A member of China's monetary policy committee says the country's foreign-exchange reserves are like a slab of meat on the block in the US. Those choice words reflect fear that US quantitative easing will lead to a falling dollar and higher inflation, chopping the value of China's $3.3 trillion stash.

That doesn't seem to have stopped China from making a record addition to its dollar reserves in January. Data from the US Treasury shows China added $51.3bn to its dollar holdings, mainly in the form of Treasury notes and bonds. That tops a previous record of $36.9bn in May 2008, when global imbalances were at their pre-crisis peak.