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Really it is about the trend. China couldn't just dump their treasuries (as explained in the article) as they would lose a lot of value that way. So dribbling them out and exchanging them for gold maximizes the value returned. At $20B/month that is a pretty steady pace of a quarter trillion a year.

EDIT: A quarter trillion not billion dollars, thanks.

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I think you meant a quarter trillion?

A trillion here, a trillion there, pretty soon you're talking about real money!

I think you might have meant a quarter trillion.

So true, just 3 decimal orders of magnitude :-). And it would eliminate their holdings in 5 years if they were to stick to it.

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