擔憂股市暴跌 中國政府極力護盤

As the Chinese stock market slumps, the country’s government has stepped in boldly, unveiling a series of measures to prop up shares. But those efforts have done little to stabilize the market, with stocks continuing to slide on Wednesday.

上海——中國股市暴跌之際，該國政府積極介入，已經推出了一系列託市措施。但是這些努力幾乎沒有起到穩定市場的效果，週三，中國股市繼續收跌。

The losses create a political and economic challenge for the nation’s leadership.

對於中國領導層來說，這種暴跌帶來了政治和經濟上的挑戰。

Beijing could face social unrest if the sell-off accelerates, since tens of millions of ordinary investors have plowed their savings into the market. The psychological toll on investors, in turn, could erode consumer confidence, dragging down growth in the already slowing economy.

如果拋售加速，北京可能會面臨社會動盪，因爲數以千萬計的普通投資者把自己的儲蓄投入了股市。投資者承受的心理壓力，可能會削弱消費信心，拖累已經放緩的經濟增長。

“The stock market is connected to the real economy,” says Fraser Howie, a longtime Asia banker and co-author of “Red Capitalism: The Fragile Financial Foundation of China’s Extraordinary Rise.” “When you see such violent moves, you don’t know what kinds of ripples are going to come down.”

“股市與實體經濟相連，”侯偉(Fraser Howie)說。“當你看到這種劇烈的動盪，就不知道會有何種影響蔓延開來。”侯偉長期在亞洲銀行業工作，是《紅色資本主義：中國非凡崛起之下的脆弱金融基礎》(Red Capitalism: The Fragile Financial Foundation of China's Extraordinary Rise)一書的合著者。

The Chinese government is moving swiftly to prevent any broader fallout.

中國政府正在迅速採取行動，防止產生影響更加廣泛的後果。

The country’s central bank has made extra cash available to fund share purchases. Brokerage houses have been ordered to pump billions of dollars into the market. And government-backed funds have earmarked billions more to prop up the shares of flagging companies.

中國央行提供了額外的現金以供買入股票。經紀公司受命將數億資金注入股市。由政府支撐的一個基金則另外撥付了鉅額資金，爲股價低迷的公司護盤。

The mess in China has not roiled global markets. That is partly because the “Chinese financial system is largely sealed off from the global financial system,” Derek Scissors, an analyst at the American Enterprise Institute, said in a report.

全球市場並沒有因爲中國的混亂而陷入動盪。美國企業研究所(American Enterprise Institute)分析師史劍道(Derek Scissors)在一份報告中稱，這在一定程度上是因爲“中國的金融體系在很大程度上與全球金融體系相隔絕”。

For now, the action is domestically focused. China’s Communist Party leaders are trying to restore confidence and stabilize the market before things get too ugly at home, introducing new fixes nearly every day. On Wednesday, China’s Ministry of Finance pledged to “adopt measures to safeguard the stability of capital markets,” and in particular protect state-owned financial enterprises. The move signals that this broad-based effort is being directed from the very top echelons of the state.

目前採取的行動主要集中在國內。中國共產黨的領導人幾乎每天都出臺新的解決措施，試圖在國內情況變得太不堪之前，恢復投資者的信心、穩定市場。週三，中國財政部甚至發誓要採取措施，以保障資本市場的穩定，特別是保護國有金融企業。這顯示出，這場廣泛的運動是由國家最高領導層指揮的。

“There are no buyers, only sellers,” said Francis Cheung, a market analyst at CLSA, the brokerage house. “So the government is buying, and they’ll ramp up buying to stabilize the market.”

“市場上沒有買盤，只有賣盤，”里昂證券(CLSA)的分析師鄭名凱(Francis Cheung)說。“因此政府正在買入，他們還會進一步買入股票，來穩定市場。”

Trouble is, they haven’t found the right formula. Despite the latest batch of moves, China’s markets were battered on Wednesday. In Shanghai, prices plunged 5.9 percent. In Shenzhen, they fell 2.5 percent. The damage is also spreading regionally, to Hong Kong and Japan, where shares also fell sharply.

麻煩的是，他們還沒有找到正確的辦法。儘管採取了這批新的措施，週三中國股市還是遭受重挫。滬市跌5.9%，深市跌2.5%。影響還蔓延到了周邊地區，香港和日本股市也大幅下跌。

While the markets are up over all for the year, the recent downward spiral is creating substantial pain. Both major exchanges are off between 30 percent to 40 percent in six weeks, putting them in bear market territory.

雖然從一年的週期來看，股市仍然有漲幅，但近期的下跌行情造成了巨大打擊。在過去六週裏，這兩大交易所暴跌30%至40%，進入了熊市。

The numbers don’t give the complete picture either. In recent days, many stocks have been halted because of exchange rules that are supposed to guard against too much misery in a single trading session. At least a third of the companies listed on the major stock exchanges had trading in their shares suspended on Wednesday.

但這些數字也沒有勾勒出完整的畫面。近日來，不少個股已經跌停。中國股市有跌停機制，是爲了防止在單一交易日內產生太慘烈的衝擊。在滬深兩市上市的公司，至少有三分之一在週三停牌。

Those market dynamics can create a chain reaction of selling. China’s major exchanges prevent a stock from falling more than 10 percent on any given day. When that happens, analysts say, many investors opt for selling other shares, broadening the sell-off. Then when the market opens the next day, they continue selling down the stock that was previously halted, effectively prolonging the turmoil.

這種規則可能會造成連鎖拋售狀況。滬深兩市不允許股價在同一天跌幅超過10%。分析師說，當一隻股票跌停，很多投資者就選擇賣出其他股票，讓更多股票遭到拋售。而當股市第二天開盤的時候，投資者會繼續拋售前一天跌停的股票，實際上延長了動盪的時間。

“It just delays the correction, so it delays the downturn,” said Mr. Cheung at CLSA.

“這只是推遲了調整，因此延長了低迷時間，”里昂證券的鄭名凱說。

While China’s stock markets have a long history of volatility, the environment is different now. The country’s economy has been sluggish. The stock market is far bigger than it has ever been, second in size only to that of the United States.

雖然中國股市長期以來都有較強的波動性，但現在已經不同於過去。目前該國經濟形勢不景氣。股市規模也遠遠大於以往任何時候，在全球僅次於美國。

And aggressive investors, many of them first-time buyers of equities, have been playing a different game. They were buying stocks with borrowed funds, using leverage as if they were “barbarians at the gate.”

而激進型投資者也在玩一個不同的遊戲，他們中不乏首次炒股的新手。這些人使用槓桿，借錢來炒股，就像“門口的野蠻人”一樣。

The panic, in part, is being driven by concerns about the huge amount of borrowing. Some analysts estimated that margin buying reached about $550 billion, or as much as 15 percent of the value of all tradable shares on the two major exchanges.

人們對負債炒股的金額巨大感到擔憂，這在部分上推動了市場的恐慌情緒。一些分析師估計，目前保證金交易達到約5500億美元，相當於滬深兩市所有流通股價值的15%。

Fear is gripping the market after a phenomenal bull run in which mainland China’s major stock indexes doubled, tripled and even quintupled over the past few years. By the time the market peaked, in early June, share prices in China were among the most expensive in the world, vastly costlier than in the United States, Europe or Hong Kong.

在過去幾年裏，內地主要股指漲了一倍、兩倍甚至三倍。在大牛市之後，市場陷入了恐懼。行情在6月初達到最高點時，中國的股價堪稱是全世界最昂貴的，遠超美國、歐洲和香港的水平。

Investors in mainland China, in other words, had to pay a huge premium to buy domestic shares, a sign the country’s stock market was frothy. Some analysts have noted that the price-to-earnings ratio of companies listed on China’s start-up index, called ChiNext, were far higher than those listed on the Nasdaq stock market in 2000, when the Internet bubble burst.

換句話說，內地投資者購買國內股票時不得不支付溢價。這個跡象表明，中國股市存在泡沫。一些分析人士指出，中國創業板上市公司目前的市盈率，遠高於2000年互聯網泡沫破滅時，納斯達克(Nasdaq)上市公司的水平。

Just a few weeks ago, the pipeline of initial public stock offerings was robust. There was the promise of innovative companies that could use the capital markets, rather than the banks, as a source of cash, and the prospect of new bourses being set up for China’s technology start-ups.

就在幾周前，新股發行的勢頭還頗爲強勁。創新公司有望通過資本市場而非銀行募集資金，並且中國還有望設立新交易所，面向科技初創企業。

China’s state-run news media, including The People’s Daily, helped hype the rip-roaring market. As recently as April, news media said that the bull market had “just begun,” only to warn some weeks later of the risks.

包括《人民日報》在內的中國官方新聞媒體，也幫助了對熱火朝天的股市的炒作。最近一幕發生在4月。新聞媒體當時稱牛市“纔剛剛開始”，但僅過了幾周，就轉而發出了危險警告。

Since then, sentiment has soured, and investors have lost confidence. The worry, analysts said, is that it could be a prolonged downturn, like the one that began in 2007 and lasted about seven years.

在那之後，情緒發生了變化，投資者失去信心。分析人士稱，人們擔心的是，它可能會成爲一場曠日持久的低迷，就像之前那次一樣。那次下跌始於2007年，持續了大約七年。

The sharp decline in prices wiped out trillions of dollars in value from a market that at one point topped $10 trillion. Still, the decline has not yet erased all, or even most, of the gains. China’s major exchanges remain up about 75 percent from a year ago, in part because big state-owned companies have fared better.

股價的大幅下跌導致數萬億美元的市值從股市蒸發，中國股市的總市值一度達到了10萬億美元。然而，下跌尚未抵消掉全部甚至大部分的漲幅。中國兩大交易所的指數仍比一年前高出大約75%。這在一定程度上是因爲大型國企表現得比其他公司好。

In late June, the government cut interest rates, which is ordinarily a good sign for stocks, since it makes them more attractive relative to bank deposits. But share prices fell anyway.

6月末，政府調低了利率。對股票來說，這通常是一個利好，因爲這樣會讓它們比銀行存款更具吸引力。但股價還是在下跌。

Since then, the authorities have introduced a wave of additional measures meant to prop up prices. Stock trading transactions were slashed. I.P.O.s were suspended. Huge stabilization funds were set up to purchase shares. Brokerage houses promised to buy more. And China’s insurance regulator eased rules so that insurers could more easily invest in stocks.

那之後，當局又出臺了一波旨在穩定股價的措施。下調交易費率、暫停新股發行、設立鉅額救市基金買進股票、證券公司承諾增購股票。此外，中國的保險監管機構也放寬了規定，這樣保險公司就更容易投資股市了。

In the face of further selling, the government continued to introduce new measures on Wednesday.

週三當天，面對進一步的拋售，政府繼續出臺新舉措。管理大型國企的國有資產監督管理委員會對很多大型國有上市企業下令，不得減持自己的股票。

China’s State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, which oversees the country’s big state corporations, ordered many such companies with public listings not to reduce holdings of their own stock.

證監會甚至發佈通知，鼓勵大股東和企業高管增持自己公司的股票。證監會在通知中還強調，爲防止內幕交易而對交易時機實施的規則，當下並不適用。

The China Securities Regulatory Commission even issued a notice encouraging major shareholders, directors and executives of companies to increase their holdings of their companies’ stock. The commission emphasized that rules about the timing of insider stock transactions that might deter such purchases would not apply.

瑞銀(UBS)駐香港市場分析師何偉華(Patrick Ho)稱，這是一種“試錯”的辦法。而且鑑於當局希望刺激經濟，並試圖阻止市場過快跌落，可能還會有更多舉措。