Despite rosy depictions, by the U.S. mainstream media, of the Vice President of China’s visit to the United States, things are not warm and fuzzy!

Vice President Xi Jinping, recently restated demands from China, that the United States end economic restrictions against China: “It is very important when addressing the China-U.S. trade imbalance that the United States adjusts its economic policies and structure, including removing various restrictions on exports to China, in particular, (and) easing controls on civilian high-tech exports to China as soon as possible.”

China’s restatement of such demands comes as reports revealed that China dumped another $3.19 billion in U.S. Treasury bonds, back in December 2011.

In total, for all of 2011 China sold off $59.4 billion in U.S. Treasuries.  But China still holds a lot of U.S. bonds; $1.10 trillion as of December 2011.

This means China has a lot of room to maneuver, when it comes to monetary action.  Some analysts say China is dumping U.S. bonds in order to provide cash to help the European economy, and because the U.S. dollar just isn’t a safe haven anymore: “The overall movement away from the U.S. dollar indicates that people are not looking for a ‘safe haven’ as much as they were in late 2011, when the markets globally fell hard on concerns about the situation in Europe. The Chinese are boosting their purchases of European and other bonds because of the need to help stabilize those economies around the world that are major markets for Chinese goods [this also indicates that the U.S. is no longer a major market for the Chinese].”-David Riedel, Riedel Research Group