WASHINGTON, Aug. 17 (Xinhua) -- China once again became the United States' biggest creditor, with its holdings of U.S. government debt increasing 44 billion U.S. dollars to 1.15 trillion dollars in June, according to Treasury Department figures released Wednesday.
Japan had held the position of Uncle Sam's largest creditor for the past eight months, but it sold 21 billion dollars in U.S. bonds in June.
The Treasury Department has ranked China as the biggest foreign creditor to the United Stats for the majority of the past nine years.
The change came as U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday directed U.S. trade representative Robert Lighthizer to examine China's intellectual property practices, despite worries about potential harms to China-U.S. trade ties.
Experts say the debt relationship has bound the world's two largest economies closely together.
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