China likely bought more European sovereign debt in the first four months of the year than it did U.S. dollar assets, in what Standard Chartered said appears to be a concerted effort to diversify away from the greenback.

Of the nearly $200 billion worth of foreign-exchange reserves China accumulated in the January-April period, it likely channeled $150 billion into non-U.S. assets, the bank said in a research note.

“China is diversifying away from the U.S. assets at the margin, buying proportionally less U.S. paper with its new foreign-exchange reserves,” said Standard Chartered economist Stephen Green in Shanghai. -(MarketWatch)