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The Federal Reserve's Chairman 美联储主席- -| 回首页 | 2007年索引 | - -Investing for kicks 投资奇道,投资歧道

Japan's currency 日元

关键词Japan,    日元                                          

Carry on living dangerously 惶惶度日

Feb 8th 2007
From The Economist print edition

Speculators and low interest rates have helped cheapen the yen, putting the world economy at risk

投机者和低利率促成了廉价的日元,却使世界经济处在危险之中



THE yen is perhaps the world's most undervalued currency. It is even cheaper than the Chinese yuan by some measures. Last week the Japanese currency hit an all-time low against the euro and its real trade-weighted value fell to its lowest since at least 1970, according to an index tracked by JPMorgan. But do not expect the G7 finance ministers and central bankers meeting in Essen, Germany, on February 9th and 10th to spend much time discussing the yen, let alone to do anything to support it.

日元大概是世界上被低估最为严重的货币了。以一定的标准折算下来,日元甚至比人民币还要廉价。上周,日元对欧元汇率创下历史低点。同时,摩根大通紧密跟踪的一项指数显示,日元的实际贸易加权价值也创下至少1970年来的新低。但别奢望七国集团的财长和央行行长们在2月9日到10日德国埃森(Essen)举行的会议上会重点讨论日元低估的问题,更别提采取什么行动了。

American and European policymakers do not see eye to eye on the yen. The Europeans would like some action to push up the currency, which, they say, is not bearing its fair share of the dollar's decline. Our latest update of The Economist's Big Mac index suggests that the yen is a massive 40% undervalued against the euro. America's big carmakers have also complained that the weak yen makes imported Japanese cars unfairly cheap. However, neither the American nor the Japanese government thinks there is a problem. Hank Paulson, America's treasury secretary, says he is not worried about the yen's weakness because it is market-driven and reflects economic fundamentals—namely low interest rates and a fragile economy. China, in contrast, is accused of manipulating its currency with heavy intervention.

美国和欧洲的决策者在日元问题上想法各异。欧洲国家认为日元在美元疲软的情况下并未保持其应有的坚挺,于是倾向于采取行动,促使日元升值。《经济学人》最新的巨无霸汉堡包指数(Big Mac index)显示日元相对于欧元低估了高达40%。美国大的汽车制造商也在抱怨疲软的日元使得进口的日本车 过于便宜,有悖公平。但不管是美国还是日本政府都对问题视而不见。美国财长汉克保尔森表示,他不担心日元走弱,因为这是市场驱动的结果,符合日本经济的基本面——这等于是说,日元走弱是低利率造成的,反映了日本经济的低迷。相比之下,中国则被指责过多地干预汇市,操控汇率。

Mr Paulson is being short-sighted. Even if Japan is not intervening to hold down its currency, the yen is still misaligned. A country with one of the world's largest current-account surpluses and low inflation (but no longer deflation) should have a much stronger currency. Japan's economy is no longer flat on its back. Last year it grew by an estimated 2.3%, and it is forecast to maintain a similar pace this year. As a result, Japan does not need such low interest rates or a super-cheap currency any more. Indeed, Japan's abnormally low rates could be viewed as a form of intervention to hold down the yen.

保尔森未免有些鼠目寸光。即便日本没有通过干预压低币值,日元还是被低估了。日本的经常项目盈余在世界上数一数二,加上较低的通胀率(尽管不再是通货紧缩),日元理应比目前坚挺得多。日本经济也逐渐摆脱了以往的低迷,去年的增长率估计达到了2.3%,预计今年还将保持相似的增速。因此,日本超低的利率和廉价的货币变得没有必要。其实,反常的低利率压低了日元的币值,使得日本当局有干预汇率之嫌。

The Bank of Japan (BoJ) bowed to government pressure and held rates unchanged at 0.25% in January. But figures due on February 15th, which are expected to show that GDP grew at an annual rate of 3.5-4% in the three months to December, could give the bank the green light to raise rates at its next meeting. This weekend the G7 could usefully back such a move.

一月,日本银行(BoJ,日本的央行——注)屈服于政府的压力,将利率维持在0.25%不变。但定于2月15日公布的数据预计将显示,去年第四季度日本GDP的年增长率达3.5-4%,这给日本央行在下次会议上加息大开绿灯。本周末的七国会议也将有力地推动这一动向。

The yen has been pushed down in recent months by the highly profitable “carry trade”. At its simplest this involves borrowing in yen at very low interest rates to buy higher-yielding assets, such as American or Australian bonds, or even emerging-market debt that offers a still more lucrative interest margin. Carry trades weaken the Japanese currency, because investors sell the borrowed yen to convert them into other currencies.

近几个月,高利润的“套息交易”是压低日元的主要原因。投资者以低息借入日元,用来购买高收益的资产,包括美国和澳大利亚的债券,甚至还有新兴市场中提供可观利差的债务。由于投资者在套息过程中需将借来的日元卖出以兑换成其它币种,套息交易压低了日元的币值。

Carry trades make sense only if the investor assumes that the yen will remain weak. If it appreciated, this would increase the repayment cost of yen-borrowing and offset the interest differential. But such an assumption is dangerous when the yen is already so undervalued. In theory, carry trades should not yield a predictable profit because the difference in interest rates between two countries should equal the rate at which investors expect the low-interest-rate currency, here the yen, to rise against the high-interest-rate one. But the carry trade turns this logic upside down by causing the yen to fall, not rise. This, in turn, lures more investors into the same strategy, amplifying the distortion. Mr Paulson may be revealing more than he intends when he says the yen is “market-driven”: the market is chasing its own tail in defiance of the economic fundamentals.

只有当投资者假设日元将保持疲软,套息交易才有意义。日元升值将增加借入日元的还款成本,抵消利差带来的收益。然而,当日元已被低估到如此程度时,抱有这种假设十分危险。两国之间的利率之差应该等于低利率货币(这里即日元)相对于高利率货币的预期升值率,因此在理论上,套息交易的预期收益为零。但是,日元的套息交易却违背了这个逻辑:它导致日元的币值不升反降。这又反过来吸引更多的投资者如法炮制,加重了日元的价格扭曲。当保尔森声称日元汇率是“市场驱动”时,也揭示了他未曾想传达的意思:市场在原地打转,未能与经济的基本面协调一致。

An elusive number
一个难以捉摸的数据

Nobody really knows how big the carry trade is. Japanese official figures show little evidence of large net lending to foreigners. For much of 2006 Japan actually had a net inflow of bond investment. Estimates based on the short-term net foreign lending of Japanese banks put the carry trade at only $200 billion.

套息交易的规模到底有多大无人知晓。日本官方的数据中也没有大量外国借贷净额的痕迹。实际上,2006年的大部分时间里,日本是债券投资的净流入国。根据日本的银行中外国短期借贷净额估计出的结果显示套息交易的规模仅有2000亿美元。

But hedge funds do not need to borrow yen and then buy higher-yielding currencies. Instead, the carry trade is typically done through transactions, such as currency forward swaps, that are off-balance-sheet and therefore do not show up in official statistics. A better clue comes from record net “short” positions in yen futures on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Estimates of the total size of the carry trade range as high as $1 trillion.

然而,对冲基金无需借入日元以购买高利率的货币。取而代之的是,投资者普遍通过买卖外汇远期互换等进行套息交易。这些交易都是资产负债表的表外项目,因此不反映在官方数据里。芝加哥商业交易所日元期货创纪录的空头净头寸为我们提供了更好的线索。据估计套息交易的总规模高达1万亿美元。



The term “carry trade” usually refers to leveraged trades by speculative international investors, such as hedge funds. But Japanese households have also shifted money out of their low-interest-rate bank accounts to earn a higher return in, say, New Zealand bonds. These outflows are certainly large, but they are of a very different nature. If markets suddenly become more volatile, hedge funds can very quickly unwind their short yen positions, whereas households are more likely to sit tight. It is the volatile type of trade that central bankers lose sleep over.

“套息交易”这一术语通常用来指包括对冲基金在内的国际投机者所进行的杠杆交易。然而,日本的家庭也纷纷将低收益的储蓄投资于回报更丰厚的资产,如新西兰的债券。这种资本流出数量固然庞大,但和前者有着本质的不同。若市场波动水平突然增大,对冲基金能够迅速地对日元空头头寸进行平仓,然而家庭投资者则倾向于采取观望态度。正是这种波动性很大的交易令央行的决策者们夜不能眠。

The received wisdom in the markets is that yen carry trades will continue as long as the BoJ raises rates only slowly. It would take a rise in Japanese interest rates of at least two percentage points to undermine these trades, and nobody thinks that likely in the next year or so. Furthermore, goes the argument, as long as interest rates stay low, so will the yen.

只要日本央行加息迟缓,日元套息交易就不会停止,这是市场上的常理。若要有效地抑制套息交易,日元利率必须上升至少2个百分点,这在未来一两年内可能性不大。此外,一些争论指出,只要利率保持低位,日元就会一直廉价下去。

In fact, the main trigger for an unwinding of carry trades is likely to be not Japanese interest rates, but an upsurge in currency volatility. That is what happened in 1998, when enormous yen carry trades had built up. After Russia's default in August and the subsequent near collapse of Long-Term Capital Management, hedge funds reduced their leveraged positions and the yen started to rise. Then in October the Japanese government announced a plan to recapitalise its crippled banks, which further bolstered the currency, forcing those who had bet against it to cover their positions. The yen jumped by 13% within three days.

其实,引发套息交易投资者进行平仓的导火索很可能是日元汇率的大幅波动,而非利率的上升。1998年大量日元套息交易建仓后发生的事情可以说明这一点。当年8月,由于俄罗斯政府违约,美国长期资本管理公司(Long-Term Capital Management)濒临破产。而后,各个对冲基金纷纷减小其杠杆头寸,日元开始升值。11月,日本政府宣布计划调整国内银行的资本结构以改变其裹足不前的现状,进一步引发日元升值,迫使看跌的投资者开始平仓。短短三天之内,日元升值了13%。

Nouriel Roubini, at Roubini Global Economics, says that the lesson of 1998 is that it takes only a small piece of positive news to unravel such trades. Suppose there is suddenly some good news about the Japanese economy at the same time as America's appears to be stalling. An initial rise in the yen could cause today's carry trades to unwind just as rapidly, causing the currency to soar, American interest rates to rise and risk spreads to widen. The volume of yen-related leverage is probably greater now than in 1998.

鲁比尼全球经济咨询公司(Roubini Global Economics)的努里尔·鲁比尼(Nouriel Roubini)表示,98年的教训告诉我们,只需少许的利好消息便可有效地抑制套息交易。假设在美国经济看上去陷入停滞的同时,日本经济突然放出利好消息,日元汇价一旦有所上抬,现有的套息交易便会迅速平仓,进而导致日元汇价飙升、美元利率上浮以及风险价差增大。目前,与日元相关的杠杆交易的规模很可能比98年时还要大。

The G7 should be concerned about carry trades not just because they could suddenly unwind and trigger financial turmoil but also because the yen's misalignment is distorting the world economy. The yen carry trade has amplified global liquidity, further inflating asset-price bubbles across the world. The trade has also prolonged global imbalances by making it easier for countries such as America, Britain and Australia to finance their large current-account deficits.

七国集团应给予套息交易足够的重视,不仅因为套息交易可能突然平仓并引发金融危机,还因为它扭曲了日元汇率,也扭曲了全球经济。日元套息交易放大了全球资本流动,使世界各地的资产价格泡沫进一步膨胀。由于套息交易的存在,美国、英国和澳大利亚等国家能够更为容易地弥补巨额的经常项目逆差,使得国际收支不平衡得以维继。

A severely misaligned exchange rate calls for action. It is true, as Mr Paulson says, that Japan is not intervening to hold down the yen. But since Japan still holds almost $900 billion of foreign-exchange reserves, accumulated a few years ago when it was intervening, it is hard to claim that the currency is truly market-determined. Stephen Jen, an economist at Morgan Stanley, argues that Japan's Ministry of Finance should consider selling some of those reserves to break the one-way bet against the yen. There is a risk that such a move could itself upset financial markets. But the lower the yen slides, the greater the threat of an even sharper rebound.

该采取行动纠正这一严重扭曲的汇率了。尽管正如保尔森所言,日本目前并未干预汇市以压低日元,但既然日本仍然持有近9000亿美元的外汇储备(这是日本近几年来干预汇市的成果),还宣称日元汇率是市场定价未免太过牵强。摩根斯坦利的经济学家施蒂芬·詹(Stephen Jen)认为日本的财长应该考虑卖出部分外汇储备以打破针对日元的单向赌博。这一举动也有风险,因为其本身也有可能扰乱金融市场。但是日元陷得越深,其剧烈反弹的威胁就越大。翻译 by  zhenglijin

【作者: feivsying】【访问统计:】【2007年05月17日 星期四 15:57】【注册】【打印

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