Carney's Checkmate: How Canada's Quiet Bond Play Forced Trump to Drop Tariffs

[In It to Win It]

https://deanblundell.substack.com/p/carneys-checkmate-how-canadas-quiet

Let’s talk about the moment Donald Trump blinked. It wasn’t loud. It wasn’t a tweetstorm or a rally rant. When the tariff threats that had the world on edge—125% on China, 25% on Canada’s autos, a global trade war in the making—suddenly softened. A “pause,” he called it. A complete turnaround from the chest-thumping of the past week. And the reason? Mark Carney and a slow, deliberate financial maneuver that most people didn’t even notice: the coordinated Treasury bond slow bleed.

This wasn’t about bravado. It was about leverage. Cold, calculated, and devastatingly effective.

Trump’s pause wasn’t because people were getting yippy…

Rewind a bit. While Trump was gearing up his trade war machine, Carney, Canada’s Prime Minister, wasn’t just sitting in Ottawa twiddling his thumbs. He’d been quietly increasing Canada’s holdings of U.S. Treasury bonds—over $350 billion worth by early 2025, part of the $8.53 trillion foreign countries hold in U.S. debt. On the surface, it looked like a safe play, a hedge against economic chaos. But it wasn’t just defense. It was a loaded gun.

Carney didn’t stop there. He took his case to Europe. Not for photo ops, but for closed-door meetings with the EU’s heavy hitters—Germany, France, the Netherlands. Japan was in the room too, listening closely. The pitch was simple: if Trump went too far with tariffs, Canada wouldn’t just retaliate with duties on American cars or steel. It would start offloading those Treasury bonds. Not a fire sale—nothing so crude. A slow, steady bleed. A signal to the markets that the U.S. dollar’s perch wasn’t so secure.

[Meowmee]

1. My brother said yesterday or Th I think US bonds are still being sold by other countries.

[Hornedfrog2000]

2. Countries know that they own his ass now

All he did was show how to make him bend over. Expect other countries to do the same.

[BoRaGard]

3. White men in ties with constipated asses and faces (R)

Sad.

[yellowcanine]

4. China could do this also. We are fucked.

Trump has screwed the pooch with these tariffs and the real long term damage is just starting. All so Trump could play “Let’s Make a Deal” with world leaders.

[GusBob]

5. A couple of things

Now the word gets out on this
1. How does Trump cover his ass without pissing off his new overlords? Lies or insults won’t work
2. Love how they are doing this behind the scenes and not on social media

[Hugin]

6. Easily missed by the Trumpanzees who militantly argue that the only measure of the US economy needed...

Is the market tickers on the bottom of their Fox News screens.

Someone correct me if I am mistaken, US Treasuries are also a manifestation of the so-called national debt.