Thanks for the kind words.

The Fed publishes two flow of funds tables regarding “Rest of the World” investment in the United States: Table F.107 (flows) and Table L.107 (levels).

These figures are revised from time to time, so what appears in, say, data for 2007 may subsequently be revised in future flow of funds releases.

The “level” table shows the total amount of investment or liability with respect to the “Rest of the World”.

The “flows” table shows the difference between level tables for each item from one period to the next. However, flow data is usually “annualized” and otherwise adjusted. For example, differences in levels between two quarters might multiplied by four to present an “annualized” value.

Because of these periodic restatements and readjustments, it is not always easy to reconcile figures that may have been derived from different Z.1 Releases.

The definitions for the different line items can be found on the Fed website here: http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/fofguide.pdf

For greater detail, you can order the Flow of Fund Guide from the Fed for $20.

The Fed flow accounts only show balances (levels) or flows (differences between levels). They do not show actual transaction volumes. For example, if in a particular period, foreigners had bought $10 billion in equities and sold $10 billion in equities, the flow figure would be zero — the same as if they had bought $100 billion and sold $100 billion.

If you want to know how much of a particular type of financial asset is held by foreigners (or any other group), go the the asset-type level table and see how much is held by each sector (households, rest of the world, etc).

There is more information on reading and interpreting flow of funds accounts in the tutorials on this site: http://capital-flow-analysis.com/investment-resources/tutorials.html

Regards,