中國投資分析師爲年度評選各顯神通

Free iPhones, revealing miniskirts and Chinese new year “red envelope” cash are among the tactics bankers say investment strategists are employing to attract votes for annual rankings in China’s “Oscars of sellside research”.

免費iPhone、暴露的超短裙和新年“紅包”，這是銀行家們口中投資策略師爲在中國的“賣方奧斯卡”年度排名中拉票而祭出的種種招數。

The intense competition for recognition in the annual rankings, run by business magazine New Fortune, is another sign of how Chinese financial markets are adopting western-style practices with domestic characteristics.

爲了在商業雜誌《新財富》(New Fortune)的年度排名中獲得認可而展開的激烈競爭，是表明中國金融市場正在採取具有中國特色的西式做法的又一跡象。

“Winning the award means getting big pay packets rivalling or even surpassing those on Wall Street. The incentive to cheat in an immature system is high,” said Hong Hao, head of research at Bocom International n Hong Kong.

“獲獎意味着拿到媲美甚至超過華爾街水平的鉅額薪資。在一個不成熟的體系中，作弊的動機是很高的，”交銀國際(Bocom International)駐香港的研究主管洪灝說。

Late last year, financial media on the Chinese mainland buzzed after a female construction materials analyst at Changjiang Securities posted studio-quality photos on her WeChat profile during the New Fortune vote period. One showed her wearing a black business suit with a short skirt, lying across a bright red sofa. In a follow-up post, she stated that her WeChat was “purely a record of my personal life” and not intended to court votes.

去年9月，在《新財富》排名投票期間，長江證券(Changjiang Securities)建材團隊一名女分析師在微信朋友圈發了兩張高清照片，此事在中國內地的財經媒體上鬧得沸沸揚揚。在其中一張照片裏，她穿着黑色西裝和短裙，趴在一張大紅色的沙發上。這名分析師後來在微信發朋友圈稱，自己的微信朋友圈內容“純屬個人生活記錄”，並不是爲了拉票。

Bankers say gifts such as iPhones are also common practice on the mainland, as well as the use of digital red envelopes sent via mobile payment apps.

銀行家表示，贈送iPhone這樣的禮物是內地的常見做法，通過移動支付應用發數字紅包也很常見。

In Hong Kong, stricter compliance procedures prevent outright bribery but the new European Mifid II regulations, which force global investment banks to charge their buyside clients for research, are adding new urgency to the yearly campaign. The assumption is that clients will be more willing to pay for research from the higher-ranked analysts.

在香港，有更嚴格的合規程序防止公開賄賂行爲，但新的《歐盟金融工具市場法規II》(Mifid II)規定，投行必須向買方客戶收取研究費用，這使一年一度的評比活動更加迫切。這其中的假設是，客戶將更願意爲排名更高的分析師付研究費。

A new brokerage ranking — where fund managers vote for favoured analysts — by Institutional Investor magazine for Asia ex-Japan is now under way.

《機構投資者》(Institutional Investor)雜誌目前正舉行一項針對亞洲除日本以外地區的新券商排名活動，由基金管理公司爲其青睞的分析師投票。

“People have always taken it seriously, but I’ve never seen it like this before,” said an analyst at a big western investment bank in Hong Kong.

“人們一直都很當回事，但我以前從來沒見過像今天這樣的情況，”一家大型西方投行的一名駐香港的分析師說。

In an attempt to stand out from the crowd, a power sector analyst from Daiwa Capital Markets in Hong Kong recorded a video of himself performing a Korean pop-style dance routine early this month. The stunt worked, as Bloomberg reported that his biography on its financial terminal received more hits than US president Donald Trump’s for a brief period.

爲了脫穎而出，香港大和資本市場(Daiwa Capital Markets)的一名電力業分析師本月早些時候錄製了一段跳韓國pop舞的視頻。這一招奏效了，據彭博社(Bloomberg)報道，這名分析師在彭博金融終端上的簡介的點擊率曾一度超過美國總統唐納德?特朗普(Donald Trump)。

This year, New Fortune strengthened its code of conduct, specifying that research institutions must maintain a “rigorously professional attitude”. Violators will now be banned from the competition for life. The company did not respond to a request for comment.

2017年，《新財富》收緊了評選規則，指出研究機構須“秉持嚴謹專業的態度”。違規者有可能被永久取消參評資格。《新財富》方面未迴應置評請求。

More harmless forms of persuasion are still thriving, however. The lead macro-economy analyst at Guotai Junan Securities, the country’s third-largest brokerage by revenue, composed a poem in Tang dynasty style entitled “Guotai macro’s goose call of everlasting spring”. At Sinolink Securities, a utilities analyst recorded an original song titled,“The song of a simple secondary-market dog”.

然而，更多溫和無害的拉票活動仍進行得如火如荼。中國按收入計的第三大券商國泰君安證券(Guotai Junan Securities)的研究所所長黃燕銘爲帶領宏觀研究團隊的經濟學家花長春賦詞一首，題爲《沁園春?國泰宏觀之雁鳴長春》。國金證券(Sinolink Securities)社服團隊則錄製了名爲《一首簡單的二級狗之歌》的原創歌曲。

Buy-side investors say China’s brokerage industry, which is more crowded and less concentrated than in the west, forces analysts to seek ways to stand out.

買方投資者表示，中國券商業比西方更擁擠、集中度更低，分析師們爲了脫穎而出不得不想盡各種辦法。

“There are a lot of sellside research securities houses and the viewpoints tend to be fairly homogenous, so the competition to distinguish themselves is intense,” said Xu Xiaoqing, managing director at Preston Asset Management, a Shanghai-based quant fund.

“賣方研究證券機構有很多，而觀點往往基本一致，因此讓自己顯得與衆不同的競爭很激烈，”上海量化基金易善資產管理有限公司(Preston Asset Management)的董事總經理徐宵青說。