It’s all very well removing the punchbowl from your own party. But what about when the rich family next door have been supplying liquor to the neighbourhood’s teenagers for the best part of a decade and eventually decide to stop?

从你自己的宴会上撤走大酒杯无可厚非。但是隔壁有钱人家在这十年的大部分时间里一直请所有街坊邻居家的青少年喝酒，如今终于决定不再这么做，这是不是也没什么？

The Federal Reserve’s meeting next week, at which it may raise interest rates after leaving them on hold for nearly seven years, has naturally raised concern among emerging markets. Before this year’s falls in commodity prices and currencies, the two defining episodes in EM assets since the global financial crisis have been the taper tantrums of mid-2013 and early 2014 at the very prospect of the Fed removing monetary stimulus.

美联储(Fed)将于本周举行议息会议，在保持利率不变近7年之后，他们可能会在此次会议上决定加息，这自然引发了新兴市场的担忧。在今年大宗商品价格和汇率下跌之前，新兴市场资产自全球金融危机以来的两段重要插曲就是，2013年中期和2014年初因美联储表露出可能退出货币刺激政策的意向而出现的两次“削减恐慌”(taper tantrum)。

This week the World Bank’s chief economist, Kaushik Basu, weighed in on the subject, saying that a premature Fed rate rise could wreak havoc across emerging markets, leading to further destabilising capital outflows. It may seem unusual, then, that several EM policymakers themselves seem quite relaxed at the prospect. At the corroboree of monetary policy experts at the Fed’s annual conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, recently, several EM central bankers lined up to say that the US might actually be better getting on and raising rates sooner rather than later.

世界银行(World Bank)首席经济学家考希克巴苏(Kaushik Basu)上周加入了这个话题的讨论，他表示，美联储过早加息可能会重创整个新兴市场，导致破坏稳定的资本外流进一步加剧。那么似乎有些异常的是，数位新兴市场的政策制定者对美国可能会加息似乎满不在乎。最近在怀俄明州的杰克逊霍尔(Jackson Hole)举行的美联储年度会议上，全球货币政策专家汇聚一堂的时候，数位新兴市场央行官员一齐表示，美国按原计划尽早加息可能更好。

It was notable that one of the most prominent was Raghuram Rajan, governor of the Reserve Bank of India, who told the Wall Street Journal that, from an emerging market perspective, it might be preferable to have “a move early on and an advertised, slow move up” than an abrupt tightening later. Early last year, Mr Rajan broke the usual central bankers’ omertàabout each other’s actions by explicitly criticising the Fed’s decision to start slowing its asset purchases under its quantitative easing programme.

值得注意的是，其中最知名的一位是印度央行(Reserve Bank of India)行长拉古拉姆拉詹(Raghuram Rajan)，他向《华尔街日报》(the Wall Street Journal)表示，在新兴市场看来，“早一点开始，并在充分预热的前提下缓慢加息”，可能好过迟些时候大幅加息。去年年初，拉詹打破了各央行行长通常遵循的缄默原则（即对彼此的做法不做评论），明确对美联储减慢其量化宽松项目下资产购买速度的决定加以批评。

To some extent, as in Mr Rajan’s comments, the EM central bank enthusiasm for a Fed increase simply reflects tactical considerations: if it were done when ’tis done, ’twere well it were done quickly. If the Fed is seen to be holding off because of fear of the market impact, the US central bank could get into a destabilising game of chicken with investors.

正如拉詹的言论所反映出的那样，新兴市场央行之所以希望美联储尽快加息，在某种程度上只是出于战术上的考量：要是干了以后就完了，那么还是快一点干（引《麦克白》中名句——译者注）。如果人们认为美联储暂时不加息是因为担心加息对市场的影响，那么美联储可能会被迫与投资者玩起破坏稳定的“懦夫博弈”。

But it also reflects irritation with those liberally minded parents down the road and the effect of super-low interest rates on encouraging EM borrowing over the past decade. The flood of “currency war” accusations in 2010-11 that the Fed was in effect driving down the dollar mainly came from finance ministries rather than central banks. But there is no doubt that a flood of cheap money into their economies that drove up their exchange rates made their task as monetary policymakers more difficult.

不过，新兴市场的这种态度，也反映出它们对邻居中那些想得开的父母以及过去十年超低利率促使新兴市场大举借贷的不满。2010年至2011年，指责美联储实际上在压低美元汇率、打“汇率战”的声浪很高，这股声浪主要来自新兴市场国家的财政部，而非它们的央行。但毫无疑问的是，当时潮水般涌入这些经济体的廉价资金推升了它们的本币汇率，加大了它们的货币政策制定者的工作难度。

In certain countries — Brazil and Turkey leap to mind — easy money made it simpler for governments to run loose fiscal policy, thus worsening the exchange rate overvaluations and the size of corrections when they came. More capital outflows and tighter credit conditions may force more domestic adjustment, but adjustment had to come at some stage.

在特定的某些国家——脑海里很快浮现的是巴西和土耳其——宽松资金让政府更容易推行宽松财政政策，从而加剧了本币汇率的高估，在调整的时候调整幅度也更大。更多的资本外流和信贷环境的收紧可能迫使国内出现更多调整，但调整迟早也都是会来的。

The varying confidence with which central banks face a Fed rate rise — and the prospect that it will push their currencies down further — reflects their economic positioning and credibility. For China, it will exacerbate their problems of capital outflow: Yao Yudong of the People’s Bank of China’s research institution blamed the prospect of a Fed increase for turmoil in Chinese financial markets and said a rate rise should be delayed. Central banks in Brazil and Turkey have already faced the unenviable task of tightening policy to squeeze inflation out of economies heading into recession. More falls in exchange rates and capital outflows will make their task yet harder and are likely to keep domestic policy tighter for longer.

面对美联储可能加息、以及本国货币将进一步被压低，各国央行表现出的不同底气，反映出它们的经济状况和可信度。美联储加息将加剧中国的资本外流问题：中国央行(PBoC)金融研究所的姚余栋认为美国可能加息是造成中国金融市场动荡的罪魁祸首，并称美联储应推迟加息。巴西和土耳其的央行已经面临一个艰难使命：在经济正在步入衰退之际收紧货币政策、挤掉通胀。汇率进一步下跌和资本进一步外流，将让它们的任务更加艰巨，可能延长它们保持从紧政策的时间。

EMs with direct exposure to the US economy may have to raise rates in response to a Fed rise but still welcome it, assuming it means that the US is growing sufficiently quickly to offset the contractionary impact with an expansion in export demand. Agustín Carstens, governor of the Mexican central bank, has said that he would like a tightening even if he had to follow suit.

美联储加息可能会让对美国经济有直接敞口的新兴国家不得不跟着加息，但考虑到美联储加息意味着美国经济在以足够快的速度增长、带来的出口需求增加会抵消掉加息对经济的紧缩效应，这些新兴国家仍对加息表示欢迎。墨西哥央行行长阿古斯丁愠斯滕斯(Agustín Carstens)表示，他希望美联储加息，即便这样的话他也得跟着加息。

For economies such as India, a net commodity importer with stable inflation and relatively little recent capital outflow, the central bank will most likely be able to keep cutting interest rates, moving in a different direction to the Fed. Mr Rajan has done a lot to get on top of inflation and instil credibility in India’s monetary policy since his appointment in September 2013, which no doubt explains his changed attitude to the prospect of a Fed tightening.

对于印度这样的经济体而言，央行很有可能可以持续降息，与美联储保持步调相反。印度是一个净大宗商品进口国，通胀稳定，近期资金流出相对较少。自2013年9月上任以来，拉詹采取了很多措施，以控制通胀并向印度货币政策注入可信度，这无疑解释了他为何对美联储可能加息改变了态度。

Central and eastern Europe, or at least the more westerly net commodity importers, also have relatively little to fear from a Fed rate rise. In Poland, where interest rates have been at 1.5 per cent since they were cut in March, the recent falls in commodity prices mean the central bank may be able to leave rates on hold for longer, and is very unlikely to have to react quickly to a move by the Fed.

中欧和东欧，或者至少更接近西方国家的净大宗商品进口国，也相对不那么担心美联储加息。波兰自3月降息以来，利率一直维持在1.5%，最近大宗商品价格下跌意味着，该国央行或许能够在更长时间内保持利率不变，而且它必须迅速对美联储加息作出反应的可能性极低。

The horror about a Fed tightening no doubt owes something to history, at least for those with long memories. The sustained rise in US interest rates that began in 1994, apart from causing the famed bloodbath in the Treasury market, also led to some of the worst EM experiences in modern times, sparking the Asian and Russian financial crisis three years later. But those were crises of dollar-pegged exchange rates, where US monetary policy was much more directly imported into the economies concerned.

围绕美联储加息的恐慌无疑在一定程度上源于历史，至少对于那些记性比较好的国家而言是这样。从1994年开始，美联储持续加息，除了造成国债市场著名的暴跌之外，还给一些新兴国家带来了近代以来最糟糕的经历，并在3年后引发亚洲和俄罗斯金融危机。但这些属于盯住美元的汇率制度的危机，美国的货币政策当时更直接地输入到了这些经济体。

Although the private sector has borrowed heavily in dollars in some EMs, governments are currently much less exposed than in earlier eras. Current account deficits have also come down considerably in many EMs since the taper tantrums of 2013 and 2014.

如今，尽管一些新兴市场的私营部门借入了大量美元债务，但政府的美元敞口远远低于以前。自2013年和2014年的“削减恐慌”以来，许多新兴市场的经常账户赤字也缩小了不少。

The prospect of higher US interest rates next month will not be filling anyone with glee, but many EM central bankers are sounding much more confident than their finance ministry counterparts and more relaxed than they were before. All parties have to end at some point: the parents of those guests who were relatively abstemious are more likely to face their ensuing hangovers with equanimity.

美国下月可能加息，这不会让任何人欢喜，但很多新兴国家央行行长听上去要比这些国家的财政部长自信得多，同时心态也比之前轻松。宴席总有散的时候：那些饮食相对节制的小宾客的父母们，更有可能冷静地面对孩子们第二天的宿醉。