Brad Setser ✓

@Brad_Setser · joined 20 May 2016

CFR senior fellow. Views are my own. Writes on sovereign debt, trade, fx reserves and capital flows.

157 379Followers

1 072Following

90 456Posts total

99.8KViews on collected posts

Against accounts of the same size

20 posts from the last 90 days, next to the 100K–1M follower range. below its peers on both reach and engagement.

Median views2 867this account6 178median for 100K–1M

Reach, %1.82%this account2.63%median for 100K–1M

Engagement, %0.79%this account1.40%median for 100K–1M

Metric	This account	Median for 100K–1M	Ratio
Median views per post	2 867	6 178	0.46×
Reach (views ÷ followers)	1.82%	2.63%	0.69×
Engagement rate	0.79%	1.40%	0.56×

Others in this range → Compare with another account → How these benchmarks are built →

Growth & engagement

How the posts we collected actually performed: views and reaction rate post by post, what the audience did with them, and where the follower count goes.

Views per post

1.8K3 Sep

1.7K

1.8K

1.6K

1.6K

2.3K

618

3.2K

2.9K

5.9K

11.9K

6.8K

11K4 Sep

7.4K

Last 14 collected posts, oldest on the left. The scale is logarithmic: one post can outrun the rest a hundred times over.

Engagement rate per post

1.19%3 Sep

0.80%

1.19%

0.81%

0.93%

1.03%

0.16%

0.69%

0.53%

0.05%

0.02%

0.22%

0.66%4 Sep

0.73%

Reactions — likes, reposts, replies and quotes — divided by views. Median for 100K–1M accounts is 1.40%.

What the audience does

Likes68.3%581 in total

Reposts10.8%92 in total

Replies4.2%36 in total

Quotes1.6%14 in total

Bookmarks15.0%128 in total

Share of every reaction we collected for this account. Replies mean argument, reposts mean endorsement, bookmarks mean the post was worth keeping.

The follower curve appears once this account has two daily snapshots — we take one a day, and this one is on its first.

Latest posts

A lot of big US companies .... Don't pay much tax in the United States. Several reporting paying more abroad than to the U.S. Treasury. A new blog with @Mike_Weilandt https://t.co/d7538CZTNq 7.4K views · 42 likes · 6 reposts · 6 replies 04 Sep 2026 Korea's current account surplus running at close to $500b annual rate. Trailing 12m sum is close to $300b and still heading up 1/3 https://t.co/Pq9LLoKEae 11K views · 58 likes · 5 reposts · 8 replies 04 Sep 2026 Important to understand what is in the manufacturing data -- last spring the deficit was inflated by pharma front running. not de stockpiling is reducing pharma imports and my trailing 3m sum of manufactures suggests the deficit is rising again (on AI demand) https://t.co/z2 6.8K views · 11 likes · 3 reposts · 0 replies 03 Sep 2026 🛑🇰🇷 South Korea July current account (not seasonally adjusted) USD 42.08 bln, prior USD 49.7304 bln. 11.9K views · 0 likes · 0 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 Much interesting data below. But despite the AI-related import boom & early tariff front-running he IDs, ytd the total US trade deficit & the goods deficit are below 2024 (Biden pre-Trump 2.0 tariff) levels. And manufacturing's is down 7.09% this year y/y ytd. That's f 5.9K views · 2 likes · 0 reposts · 0 replies 03 Sep 2026 And for those interested, here are the latest simple (tariffs collected/ imports) effective tariff rates for various major trading partners. This is before the latest tit for tat with Canada 11/11 https://t.co/NgRiSN5IX6 2.9K views · 14 likes · 1 reposts · 0 replies 03 Sep 2026 And the boom in electronics imports is so big that it is pulling in imports from China too (doesn't hurt that tariffs were down to 10% for goods not on the legacy 301 lists). Total imports from Asia are now massive 10/ https://t.co/g6mGkzaoju 3.2K views · 18 likes · 3 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 @Brad_Setser @Brad_Setser The July release makes the case broader. The deficit widened 24.4% as imports rose 2.8% and exports fell 2.1%. Both sides of the ledger moved against compression, though the headline balance cannot separate resilient demand from tariff front-running. 618 views · 0 likes · 0 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 If Trump's second term trade policy was really driven by his old belief that a bilateral deficit was a symbol of losing, we would be fighting a trade war with Mexico right now -- and not one with Canada ... 9/ https://t.co/DJbveih3io 2.3K views · 18 likes · 4 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 This shows up in the bilateral numbers too, if you know where to look -- imports from ASEAN and Vietnam are way up. WAY UP. So are imports from Mexico (that is computers not cars ... ). While imports from the EU (pharma) are down 8/ https://t.co/PM4bH9KbkF 1.6K views · 13 likes · 1 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 Capital goods imports (basically all computers, other categories are weak) are up $600b since the end of 24 -- about 2 pp of GDP (trailing 3m sums annualized) That is to be expected if a country with a 6 pp of GDP budget deficit has a debt financed investment boom ... 7/ 1.6K views · 12 likes · 0 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 And there is no secret as to why -- the US is importing a ton of expensive computers (with very expensive Korean/ Taiwanese chips) to kit out a lot of data centers. Other import categories actually remain quite weak 6/ https://t.co/ylbDNW3niO 1.8K views · 18 likes · 2 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 July of course jumps out, but the trailing 3m sums show import growth far exceeding export growth ... 5/ https://t.co/Kh1M07B0pP 1.7K views · 11 likes · 1 reposts · 2 replies 03 Sep 2026 And it stems in part from the fact that the gold distortion that held down the deficit earlier in 2026 has faded (pharma imports tho are still quite low, more on that later) 4/ https://t.co/Kk3Bmqc4CL 1.8K views · 18 likes · 2 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 I don't think the big deficit in July in an outlier, it is a continuation of the trend that started in May ... 3/ https://t.co/lmosEarzq4 1.9K views · 19 likes · 5 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 In Trumpian terms, we are losing like we have never lost before - so much losing in fact. 100s of billions of dollars are flowing out of the United States (in other words, a record trade deficit outside the period of tariff front running; sign reversed in the chart) 2/ https: 2.9K views · 41 likes · 7 reposts · 3 replies 03 Sep 2026 In the battle between standard macroeconomics and the Trump administration, standard macroeconomics is winning. The US trade deficit exploded in July, on the back of surging US imports ... 1/ https://t.co/yXirKCBSTb 15.5K views · 139 likes · 36 reposts · 4 replies 03 Sep 2026 @Brad_Setser The BOK release credits banks' FX deposits at the central bank. That's a borrowed line, not owned reserves - it can walk. The stock rose $14.33bn to $442.28bn, a four-year high but still $27bn under the Oct 2021 peak, and short of the $20bn flow. 516 views · 2 likes · 1 reposts · 1 replies 03 Sep 2026 Great scoop from Reuters h/t @Richard_Casey 2/2 https://t.co/LqZOAciD8i 3.7K views · 26 likes · 2 reposts · 0 replies 03 Sep 2026 Well, we now know why Korea's reserves jumped in August! $20b of the Hynix US listing was bought by Korea's government ... 1/2 https://t.co/Cj7OFmg57W 14.8K views · 119 likes · 13 reposts · 3 replies 03 Sep 2026

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