[Analysis: U.S. Expands Treasury Buyback Program, Market Questions Its Ability to Ease Fiscal Pressure] Odaily Planet Daily News – The U.S. Treasury Department announced that it will repurchase up to $6 billion in longer-term government bonds on Thursday, marking the first such operation since Treasury Secretary Bessent expanded the buyback program. The move aims to curb the recent rise in borrowing costs. The upper limit of this buyback is three times the $2 billion initially disclosed to investors in early August. The original plan was canceled in an unexpected announcement on August 19, when the Treasury stated it would "at least double" the scale of such operations. Following the announcement, 20- to 30-year U.S. Treasury bonds, which are the target of Thursday's buyback, continued to decline. The yield on 30-year Treasuries briefly rose to 5.38% during the session, nearing the early October high of approximately 5.40%, the highest level since 2007. In response to external criticism that the move amounts to market intervention and fails to address fundamental fiscal challenges, Bessent defended the expansion of the Treasury buyback program, arguing that action was necessary because he believed market prices were "deviating" from equilibrium levels. The Institute of International Finance (IIF) warned on Wednesday that attempting to address underlying debt dynamics through "financial engineering" cannot resolve the issue. Interventions such as purchasing securities in the secondary market "may provide temporary relief but cannot address the structural factors driving debt growth."