China is quietly building a rival to the US bond market, which is bad news for the dollar and good for gold.

• China just raised a record amount in euro bonds aimed at European pension funds and insurers — the same buyers who usually buy US government debt.
• Demand was huge: China asked for 5 billion euros and got orders for nearly 30 billion, letting it borrow cheaply.
• Beijing is dumping the dollar — it has stopped adding US bonds, fearing they could be frozen like Russia's were, and is loading up on gold instead.
• The US is pushing oil producers like Iran, Venezuela, and Russia to keep pricing oil in dollars, a sign Washington is worried about losing dollar dominance.
• China's central bank and ordinary savers are both buying gold, draining it from Western vaults to the East.

Outlook: Expect China to keep issuing dollar and euro bonds to pull money away from US Treasuries while steadily buying more gold.