Financial markets began 2014 in an ebullient mood. Omens of economic recovery in the developed world buoyed investors across the globe. Troubles in emerging markets, it was thought, would amount only to a handful of little local difficulties.
2014年的金融市场是在一片高涨的情绪中揭幕的。发达国家经济复苏的征兆令全球投资者振奋。人们认为，新兴市场遇到的麻烦只会局限于少数小规模的局部困境。
It did not last.
然而这种状况并未持续。
In developed markets, the past weeks have seen the steepest falls in equity prices since mid-2013, when fears that the US Federal Reserve would begin phasing out its massive bond-buying programme caused interest rates to surge. This time, however, there has been no rise in short-term interest rates in the US or Europe, and bond yields have even fallen slightly. There has been no change, then, in the market’s reading of the Fed or the European Central Bank’s policy stance.
过去几周，发达市场股价出现了2013年年中（当时人们对美联储逐步退出量化宽松的担心导致利率激增）以来最剧烈的下跌。但这一次，欧美短期利率没有升高，债券收益率甚至略有下降。也就是说，市场对美联储(Fed)或欧洲央行(ECB)政策立场的解读并未变化。
Instead, traders have been rattled by the indications that global economic demand is weaker than thought. Inflation now stands at about a paltry 1 per cent in the US and Europe, and there has been a string of disappointing data on US economic activity.
相反，令交易员感到恐慌的是，全球经济需求出现了弱于预期的迹象。欧美目前的通胀率仍徘徊于区区1%的水平，而美国经济活动的一系列数据令人失望。
In previous years, this combination of events might already have had the Fed signalling a willingness to use monetary policy to stimulate the economy. But so far in 2014 the silence has been deafening.
如果是在过去几年，这些状况可能已促使美联储释放出动用货币政策刺激经济的意愿。而2014年迄今美联储一言不发。
Investors have long believed that under Alan Greenspan and then Ben Bernanke, the Fed deliberately shielded the stock market from losses by using monetary policy to lift share prices whenever they suffered steep falls. Now investors are debating whether Janet Yellen, the incoming chairwoman, will do the same. Many are nervous. Ms Yellen has been silent on all the main issues for almost a year. Stanley Fischer, the vice chairman, is thought to be sceptical about some of the most dovish aspects of recent Fed orthodoxy.
长期以来，投资者始终相信，在艾伦•格林斯潘(Alan Greenspan)和随后的本•伯南克(Ben Bernanke)时代，美联储都有意保护股市，动用货币政策“托盘”，使股市免受巨大亏损。如今，投资者正在为美联储新任主席珍妮特•耶伦(Janet Yellen)是否会采取同样策略展开辩论。许多人对此十分紧张。近一年来，耶伦在所有重大问题上保持沉默。美联储副主席斯坦利•费希尔(Stanley Fischer)据信对近年美联储信条中某些鸽派色彩最浓重的方面持怀疑态度。
None of this would matter if the US economy had maintained the healthy rates of growth seen in late 2013. But growth seems to have dipped to about 2 per cent in the current quarter, from 3.5 per cent in the second half of last year. Markets had been cheered by a recent outbreak of sanity in Congress, which has cancelled some of the sweeping spending cuts that had been planned and now seems less likely to march America back to the brink of default. But now the fear is that this will not be enough. The economy might return to earth with a thud, as it did after a short spurt of growth in 2009-10.
如果2013年底美国经济能保持健康的增速，这一切就无关紧要了。然而，美国经济增长率似乎已从去年下半年的3.5%跌至本季度的大约2%。美国国会近期展示的清醒头脑令市场感到欣慰，他们取消了部分原本打算开展的全面减支计划，似乎也不那么想把美国再次推回债务违约边缘。不过，市场现在担心的是，仅仅这些是不够的。美国经济可能会急转直下——就像2009-10年短暂加速后出现的情形一样。
The Fed plans to taper its asset purchases only very gradually. Yields on long-term bonds are expected to rise only by about 1 per cent. If the US economy proved unable to withstand even this featherweight touch, market optimists would lose their verve. The stock market has a long way to fall – shares are currently selling for fairly high multiples of company profits, by historical standards. A bear market could ensue.
美联储只打算以非常渐进的节奏缩减资产购买规模。预计长期债券的收益率只会上升大约1%。如果美国经济被证明连这种超轻量级的压力都无法承受，市场乐观者可能会方寸大乱。按历史标准，目前股价处于相当高的市盈率水平，也就是说仍有很大的下跌空间。熊市可能会随之而来。
Yet these fears seem overblown. The January weakness in US employment data, and in the ISM manufacturing survey, shocked the markets, but other statistics have painted a brighter picture. The slowdown may turn out to be a blip, caused by a one-off pause while companies run down excess inventories, or the effects of extraordinary weather. If this view proves correct – and I think it will – the recovery will strengthen later in the year.
然而这种担忧似乎过头了。虽然1月份疲软的美国就业数据及供应管理协会(ISM)制造业调查数据令市场震惊，但其他统计资料描绘了比较光明的图景。这次放缓可能被证明是暂时现象，原因可能是企业用掉过多库存后的一次性暂停，或者是恶劣天气的影响。如果这种观点被证明是正确的——我认为是——今年晚些时候美国复苏势头将会加强。
This sanguine assessment does not, however, apply to the emerging markets, where a storm is brewing.
不过，这种乐观的估计对于新兴市场并不适用——新兴市场正酝酿着一场风暴。
Since the Fed began its quantitative easing, investors who could no longer earn their keep buying US government debt have ventured further afield. This has resulted in a huge influx of capital into countries such as Turkey and Argentina. But the ensuing credit bubbles were not sufficiently controlled by monetary authorities, and now that policy is being tightened in the west, they threaten to burst. Central banks in emerging markets have been pleading for help. But these calls have been politely dismissed by both the Fed and ECB, whose job is to look after the economy at home.
自美联储开始量化宽松以来，那些无法再从购买美国国债赚得足够利润的投资者开始到远方冒险，导致大量资本涌入土耳其和阿根廷这类国家。然而，这些国家的货币当局未能充分控制随之而来的信贷泡沫。如今，随着西方收紧货币政策，这些泡沫有破裂的危险。新兴市场的央行最近在四处求助，然而美联储和欧洲央行婉拒了这些请求——他们的职责是照看好本国经济。
Now China has decided to withdraw its own huge monetary stimulus. Both of the world’s major economic powers are therefore pulling in the wrong direction for most emerging nations. They have not been helped by the collapse in the yen, which effectively cuts the price of Japanese products, or the euro area’s growing trade surplus. They have little option but to let their currencies slide, with rising interest rates and slowing growth rates looking inevitable.
现在中国也决定收回其巨大的货币刺激。因此，对于多数新兴市场国家来说，世界两大经济强国都在朝着对他们不利的方向行动。此外，日元暴跌（这大幅压低了日本产品价格）和欧元区不断增长的贸易顺差也对他们没有帮助。除了让货币贬值外，这些国家没什么别的选择，利率升高和增长放缓似乎已不可避免。
In many emerging markets, monetary conditions are tightening sharply – the opposite of what these weakening economies need. In the aftermath of a boom fuelled by cheap credit, the spectre of widespread economy looms.
在许多新兴市场，货币状况正急剧收紧——与这些疲弱经济体急需的补药恰恰相反。在廉价信贷推动的繁荣过后，大范围资不抵债的阴影隐约出现。
All eyes are now on China. Few, if any, major economies have emerged intact from a credit bubble as intensive as the one in China’s shadow banking sector today. But no country has had $3.5tn of liquid reserves to fall back on, either.
如今，所有人的目光都集中在中国身上。中国影子银行业存在着巨大的信贷泡沫，没有哪个主要经济体在遭遇这么大的泡沫后还能全身而退。不过，也没有哪个国家像中国这样，有3.5万亿美元的流动性储备作为后盾。
China’s decision in December to bail out an investment product distributed by its largest bank, shows that for now, the authorities prefer to absorb the losses of the private sector than to sow panic among investors. But before this is over there will be failures in financial institutions, just as there were in 1998 when Premier Zhu Rongji allowed the collapse of Gitic to act as a lesson to others.
去年12月份，中国决定为其最大银行分销的一款投资产品纾困。这表明中国官方宁愿吸收私营部门的亏损，也不愿在投资者中引发恐慌情绪。不过，这一切结束之前，将会出现金融机构的倒闭——正如1998年那样。当时，中国总理朱镕基曾决定让广东国际信托投资公司(GITIC)破产，以此作为对其他人的教训。
Investors are asking whether the markets can survive tapering by the Fed. The harder question is whether they can survive a monetary tightening by the People’s Bank of China. Many are betting on a bumpy landing, but one that causes few casualties. But China is where the unknown unknowns in the global economy currently lurk.
投资者正在问一个问题：市场能否从美联储逐步缩减量化宽松规模的过程中幸存下来？而更难回答的问题则是：市场能否从中国央行的一轮货币政策收紧中幸存下来？许多人猜测，全球市场将有一次颠簸的着陆，但不会有太多伤亡。不过，中国目前是全球经济中未知因素潜伏的地方。