My Diary 82 --- 美元：格林斯潘的“小心肝”

外匯市場上美元的漲落就是投資者對美國經濟和金融市場結構性和周期性因素忐忑不安心情的最好縮影了。上周格老在倫敦關於美國資本帳戶赤字（Current Account Deficit）問題的演講和本周小布什總統的緊縮預算草案似乎為積弱不振的美元粉飾了太平前景。市場本周也因受到格老憧憬未來口吻的所誤導，將關注焦點集中在美國經濟的成長前景和Fed的短期利率政策上，周二美元兌歐元創下今年以來的高點。

 

 

然而市場這次可能真得判斷錯了，因為格老的演講中有很多條件假設，此外這也還沒到將結構性問題置之不顧的時候啊。格老“安慰”式的講話也可能是想防止市場再次重演去年11月因為他的一次公開評論而引發賣空美元的短期交易行為。還有，小布什總統的緊縮預算草案能否通過國會的三讀辯論也還存在疑問，因為自從他當家後，美國的年平均開支的增長速度為7 %，而且即使降低了預算也不意味著大手大腳慣了的美國人就會減少購買價廉物美的進口商品。另外，在格林斯潘發表演講的當天，San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank舉行了一場經濟研討會，與會的絕大多數經濟學家認為美元的局麵可能變的更壞。紐約大學Stern商學院經濟學家Nouriel Roubini 和牛津大學Brad Setser教授說：“The United States' large trade deficit and rapidly rising external debt to GDP ratio imply that a large future fall in the dollar will be needed to reduce the U.S. trade deficit to more sustainable levels, 而對投資損失的預期將最終使投資人撤離美元資產（shy away from dollar assets）。”

 

 

好了，說了這麽多，也該認認真真讀一遍格林斯潘在2月4號對 European Banking Congress的演講稿了，這裏頭有許多看法和評論還是很值的仔細琢磨和推敲的。

 

 

首先，格老關於貿易和資本帳戶赤字正在改善的提法好象站不住腳。他說，由於美國進出口存在著巨額逆差，隻有出口增長大約達到進口的一半時才有可能控製住貿易赤字飛奔的腳步，這點benchmark已經作到了。然而去年1-11月份的統計顯示，美國進口總額達$1.6 trillion, 比出口$1.04 trillion 高了65%。另外，同比2003年美國出口增加了12%，如果進口增長保持在8%就能穩定赤字，可是實際進口提高了16個百分點。接著，格老又假設說，當美國和貿易夥伴國之間的經濟成長率一樣的時候，美國相對傾向於大量進口。然而我們都知道，美國去年的GDP增長遠高於歐盟和日本等主要工業化國家和地區。再者就是，歐洲出口商品價格相對於歐元的強勁逼供內沒有增加多少。不過這點也並非牢不可破，因為歐洲出口商目前還可以容忍已經被壓縮利潤空間，而不願意提高價格而失去市場份額，但是這種局麵不會持續很久的時間。對於這個問題，格老的解釋.是，“Increases in import prices lower the quantity of imports but leave the resulting value of imports uncertain。”換句話也就是，即使真實進口價值下降，名義價值卻不一定下跌。那麽如果名義貿易赤字沒有變化，美國則仍然需要大量的海外投資來彌補這個缺口的！

 

 

第二點被格老提到的是財政赤字得到縮減和美國家庭儲蓄隨著mortgage refinancing的退潮而提高可能性。事實上這兩方麵也不樂觀。因為目前國會關於布什總統削減政府預算的許多建議均有異議，所以在2005或者2006財政年度實現大幅削減赤字看來是遙不可及了。在家庭方麵，低利率使得很多家庭通過二次抵押獲得更多的消費資金，然而這些因房產泡沫帶來的錢並不代表美國家庭的當前收入，因此儲蓄率並不可能增加很多，即使人們確實放慢生活的腳步了。唯一一點的成哩的是，隨著抵押再貸款的減少，人們花錢的能力確實受到抑製，但是能到多大的程度，這點格林斯潘就跳過不提了！畢竟由儉入奢易，由奢入儉難啊！

 

 

最後一點是關於赤字測不準的模糊問題。格老的演講提高的大量存在於貿易和資本帳戶赤字中的難以量化的不確定性因數。比如：在國際間經濟互動往來的過程中，貨幣管理機構很難準確預測外匯匯率變化以及難以估計貿易和資本赤字的經濟後果。他總結說，在美國調整資本帳戶的過程中，還有許多懸而未決的問題，其中之一就是亞洲國家通過人為幹預匯率市場來支撐美元地位的局麵是很難被扭轉的。然而至少有一點是現在市場都很明白，那就是中國不會停止外匯幹預和人民幣盯緊美元的作法。上周末，周小川行長很清楚的表明中國將根據自己的時間表對人民幣匯率進行調整，並且強調如果考調慮中國的外匯支付和資本流動總體格局，人民幣並沒有象外界說的那樣被“嚴重低估”。我想這個時間表上，暫時還沒有2005年，甚至2006年的字眼吧！

 

 

不過，格林斯潘也確實不愧為世界金融市場的第一人，他講話的時候，幾乎每個人都樹起耳朵在聽，生怕漏掉什麽重要信息！看到格老70多歲的人了，還要屢屢站出來捍衛美元這個“小心肝”，以免自己十幾年來的英名被美元一起拉下台階，我還真想替美元鼓鼓勁，加加油。噢，還有，格老您多保重，這還有11個月的時間得撐著哪！

 

 

 

寫於2005年2月12日多倫多

[不忘中囯]

夜掌櫃“留香”來了，難得墨寶啊！

[夜林]

看到標題想起個笑話，一個護士給病人查肝功，發現他喝酒過多，就告誡他：“小心肝”。病人一楞，回答到：“小寶貝”。。。

[不忘中囯]

Hi, Wei :

Thank you very much for your reply. I think you raise couple points here and let me response to them one by one.

First of all, I agree with you that Forex policy is not the fundamental solution to the global structural imbalances and the runaway of dollar. The balance of economic growth and more cooperation among the major economic entities will be the bottom line. In this sense, I am glad to see that the G7 meeting has invited the Asia’s No.2 and No. 4 economies to their Feb. 4 conference. The mutual understanding and trust among the central banks have become more and more important within the background of globalization.

Back to the near-term global economy, Global Leading Economic Indicators were essentially unchanged in December, signalling sluggish growth over the next 6 to 9 months. The U.S. component edged up, aided by the stimulus to spending from lower bond yields. But there is little sign of renewed momentum elsewhere. For example, the Japan’s planned tax increase raised recession concerns, and that could extend more than 6 years of deflation period of the world’s No.3 economy. Europe, well, is now having some concerns on the inflation over the house price growth, but I don’t think it can be the new engine of global economy in the near future. China is the heir apparent, according to the conventional wisdom, and would lead the so-called “Pacific Century”. However, it is not all good, perhaps, since it is still unclear how much the rest of Asia will be able to compete with China’s low wages and growing market share. Also, another big question mark is China’s banks, undermined by an institutionalized misallocation of capital with little regard fro risk management and the extension of credit.

Secondly, I think it could be just a statistical relationship between the declining export and the rate hikes. For Mr. Chairman, he seems to pay more attention on the balance between inflationary and deflationary pressure and the growth, and this perhaps is the key driver when he is considering the adjustment of monetary policy.


My last point is the shape of curve was also driven by the other market factors. For example, the back end of curve was flattened due to the legal requirements for pension fund to match their durations and the buy-in of foreign central banks. One of my recent observations is that including US, Japan and China are addressing the necessity to deal with the aging problem in the coming decades. Certainly, I may not have to put all this together, but considering the weights of these three countries in the world, it may imply that we will have low inflation and high saving in the future 10-15 years, which is a good news to the outlook of Bond markets and bad to Equities.


Have a good day!