A new economic/financial earthquake is looming. Can everyone see it?
2013年06月13日
社论
2013年6月13日
金融市场这两个月来剧烈震荡，投资者的情绪也七上八下。黄金价格连续上涨多年后，在4月中突然暴跌，从2011年9月每安士1920美元的历史高点 猛降至1321美元，黄金进入了熊市。同样的，东京股市在日本首相安倍晋三上台以来，也曾大幅度上涨，但日经指数最近却节节败退，从5月23日的高峰期下 跌了两成，符合了熊市的定义。除此之外，高股息的股票，特别是房地产信托基金，一度是投资者追逐收益时的首选，最近遭到巨大的卖压。
黄金、日本股票及高息股票的暴跌，部分原因是从高位调整及卖空者平仓，毕竟在宽松货币政策的环境下，这些投资工具的涨势凌厉，即使在这一轮的盘整 后，其价格还是比金融危机前夕高。这些投资在此之前暴涨，主要归功于多国中央银行在金融危机后推出的货币量化宽松政策。全球主要央行推出非常规的量宽政 策，试图通过通胀以刺激疲软的经济，导致资产价格飞涨。从主要工业国缓慢的经济复苏步伐显示，量宽政策投放的巨额流动资金，没有如预期般的流入实体经济， 而是卡在金融及投资市场。资金泛滥令投资者担心货币购买力的减弱，也驱使他们四处追逐收益，并投入楼市及股市等的高风险资产。发达国家的量宽政策外溢，导 致新兴市场面对热钱涌入及房地产泡沫的挑战。因此，量宽政策的终结及热钱回流，将可能重挫新兴市场。
美国联储局自2008年11月以来，推出三轮量宽政策，其资产负债表从2008年初的9222亿美元剧增至目前的3.4万亿美元。美国舆论及财经界 开始担心，这个非常规的货币政策若持续过久，将使资产泡沫不断膨胀，并扭曲资金的成本，使价格趋向不稳定。此外，量宽政策是变相的货币贬值，可能引发货币 战及贸易保护主义，使市场对货币失去信心。美国联储局在最近几次的政策会议上，也开始提出退市的课题。联储局主席伯南克去年底指出，只有在美国失业率降至 6.5％以下及通胀率上升到2％以上，才会考虑停止量宽政策。但他最近则表示，联储局将根据经济情况增减量宽的规模。虽然他对退市问题不置可否，但市场宁 可相信，量宽政策的规模即将缩小，最终完全退出。从黄金、日本股票及高息股票的暴跌以及区域货币走软显示，敏感的市场在美国量宽政策终结前，已作出反应。 最近，美国10年期国债息率上升及美元走强，反映市场对联储局退市的预期。此外，美元上升也吸引了资金回流。
由于美国的量宽政策持续了近五年，联储局的资产负债表膨胀了不少，它要如何既有序地退市而又不会导致金融市场的震荡，将考验伯南克的智慧及他对时间 点的掌握。市场及炒家对退市的时间表，做出多种揣测。有分析员根据伯南克去年底提出的失业率及通胀率两个指标，推论量宽政策还会持续一段时间，因为美国最 近公布的失业率还是高达7.6％。但美国联储局前主席格林斯潘近日表示，不论美国经济是否已复苏，量宽政策应该尽快结束，“因为市场不会给我们太多的时 间”。世界银行前行长及美国前副国务卿佐立克前天在新加坡举行的一个论坛上也警告，中央银行推出的量宽政策，压低了利率，导致资产价格与经济基本面脱钩。 然而，格林斯潘和佐立克异口同声警告，仓促退市将使市场出现巨大震荡。
除了美国外，欧元区国家及日本也有量宽政策的计划。但欧元区是由17个国家组成，富裕国家不愿买单，因此欧洲央行购买债券的计划还未能落实。德国一 些民众指这个计划违反宪法，交由法庭裁决。日本在安倍首相领导下推行的量宽政策，也尚未取得预期的效果。日本国债利率及日元汇率最近不下反上，反映市场的 谨慎态度。另一方面，虽然中国经济增长放缓，但中国国务院总理李克强表示，要通过激活货币信贷存量支持实体经济发展，这显示扩张性的货币政策空间不大。
在量宽政策的缩减及终结下，市场将为急剧膨胀的资产，重新定价。当利率回升到金融危机前的正常水平及热钱回流时，新兴经济体在这几年来资金泛滥下的信贷扩张，将面临偿债能力的考验。投资者在投入风险资产时，应先计算自己的持守能力。
A bubble that's primed to explode, not just pop
US tightening, Japan easing, Europe deleveraging - it's a nerve-racking balancing process
Lack of coordination? Maintaining the lake of global liquidity created by quantitative easing seems to be regarded by markets as the shared obligation of the Federal Reserve (above) and other leading individual central banks, even though these august institutions themselves apparently feel no such obligation. - PHOTO: AFP
I AM getting nervous - very nervous, in fact. In my career as a journalist, I have seen many financial bubbles develop and burst but never anything like the present QE-induced global bubble. I doubt whether there ever has been such a phenomenon before, in absolute or GDP-relative terms.
I'm referring, of course, to the massive quantitative easing (QE) packages that have proliferated in number and size at the hands of the US Federal Reserve, the Bank of England, the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan (BOJ) principally.
Each and all of these banks has blown its own bubbles in the past: in the UK in the 1970s, in Japan in the 1980s, in the US in the late 1990s, and then again in 2008, and in Europe too.
But they are all blowing together this time and the bubble could explode rather than simply pop.
Synchronised
What is most worrying perhaps is that while central banks have no "synchronised" strategy for exiting from these monumental monetary easing exercises (any more than they synchronised their entry), financial markets are becoming highly synchronised in their reaction to a prospective exit.
Not only that but maintaining the lake of global liquidity created by QE seems to be regarded by markets as the shared obligation of leading individual central banks, even though these august institutions themselves apparently feel no such obligation
An illustration came this week when the Bank of Japan, judging that Japanese Government Bonds (JGB) had begun to stabilise after their recent extreme volatility, decided not to make the further moves that markets had looked for to ward off possible further yield spikes.
Equity markets from London to Asia went into a spin (yet another one) and analysts blamed the BOJ for not doing anything new to add to the pool of global liquidity by buying yet more bonds. Thus we have a globalised market expectation of what is not a globalised commitment by the central banks.
The Fed, through its chairman Ben Bernanke, has suggested that it might start tightening (buying fewer Treasury bonds) earlier than many had expected, and we seem to have an expectation on the part of financial markets that other central banks will make easing gestures to compensate.
What happens, I asked someone familiar with BOJ thinking, if the Fed becomes serious about its tightening intentions? What impact might that have on BOJ policy, and on the flows of liquidity into and out of Japan and other economies outside of the US?
The response was instructive and, in my view at least, far from reassuring. The idea of synchronised tightening by the Fed, the BOJ or other leading central banks "does not make sense", the person suggested.
Similar views were expressed by BOJ governor Haruhiko Kuroda after the BOJ Policy Board met on Tuesday.
The Fed, he said, is well into its QE programme whereas Japan is only now getting started in earnest. The implication was that each must go its own way.
This disavowal of synchronised action misses the point that even if central banks see no need to move in coordinated fashion, bond, equity and currency markets seem to expect that this is precisely what the central banks should do if damage is not to result from uncoordinated moves.
Equally, or perhaps more worrying, is that central banks do not appear to have any real idea of what will happen once one or more of their number decides that it's time to exit from QE and starts to tighten the screws on easy money.
A common assumption is that once the Fed does begin to put up the shutters on QE, US interest rates will "normalise" (rise) and money will flow back to the US from Asian and other emerging markets where it has contributed to a surge in asset prices.
Not necessarily so, argue BOJ insiders. There could be "turmoil" in US financial markets as a result of a change in Fed policy and that could cause money actually to flow out of the US and into other markets. This may be true - but it's hardly something we should be reassured about.
It would be nice to think that the Ben Bernankes, Haruhiko Kurodas, Mario Draghis and Mervyn Kings of this world (respective central bank governors in the US, Japan, Europe and Britain) talked intensively and often about the need to coordinate their actions.
But recent experience - plus the fact that even the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in Basel, which is supposed to be the "central bankers' bank", felt bound to issue a caution recently about unbridled QE excesses - suggests that central bankers are intent on doing their own thing.
Central banks are prone to suffering from "blind spots" from time to time. For a long time, this myopia was related to domestic asset inflation or massive run-ups in the level of stock and property markets at home. But since the birth of QE, it has taken on an international or global dimension.
This is obvious from global capital flows. As the World Bank notes in its latest Global Economic Prospects report, "during the first five months of 2013, gross capital flows (international bond issuance, cross-border syndicated bank loans and equity placements) to developing countries rose 63 per cent, reaching a historic high at US$306 billion".
Volatile
How volatile these flows will prove is not certain. "The uniformly accommodative stance of monetary policy in high-income countries may become more diverse as the US reduces the extent of quantitative easing and Japan expands it," says the World Bank.
A gradual transition towards tightening in the US is likely to increase the cost of capital for developing countries, and expectations of such a move may lead to an easing in flows even earlier.
All of this may yet unwind smoothly if - and it is a big if - Japan's easing smoothly takes up the slack left by a tightening US and if deleveraging by European banks slows in a controlled manner.
But continuing violent swings in equity, bond and currency markets do not suggest that financial markets have confidence in the ability of central banks to manage the transition.
