Saudi Arabia and the UAE lead the Arab world, while Iraq continues to decline… Latest US bond data
Saudi Arabia and the UAE lead the Arab world, while Iraq continues to decline… Latest US bond data
2026-09-19
Shafaq News – Baghdad / Washington
The latest data from the US Treasury Department for July 2026 showed that Saudi Arabia and the UAE were the only two Arab countries on the list of major holders of US Treasury bonds, while Iraq was absent from the list.
According to data from the US Treasury, which was reviewed by Shafaq News Agency, Saudi Arabia’s holdings of Treasury bonds amounted to $142.4 billion in July 2026, compared to $142.5 billion in June, while the UAE’s holdings amounted to $110.1 billion, compared to $114.8 billion in the previous month.
Saudi Arabia came in seventeenth place on the list, and the UAE in nineteenth place, while Japan topped the list with holdings of $1.1039 trillion, followed by the United Kingdom with $998.3 billion, and then China with $618 billion.
Foreign holdings of U.S. Treasury securities totaled $9.2481 trillion in July 2026.
Iraq last appeared in a list of the top 40 countries holding US bonds in December 2022, when its holdings amounted to about $40.8 billion, distributed between long-term and short-term US bonds and securities.
Since then, Iraq has not appeared in the tables of the largest holders of US bonds, including data published up to the end of 2025, and then the most recent data from July 2026.
Tables of major bondholders show that the countries listed at the bottom of the list have holdings of approximately $30 billion or more during that period, which means that Iraq’s absence indicates either that Iraq withdrew money from US bonds, or reduced its holdings to less than $30 billion and thus fell below the holding level that qualifies it to appear on the list of the largest bondholders.
shafaq.com
