Global markets 全球市场
Storm in a T-bond 国债风暴
America's Treasury market is unsettled by inflation, in another jittery week for the world's investors
在投资者战战兢兢的又一周里，美国国债市场被通胀搅乱

THIS has been another fraught week for the world's financial markets. It began with stock markets tumbling in Europe, Asia and America. And then, just when those markets seemed to have steadied themselves, America's Treasury-bond market, which had hitherto weathered the storms of the past few weeks remarkably well, took a sudden downward lurch.

对于全球金融市场来说，这又是令人提心吊胆的一周。它从欧洲、亚洲和美洲的股市下跌开始，而就当股市看上去已经稳定的时候，美国国债市场，这个至今为止引人注目的经受住过去几周风暴的市场，却突然猛跌。

The cause of the bond market's sell-off on June 14th was another larger-than-expected rise in American consumer prices. In truth, the surprise was a small one, even a rounding error. The core consumer-price index, which excludes food and energy prices, rose by 0.3% in May. Markets had been hoping for 0.2%. But the figure was enough to convince bond-market nvestors that the Federal Reserve was sure to raise interest rates for the 17th time running at its next meeting on June 29th, and might go further in August. Yields on two-year Treasury bonds increased to 5.1%, their highest level in more than five-and-a-half years. Ten-year yields also pulled clear of 5%.

6月14日债券市场下跌的原因是又一个超过预期的美国消费价格上升，实际上这次上升算不上令人吃惊，它还是处于预计误差之内的。不包括食品和能源价格的核心消费价格指数5月份上升了0.3％，而市场预期是0.2％。但是这个数字足以使债券市场投资者相信，美联储肯定会在6月29日的下次会议上决定第17次升息，甚至在8月还将继续升息。2年期国债收益率上涨至5.1％，这是超过5年半以来的最高水平了，10年期国债收益率也开始从5％下降（注1）。

Curiously, America's stock markets rose after the inflation report, having fallen sharply ahead of it. Investors' concerns had been stoked for a good week or more by a host of central bankers, including Ben Bernanke, the Fed chairman, some of his fellow governors and their foreign counterparts. On June 12th Mervyn King, governor of the Bank of England, warned that price pressures in Britain were building up, largely because of rising import prices.

奇怪的是美国股市在通胀报告出来之前急跌，而在之后却反而上升。投资者被一群中央银行家们激起期望一周或几周的好日子，这些银行家包括美联储主席本.伯南克和他的下属以及国外的同行们。6月12日英格兰银行（英国央行）行长默文.金警告英国的价格压力开始上升，其主要是源于进口价格的上涨。

During five weeks of turbulence, however, one of the intriguing anomalies was that the Treasury-bond market had appeared aloof to the inflation fears whipping through global markets. Inflationary expectations, measured by the difference between index-linked and coupon-bearing bonds, fell from mid- May until this week, even after Mr Bernanke issued a stern warning that increases in core inflation were “unwelcome developments”. Gold prices, which are often a hedge against inflation, also fell.

然而在5周的动荡后，一个令人好奇的不寻常之处就是国债市场似乎远离折磨全球市场的通胀担忧。测度通胀预期的指数联动债券和附息债券之差，自5月中旬到本周一直是下降的，甚至在伯南克严厉警告核心通胀率为“不受欢迎的增长”之后也是如此。而通常与通货膨胀对冲的黄金价格也一样下降了。

There have been other curiosities about the performance of financial markets that have made it difficult to gauge the seriousness of the sell-off. Stock market investors have expressed concern that the Fed, anxious to prove its inflation-fighting credentials, may tighten a notch or two too far, just as its prior moves over the past two years begin to take a toll on economic growth. Already, there are indications that the housing market and consumer spending are cooling.

还有令人好奇的是金融市场的表现人使难以衡量下跌的严重性。股市的投资者表达了对美联储的关注，它急于展现战胜通胀的可信度，也许会再次升息一次或两次，正如其在过去的两年里对经济增长预先敲响警钟所做的那样。同时，有迹象表明房产市场和消费支出有降温的趋势。

Yet concerns about a sharp slowdown in growth are not fully reflected in other markets. Corporate bonds, for example, have outperformed shares, giving few indications that economic hardship will raise default rates. Thomson Financial, a data compiler, says that upgrades to corporate-earnings forecasts are still exceeding downgrades in every big stock market except Britain's, which hardly indicates pessimism about the world economy. Earnings yields, too, are attractive compared with bond yields, says Peter Oppenheimer, a strategist at Goldman Sachs. “If you look at the numbers, you wonder why people are as worried as they are.”

然而令人关注的是增长的急剧放缓并未完全反映在其他市场上，比如说公司债券，它的表现超过了股票，这透露出少许经济困难将会提高潜在利率的信息。数据分析公司汤姆森金融称，公司利润预测的提升仍然跑赢了除英国以外的主要股市的下跌，这很难让人对世界经济的表现表示悲观。相比债券收益率来说，股票收益率仍然是具有吸引力的，高盛的战略分析师彼得.奥本海默称：“如果你看到数字，你就会奇怪人们为什么会这样的担心。”

A look at the markets' long-term performance provides further pause for thought. For some investors, the short-term pain is indeed intense. The sufferers include funds that have borrowed a lot and bought shares and commodities shortly before their prices began to tumble. They also include those who sold derivatives offering insurance against falling prices when the sell-off began.

观察市场的长期表现让人不得其解，而对于一些投资者来说，短期的痛苦却实在剧烈，遭受痛苦的包括借入大量资金和在价格大跌之前买入股票和商品的基金，还包括出售在价格下跌时为跌价提供保险衍生品的人（注2）。

Analysts say the selling of derivatives, as much as any other factor, exacerbated the drop in share prices early this week. On June 13th the Dow Jones Industrial Average gave up its gains for the year, which European markets had done previously, before reviving the next day. In Tokyo the Nikkei sank by 4.1%, its worst one-day decline for two years. Russian, Indian and Turkish stock markets tumbled the same day, and the Turkish lira also fell, despite the central bank's best efforts to support the currency. The prices of gold and copper, darlings of the commodities boom, dropped like stones: gold prices suffered their steepest decline in 15 years on June 13th. Even those investors who took what they thought was a safe bet on a falling dollar have been nursing losses.

分析师称出售衍生品和其他因素一起加剧了本周开始时的股价下跌。6月13日道琼斯工业平均指数跌去了一年来的收益；欧洲市场在此前下跌，此后第二天回升；东京日经指数下跌4.1％，创2年来的单日最大跌幅；俄罗斯、印度和土耳其的股市在同日也纷纷下挫，尽管土耳其央行做了最大努力支持其货币，但土耳其里拉仍然下跌。大宗商品的佼佼者黄金和铜，其价格跌势如巨石下坠：黄金价格在6月13日遭受了15年来的最大跌幅，尽管投资者打赌认为美元贬值将会确保其收益不受损失。

There is no telling whether the stock market slide will continue. But anyone who started investing near the start of the bull run three years ago can still boast a handsome profit (see chart 1). Emerging markets, which have born the brunt of the damage since the selling began on May 10th, remain up more than 125% since the beginning of 2003, according to Morgan Stanley's index. India is up by 167% and Turkey by 212%. Even the Chicago Board Options Exchange's VIX volatility index, which is derived from the prices of options on the S&P 500, is still near the bottom of its long-term range, despite having hit a three-year high this week (see chart 2).

没有迹象表明股市的下滑是否会继续，但任何一个在3年前牛市启动时开始投资的人都赚到了值得夸耀的丰厚利润（图1）。根据摩根斯坦利指数，即使是在自5月10日开始抛售从而产生破坏性冲击的新兴市场，相比2003年初仍然上涨了超过125％，印度是上涨了167％，土耳其是212％。基于标准普尔500期权价格的芝加哥期权交易所波动率指数（注3）， 尽管在本周遭受3年来的最大打击，但仍然接近长期趋势的波谷处（图2）。

So what else is making investors jumpy, besides growth and inflation? One prominent fear is that central banks are draining liquidity from the financial system. Abundant liquidity has helped support asset prices from Iceland to India, housing to hedge funds, and commodities to consumer credit. According to Joachim Fels, an economist at Morgan Stanley, for the first time since 2000 the growth of GDP in the world's top five economies is outstripping the growth of the money supply, so that less excess liquidity is available “to churn asset prices”. Yet it has not dried up completely. In much of the world, money remains cheap, and plenty is still being recycled through global bond markets.

除了经济增长和通胀，是什么让投资者变得神经过敏？一个主要的担忧就是中央银行正在减少金融体系中的流动性，充足的流动性支持了从冰岛到印度，从房产到对冲基金，以及商品到消费信贷的资产价格上升。根据摩根斯坦利经济学家乔基姆.费尔斯的观点，自2000年世界前5大经济体首次增长以来，GDP的增长导致了货币的超额供给，所以减少过剩流动性将会“搅动资产价格”。但流动性并不是被完全抽干，在世界的大部分地区，资金仍然是便宜的，而且仍有充足的资金流动在全球的债券市场。

Ultimately, a greater concern must be that the turmoil eventually spreads beyond the financial markets into the wider economy. One of the main causes for that would be a rise in bond yields that went far enough to make it hard for households and firms to repay their debts. For that reason, investors will be watching the Treasury market like hawks.

最后，更主要的关注是金融市场的动荡最终将会向整体经济蔓延。一个主要原因是债券收益率可能会上升到使房产拥有者和公司难以偿还债务的水平，正是由于这一点，投资者们将会像鹰一般注视着国债市场。