CoolDown 经济学人阅读(31) - Fear of finance

Fear of finance

文章选自2017/8/26的The Economist。 这里对文章进行生词释义和句子分析，仅供学习使用，欢迎交流。

导读: 如何平衡金融稳定性与经济增长的关系， 是各国央行面临的挑战。 并且各国情况不尽相同

• 金融恐惧

Financial stability is a growing concern of central banks. Only some should be worried

金融稳定性是一个中央银行越来越关切的问题。 但只有一些问题应该被担心

• financial stability:金融稳定

CENTRAL bankers have gathered at their annual shindig in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, for
the past ten years with only one thing on their minds: the health of the global economy. This year’s gathering is different. The bankers’ preoccupations are
changing, from recovery to financial stability.

央行行长们已经在Jackson Hole, Wyoming的年度聚会上碰头，在过去十年中，只有一件事情萦绕他们心头:全球经济的健康

• shindig(n.): 狂欢聚会
• preoccupation(n.): 长期专注的事
  e.g. have a preoccupation with 专注于某事

Oddly, rising concern about the risks of financial excess is good news. It reflects the arrival of the first synchronised global economic upswing since 2010. GDP growth in the quarter ending in June was the most rapid since then, according to JPMorgan Chase, thanks to stronger-than-expected activity in China, Japan and Europe (Britain was a notable exception). Any relief, however, is mixed with anxiety that the excesses which led to the crisis of 2007-08 are again pervasive.

不断加重的对金融过度的风险的担心意外地成为了好消息。这反映出自2010年以来， 第一次同步化的全球金融改善的到来

• financial excess: 金融过度
• upswing(n.): 改善
• pervasive(adj.): 弥漫的

Policymakers have helped support the economy over the past decade. But by keeping interest rates low, they have also spurred investors to take extra risks in search of larger returns. The American stockmarket is on a cyclically adjusted price-earnings ratio of 30—a level surpassed only in 1929 and the late 1990s. Investors are rushing to buy government debt from risky countries. Argentina has defaulted on its debts six times in the past century, but still easily found buyers for a 100-year bond in June. Earlier this month buyers snapped up Iraq’s first independent bond issue for more than a decade.

政策制定者已经在过去的十年中给予经济支持。 但通过保持低利率， 他们能刺激投资者冒额外的风险谋求更大的利益

• spur investors to do:激励投资者做...
  e.g. cut interest rates to spur demand 降低利率以刺激需求
• in search of: 寻求，搜索
• price-earningsratio: 股票收益率
• government debt: 国债
• snap up: 抢购
  e.g. The tickets were snapped up. 票被抢购一空
• bond issue: 债券发行

The tension between growth and stability is most obvious in China. The IMF this month simultaneously raised its growth forecasts and warned that the country was gorging itself on debt, which jumped from 150% of GDP in 2007 to 280% in 2016. Since the start of this year, the People’s Bank of China has restricted the supply of short-term liquidity to banks. Regulators have also ordered them to account for loans hidden off their balance-sheets. So far, so good: funding costs have risen and overall credit growth has slowed even as nominal growth has rebounded. But the economy has recently started to lose momentum. Will China continue efforts to constrain credit even when growth dips below official targets? The fear is that it will revert to type and let credit surge again.

增长和稳定的紧张关系在中国最明显。 国际货币基金组织本月持续提出增长预测并且警告这个国家正在被债务吞噬， 从2007年150%的GDP到2016年280%的GDP

• IMF(n.): 国际货币基金组织
• gorge(v.): 狼吞虎咽
• short-term liquidity: 资产的短期流动性
• account for: 解释...的原因
• balance-sheets: 资产负债表
• lose momentum: 失去动力
• dip(n.): 下降
• surge(v.): 上涨
• nominal growth: 名义上的增长
• lose momentum: 势头减弱
• revert to type: 恢复原状

Concerns about financial fragility are of a very different kind in Europe, where a recovery is gaining strength. Since December, when the European Central Bank lowered its target for asset purchases, to €60bn ($70bn) a month, there has been speculation that the ECB’s programme of quantitative easing (QE, the creation of money to buy assets) must wind down soon. But the bank is nervous about a repeat of the “taper tantrum” of 2013, when markets were spooked by signals from the Fed that it would be stopping QE. A hurried withdrawal of QE might cause a sudden rise in bond yields as bubbly assets are repriced. That could hurt countries, such as Italy, with big public-debt burdens.

对于金融脆弱性的担心是与欧洲的完全不同的， 在那里复苏正的趋势在变强。 自从十二月以来， 欧洲央行降低了不动产购买的指标， 到600亿一个月， 有预测指出欧洲央行的量化宽松计划也一定会放慢下来

• asset purchase:资产收购
• quantitative easing: 量化宽松
• wind down: 平静下来
• taper tantrum: 缩减恐慌
• bond yield: 公债利息
• public debt: 公债

The Federal Reserve sits somewhere between China and Europe. The American economy has been expanding for years; only twice in its history has it grown for more consecutive quarters. Its financial system looks robust. But here, too, queasiness about share prices and the lengths to which investors will go to buy bonds with decent yields has crept into the Fed’s deliberations. As the crisis of 2007-08 fades from memory, the Fed is worrying about the efforts of the Trump administration to loosen the shackles that bind the banks. Stanley Fischer, its vice-chairman, has opposed proposals from the Treasury that “stress tests” of big banks should be softer.

联邦储备银行出于中国和欧洲之间的某个位置。 美国经济已经持续增长了若干年； 在历史上只有两次持续增长了多个季度。美国的金融系统看似健壮。但是， 对于股价以及投资者持股周期的担忧已经在联邦储备银行的审议过程中蔓延

• Federal Reserve: 联邦储备银行
• queasiness(n.): 不安
• creep into: 在...中蔓延
• deliberation(n.): 审议过程
• fade from memory: 从记忆中消逝
• loosen the shackles: 解除束缚
• opposed proposals: 截然不同的提议
• the Treasury: 财政部

Alarm bells
It is right that central banks should be vigilant about threats to financial stability. But the Fed should not yet put concerns about risk-taking above the immediate demands of the economy. American banks are well-capitalised; and there is a decent case for simplifying some post-crisis regulations, particularly those that bind America’s smaller lenders. As for the euro zone, its recovery is still recent and continues to need support; the ECB should not be withdrawing stimulus abruptly in any case. For China the real test lies ahead, perhaps as early as next year. Tensions between growth and stability will become more acute as time goes on. But as the central bankers descend on Wyoming, it is too soon for them to stop worrying about the health of the world economy.

中央银行对针对金融稳定性的威胁保持警惕是正确的。 但是联邦银行还没有将对风险的担忧放到经济的当前需求之上

• be vigilant about:对...保持警惕
• risk-taking(n.): 冒险
• well-capitalised(n.): 资本雄厚
• post-crisis regulation: 危机后管理
• stimulus(n.): 刺激
• abruptly(adv.): 突然地
• tension(n.): 紧张关系