銀行業是否處於窮途末路 Lenders struggle to weather storms on all sides

It is more than seven years since the height of the financial crisis, but the run of disastrous banking news during the past few weeks has revived bad memories. Profit warnings, mass job cuts, share price plunges and defensive capital raisings have abounded.

全球金融危機最嚴重時期已過去7年多了，但過去幾周，一輪災難性的銀行業消息喚醒了過去那些痛苦的回憶。盈利預警、大規模裁員、股價暴跌以及防禦性融資，這樣的消息不絕於耳。

With the aftershocks of 2008 still Hitting the global economy — and central banks in the US and UK shying away from normalising ultra-accommodative monetary policies — banks, formerly seen as the powerhouses of growth, are under pressure on every side. Regulation is piling up. Competitors are stealing business. And many lenders are shrinking fast. Is banking in terminal decline?

2008年金融危機的餘波仍在影響全球經濟以及美國和英國央行（它們正迴避超寬鬆貨幣政策的正常化），曾被視為增長推動力的銀行正面臨各方壓力。監管力度在增強。競爭對手正竊取業務。很多銀行正快速收縮規模。銀行業是否正處於窮途末路？

It is certainly in turmoil. Hit by challenging markets and onerous post-crisis regulation, bank profitability has been squeezed hard. Today, even JPMorgan Chase, the most profitable Wall Street bank on recent performance, generates a return on equity of just 12 per cent. That compares with the industry average of about 25 to 30 per cent pre-crisis.

銀行業肯定正處於動盪之中。受到具有挑戰性的市場以及危機過後嚴格監管的影響，銀行利潤率一直被嚴重擠壓。如今，甚至連根據最近表現堪稱華爾街最賺錢銀行的摩根大通(JPMorgan Chase)，也僅僅取得了12%的股本回報率。而危機之前的行業平均水平約為25%至30%。

A decade ago, investors would have slammed JPM’s chief executive Jamie Dimon for such a dismal return.

如果摩根大通10年前取得如此慘淡的回報率，投資者會狠狠抨擊該銀行的首席執行官傑米戴蒙(Jamie Dimon)。

Goldman Sachs , another of the banks that has prospered relative to rivals, suffered a near 40 per cent slump in third-quarter net income. Goldman’s ROE is now just 7 per cent.

另一家較競爭對手錶現較佳的銀行高盛(Goldman Sachs)第三季度淨利潤下滑近40%，股本回報率目前僅為7%。

There are three simplistic schools of thought about what is going on. The first theory is that this is just a blip induced by excessive regulation; the second, that it is merely a return to normal after an exceptional pre-crisis boom; the third suggests the slow death of banking.

對於目前的銀行業狀況有三種簡單看法。第一種看法是這只是由過度監管引發的短暫現象；第二種是，這只不過是在危機前的超常繁榮後的常態迴歸；第三種看法認為銀行業正慢慢滅亡。

Many bankers see evidence of the first theory in Europe, where politicians and regulators have recently signalled a willingness to relax certain new rules, for example regarding the obligatory “ringfencing” of retail banking from riskier investment banking in the UK. “One of the things that European [policymakers] have done, which is quite damaging to the infrastructure, is reining back the European investment banks,” says Colm Kelleher, investment banking chief at Morgan Stanley.

很多銀行人士在歐洲看到了第一種看法的證據，在這裏，政治人士和監管者最近表示願意放鬆某些新規，例如英國有關將零售銀行業強制性“圈護”起來、與風險較高的投行業務隔離的規定。摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)投行業務主管科爾姆凱勒爾(Colm Kelleher)表示：“歐洲（政策制定者）實行的對基礎設施造成相當大破壞的一個舉措是，約束歐洲投資銀行。”

Other bankers cling to the second argument — that we are experiencing a return to normal. Sergio Ermotti , UBS chief executive, says: “When we look back to the mid-90s [and] over the last 15 years, we saw a lot of banks doing a me-too strategy, trying to be everything to everybody, changing their DNAs, doing things they weren’t equipped to do. [That] was the anomaly.”

還有一些銀行人士傾向於第二種觀點：我們正經歷常態迴歸。瑞銀(UBS)首席執行官塞爾吉奧埃爾默蒂(Sergio Ermotti)表示：“當我們回顧上世紀90年代中期（以及）過去15年時，我們看到很多銀行在實行跟隨戰略(me-too strategy)，試圖為所有人提供無所不包的服務，改變銀行自己的DNA，做一些它們沒有能力做的事情。（這）不正常。”

UBS has probably gone further and faster than any other bank to focus on its strengths and ditch businesses that are no longer economic, cutting half its assets and a quarter of its staff since 2007.

在關注自身優勢以及放棄不再具有經濟效益的業務方面，瑞銀或許比其他銀行做的更多而且速度也更快，自2007年以來，瑞銀削減了一半的資產，裁員四分之一。

“The banking model is in many ways getting more like we’re turning the clock back to the early 1990s,” agrees Philipp Hildebrand, former head of the Swiss National Bank and now a senior executive at asset manager BlackRock. “When the history books are written, the aberration will not be the past crisis but the 15 years running up to 2007.”

“從很多角度來看，現在的銀行業模式更像是我們把時鐘撥回到上世紀90年代初，”瑞士央行(SNB)前行長、現任資產管理公司貝萊德(BlackRock)高管的菲利普希爾德布蘭德(Philipp Hildebrand)認為，“在撰寫歷史書時，作為反常現象被寫入的將不是過去這次危機，而是2007年之前的15年。”

The third, and most extreme, thesis about the mayhem in banking — that much of the industry is now in terminal decline — is peddled by those who are challenging banks’ traditional ways of doing things.

對於銀行業亂象的第三種（也是最極端）的看法認為，銀行業正大範圍走入窮途末路，這是由那些正挑戰傳統銀行業的人士提出的。

Peer-to-peer or marketplace lenders — online platforms that match lenders with borrowers — are one of several upstart fraternities that believe they can steadily chip away at many of the banking industry’s longstanding functions.

個人對個人(P2P)或市場貸款機構（將貸款人與借款人匹配的在線平台）是幾個新貴羣體之一，它們認為自己可以穩定侵蝕掉銀行業的許多歷史悠久的職能。

“Clearly banks are under attack on multiple fronts,” says Renaud Laplanche, chief executive of the world’s biggest P2P platform, San Francisco-based Lending Club. “In credit, there is market-based lending. In payments, PayPal is [dominant]. In asset management, you have all the robo advisers. There is a massive competitive threat from tech companies.”

“顯然，銀行正在多個方面遭遇圍攻，”全球最大P2P貸款平台、總部位於舊金山的貸款俱樂部(Lending Club)的首席執行官雷諾拉普朗什(Renaud Laplanche)表示，“在信貸領域，出現了基於市場的貸款。在支付領域，PayPal（佔據主導地位）。在資產管理領域，出現了機器人顧問。銀行面臨來自科技公司的大規模競爭威脅。”

The main advantage new challengers have, says Mr Laplanche, is straightforward: they are unencumbered by old expensive systems, and new regulatory overheads. “Our operating cost is 2 per cent of assets compared with 7 per cent at a typical bank,” he says.

拉普朗什表示，新的挑戰者具備的主要優勢簡單明瞭：它們不受成本高昂的舊系統以及新的監管費用的阻礙。他表示：“我們的營運成本為資產的2%，而銀行平均為7%。”