The US net international investment position worsened by about $16tn between 2019 and 2025, driven by roughly $5.5tn in net inflows and $10tn in valuation losses, as higher rates hit a larger net liability stock, raising interest rate-sensitivity.

Foreign holdings of U.S. financial assets are immense, with official estimates putting their current market value at $69 trillion. U.S. holdings of foreign assets are also impressive but much smaller, at $41 trillion. The shortfall in U.S. foreign assets relative to foreign liabilities has been mounting for decades. Yet U.S. investment income receipts—in profits, dividends, and interest—comfortably exceeded income payments until recently. Payments on U.S. assets owned by foreign investors represent a servicing burden for the U.S. economy. Profits, dividends, and interest payments that would otherwise accrue to domestic investors instead flow abroad. Given the need to sell U.S. assets to finance ongoing trade deficits, this servicing burden seems likely to mount. The related buildup in the U.S. net liability position in interest-bearing assets will also make the income balance more sensitive to swings in interest rates. This increased sensitivity is already in evidence. At present, with the asset-liability gap at -$15 trillion, a 1 percentage point increase in U.S. and foreign interest rates would subtract $150 billion from the U.S. net income balance. (A 1pp fall in rates would result in a similar improvement.) Only five years ago, a 1 percentage point rise in rates would have subtracted $100 billion.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

The $28tn gap between foreign holdings of U.S. assets ($69tn) and U.S. foreign holdings ($41tn) drives mounting income payments abroad.
A 1pp interest rate rise now subtracts $150bn from U.S. net income—50% more than five years ago—as the $15tn net.
Ongoing trade deficits force asset sales to foreign investors, leading to larger servicing burdens and greater exposure to interest rate.

Don't Blame America's Current Account Deficit On the Dollar

Maurice Obstfeld Peterson Institute for International Economics

Date Posted:: April 14, 2026
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Noting the minimal relationship between official liabilities and the CA, Obstfeld argues that the reserve currency role of the dollar is not the cause of the trade deficit. He urges reduction in the US fiscal deficit to increase national saving.

Critics of the dollar's global role have argued that foreign official dollar purchases (labeled US incurrence of official liabilities in the figure) feed one-for-one into US current account deficits. To illustrate the true loose relationship between these two variables, the figure shows both of them over the 2003–25 period, as percentages of GDP. US net incurrence of liabilities to official holders, reported with a minus sign as in standard balance-of-payments methodology, is usually far too small to mirror the US current account deficit. And since roughly 2014, net official financial inflows have fluctuated around zero as the current account deficit has widened. To be sure, the strong international demand for dollars may make the dollar stronger against foreign currencies than it would be otherwise, [but] while they imply a smaller current account balance, they do not necessarily imply a negative balance and certainly not a rising negative balance, especially when foreign dollar reserve holdings have been shrinking relative to global economic activity (as figure 1 also implies). The euro is the world's second reserve currency, yet the euro area has a current account surplus. Britain had surpluses up until World War I despite issuing the world's premier global currency and hosting its leading financial center. Reducing the US fiscal deficit materially and sustainably is the most important US policy prerequisite for global current account rebalancing.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

I cannot generate the requested takeaways because the source material contains no quantitative data, numerical findings, or comparative metrics. The.
To produce compliant takeaways, I would need data such as: current account deficit figures, dollar reserve holdings, asset sale volumes.

Understanding Global Imbalances

IMF Staff International Monetary Fund

Date Posted:: April 7, 2026
Is Database:: Database

As of 2024, the US, China, Germany, and Japan accounted for ~2/3 of total global imbalances (the sum of the absolute value of each economy’s current account deficit and surplus). The US CA deficit is between 0.8 and 1% of world GDP.

Four economies—the US, China, Germany, and Japan—account for roughly two-thirds of global imbalances. The US deficit—equivalent to 4% of GDP as of 2024—has been financed by capital inflows and portfolio investors seeking dollar assets. Germany and Japan’s surpluses have been driven by high saving rates, joined by substantial surpluses in China beginning in the 2000s. Oil-exporting countries’ surpluses fluctuate with commodity prices, creating episodic contributions to global imbalances. In earlier decades, surpluses and deficits were more cyclical: countries moved in and out of surplus depending on business cycles, commodity shocks, and exchange rate movements. While there is no standard definition of persistence, the average duration of a deficit or surplus spell roughly doubled since the 1980s. Persistent surpluses over the past two decades have accumulated into very large net foreign asset positions for economies such as China, Germany, and Japan, with each holding net foreign assets equivalent to 3–3.5% of global GDP in 2024. Similarly, persistent deficits have built up into large net liability positions, most notably in the US where the NIIP stands at about -25% of global GDP in 2024, underscoring the central role of the US position in global balances (Figure 6).

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

Surplus durations have doubled since the 1980s, accumulating massive foreign asset positions for China, Germany, and Japan.
Understanding Global Imbalances.
Germany and Japan’s surpluses have been driven by high saving rates, joined by substantial surpluses in China beginning in the.

China’s Cheap Money Is Shaking $9.5 Trillion Global Loan Market

Bloomberg Staff Bloomberg

Date Posted:: March 5, 2026
Is Database:: Database

China’s savings glut and “monetary easing to counter slowing growth” are manifesting themselves in credit expansion overseas, as bankers seek higher yields than they can get at home amidst deflationary pressure.

Chinese banks, flush with low-cost funds, are reshaping parts of the global loan market, underscoring how deflationary pressures in the world’s second-largest economy are increasingly influencing competition with international lenders. Much like US and European manufacturers who have long complained about being undercut by cheaper Chinese rivals, bankers at global institutions now say they’re facing the financial equivalent: being priced out of some of Asia’s most sought-after borrowers as Chinese lenders extend cheaper credit across borders. Enabled by Beijing’s monetary easing to counter slowing growth, Chinese banks are expanding overseas lending amid weakening domestic credit demand. That edge may prove even more significant as the Iran crisis threatens to upend global energy markets, raising the likelihood that major central banks will hold off easing interest rates amid mounting uncertainty.

Tariffs and "International Payments Problems"

Matt Klein The Overshoot

Date Posted:: March 4, 2026
Is Database:: Database

The worsening of the US net international investment position – from -20% of US GDP in 2010, to -53% pre-pandemic, and to -89% as of the end of 2025Q3 – reflects valuation gains on US stocks relative to stocks in the rest of the world.

Foreigners are accumulating more financial claims on Americans than Americans are accumulating on foreigners across every single category: FDI, stocks, bonds, physical currency, deposits, and loans. Foreign official investors supposedly have been mild sellers of U.S. assets over the past 12 months, but the standard measure does not include state-affiliated institutions that operate on behalf of foreign governments. Meanwhile, the U.S. net international investment position has swung massively over the past few years, from -20% of U.S. GDP in 2010, to -53% of U.S. GDP on the eve of the pandemic to -89% as of the end of 2025Q3. Almost all of that reflects massive valuation gains on U.S. stocks relative to stock markets in the rest of the world. The good news is that actual U.S. indebtedness has not meaningfully increased, and the methods used to assign market values to FDI in the U.S. and abroad make the situation look more extreme than it is. (U.S. FDI assets in Ireland are overwhelmingly big tech and big pharma, for example, but the market value of those assets is imputed based on the performance of the maker of Kerrygold.) The bad news is that, if the current level of the NIIP is unsustainable, the easiest way for it to revert is for U.S. stock prices to fall dramatically.

Asian savings have led to large current-account surpluses, averaging $525bn annually over the past five years, slightly higher than pre-2008 levels.

Using annual data for 146 countries from 1985 – 2024, Gagnon and Agrawal find that a $1 increase in a country’s cyclically adjusted fiscal deficit is associated with a 22–38¢ increase in its current-account deficit, with most of the estimates ~30¢.

Related Articles:

The US net international investment position worsened by about $16tn between 2019 and 2025, driven by roughly $5.5tn in net inflows and $10tn in valuation losses, as higher rates hit a larger net liability stock, raising interest rate-sensitivity.

Is rising interest rates widening America's foreign investment income gap?

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

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Noting the minimal relationship between official liabilities and the CA, Obstfeld argues that the reserve currency role of the dollar is not the cause of the trade deficit. He urges reduction in the US fiscal deficit to increase national saving.

Is the current account deficit driven by dollar demand or asset sales?

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

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As of 2024, the US, China, Germany, and Japan accounted for ~2/3 of total global imbalances (the sum of the absolute value of each economy’s current account deficit and surplus). The US CA deficit is between 0.8 and 1% of world GDP.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

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China’s savings glut and “monetary easing to counter slowing growth” are manifesting themselves in credit expansion overseas, as bankers seek higher yields than they can get at home amidst deflationary pressure.

Related Articles:

The worsening of the US net international investment position – from -20% of US GDP in 2010, to -53% pre-pandemic, and to -89% as of the end of 2025Q3 – reflects valuation gains on US stocks relative to stocks in the rest of the world.

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Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI