LONDON, Oct 12 (Reuters) - The British government unveiled on Wednesday a plan to bolster ailing banks and shore up the financial system. [ID:nL8586784]
Following are some key facts on the package.
RECAPITALISATION
The government will spend at least 50 billion pounds ($87.8 billion) buying stakes in UK banks to improve their capital strength. Banks will be able to draw on 25 billion pounds in the form of preference shares or permanent interest bearing shares (PIBS) by the end of the year. The government will also assist in raising ordinary equity if asked to and is ready to provide a minimum of 25 billion pounds of further support.
LIQUIDITY
The Bank of England will make at least 200 billion pounds ($351 billion) in loans available to banks via auctions in order to ensure sufficient liquidity and stability in the banking system. Until markets stabilise, the bank will continue to conduct auctions to lend sterling for three months, and also dollars for one week, against extended collateral.
DEBT
So that banks can refinance and meet refunding obligations the government will, for an interim period, guarantee what it expects to be about 250 billion pounds ($439 billion) worth of new short and medium-term debt issuance by the banks.
WHO BENEFITS?
The banks that have already confirmed their participation in the recapitalisation scheme are Abbey, which is owned by Spain's Santander (SAN.MC: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Barclays (BARC.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), HBOS (HBOS.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), HSBC (HSBA.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Lloyds TSB (LLOY.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Nationwide Building Society, Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Standard Chartered (STAN.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz). HSBC has said it has no plans to make use of it at present. Other UK financial institutions, including those under foreign ownership, are entitled to apply for membership of the scheme.
(Reporting by Paul Hoskins, editing by Will Waterman)
2008年10月12日星期日
UPDATE 3-UK banks set to unveil bailout plans -source
By Ralph Gowling and Steve Slater
LONDON, Oct 12 (Reuters) - Major British banks are likely to announce their plans to recapitalise early on Monday, a person familiar with the matter said, a move which could see the government take multi-billion pound stakes in several lenders.
Banks are in talks with the government and regulators to determine how much capital each needs from 50 billion pounds ($86 billion) offered by Britain on Wednesday
An announcement is expected before market opens on Monday, said the source who declined to be identified because of sensitivity of the matter.
The Sunday Times said Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), HBOS (HBOS.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Lloyds TSB (LLOY.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Barclays (BARC.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) could ask for a combined 35 billion pound lifeline.
That could result in the government becoming the biggest shareholder -- and even a majority investor -- in RBS and HBOS. It could also force the departure of RBS Chief Executive Fred Goodwin, as shareholders have said he would need to go if the bank seeks to raise more cash.
The government could take seats on the boards of banks, a government source said on Saturday.
Spokespeople for all four banks declined to comment and government officials were not immediately available.
British Finance Minister Alistair Darling, attending a G7 finance ministers' meeting in Washington, said on Saturday the government was to give more details early this week about its already announced 400 billion pound banking rescue plan.
The Sunday Times said the scale of the fund-raising could lead to trading at the London Stock Exchange being suspended to give the market time to digest the impact.
The LSE downplayed that prospect, however. "My information is that the market will open on Monday," a spokesman said.
RBS, which has seen its market value fall to below 12 billion pounds, is to ask ministers to underwrite a 15 billion pound cash call, the Sunday Times said.
HBOS, Britain's biggest provider of mortgages, was seeking up to 10 billion pounds, Lloyds wanted 7 billion pounds and Barclays needed 3 billion pounds, the newspaper said.
Barclays, Britain's second biggest bank, has said it is considering raising capital privately and is expected to try and raise funds from existing shareholders to limit any funds provided by the government.
Lloyds is in the process of buying HBOS and the fundraising could see Lloyds renegotiate the terms of the deal, although both sides were still keen for the merger to go ahead, the Sunday Times said.
Banks were in crisis talks over the weekend with the Treasury, the Financial Services Authority and the Bank of England. The scale of the cash required by each will depend on estimates of more losses from their exposure to subprime mortgages and other financial instruments, the source said.
Last week's multi-billion pound package was aimed at stabilising banks and getting them lending again, but it failed to halt a collapse in share prices.
The package included a 50 billion pound cash injection, guaranteeing interbank lending by 250 billion sterling to help unfreeze wholesale markets, and extending a Bank of England scheme that swaps banks' risky assets for government debt to provide 200 billion pound of cash to the system. (Additional reporting by Myles Neligan; Editing by Anshuman Daga)
LONDON, Oct 12 (Reuters) - Major British banks are likely to announce their plans to recapitalise early on Monday, a person familiar with the matter said, a move which could see the government take multi-billion pound stakes in several lenders.
Banks are in talks with the government and regulators to determine how much capital each needs from 50 billion pounds ($86 billion) offered by Britain on Wednesday
An announcement is expected before market opens on Monday, said the source who declined to be identified because of sensitivity of the matter.
The Sunday Times said Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), HBOS (HBOS.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Lloyds TSB (LLOY.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Barclays (BARC.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) could ask for a combined 35 billion pound lifeline.
That could result in the government becoming the biggest shareholder -- and even a majority investor -- in RBS and HBOS. It could also force the departure of RBS Chief Executive Fred Goodwin, as shareholders have said he would need to go if the bank seeks to raise more cash.
The government could take seats on the boards of banks, a government source said on Saturday.
Spokespeople for all four banks declined to comment and government officials were not immediately available.
British Finance Minister Alistair Darling, attending a G7 finance ministers' meeting in Washington, said on Saturday the government was to give more details early this week about its already announced 400 billion pound banking rescue plan.
The Sunday Times said the scale of the fund-raising could lead to trading at the London Stock Exchange being suspended to give the market time to digest the impact.
The LSE downplayed that prospect, however. "My information is that the market will open on Monday," a spokesman said.
RBS, which has seen its market value fall to below 12 billion pounds, is to ask ministers to underwrite a 15 billion pound cash call, the Sunday Times said.
HBOS, Britain's biggest provider of mortgages, was seeking up to 10 billion pounds, Lloyds wanted 7 billion pounds and Barclays needed 3 billion pounds, the newspaper said.
Barclays, Britain's second biggest bank, has said it is considering raising capital privately and is expected to try and raise funds from existing shareholders to limit any funds provided by the government.
Lloyds is in the process of buying HBOS and the fundraising could see Lloyds renegotiate the terms of the deal, although both sides were still keen for the merger to go ahead, the Sunday Times said.
Banks were in crisis talks over the weekend with the Treasury, the Financial Services Authority and the Bank of England. The scale of the cash required by each will depend on estimates of more losses from their exposure to subprime mortgages and other financial instruments, the source said.
Last week's multi-billion pound package was aimed at stabilising banks and getting them lending again, but it failed to halt a collapse in share prices.
The package included a 50 billion pound cash injection, guaranteeing interbank lending by 250 billion sterling to help unfreeze wholesale markets, and extending a Bank of England scheme that swaps banks' risky assets for government debt to provide 200 billion pound of cash to the system. (Additional reporting by Myles Neligan; Editing by Anshuman Daga)
EU leaders to study crisis plan in Paris
By Tamora Vidaillet
PARIS, Oct 12 (Reuters) - Leaders of euro zone countries hold an emergency meeting in Paris on Sunday hoping to agree on specific, pan-European measures to prevent market panic from triggering the most severe global downturn in decades.
Government officials have suggested action rather than talk could emerge from the first such gathering of the so-called Eurogroup, hastily arranged by President Nicolas Sarkozy after stock markets around the world plunged last week.
The meeting of the 15 countries which use the euro as their currency comes on the heels of a G7 summit of rich nations in Washington which offered no concrete, collective action but promised to do whatever was needed to unfreeze credit markets.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, whose country is not in the euro zone, will also meet Sarkozy on Sunday and a French official said the Eurogroup will likely use a rescue package unveiled by London last week as its reference point.
Speaking just before leaving Washington overnight, French Economy Minister Christine Lagarde said the Eurogroup would go beyond talking about remedies to "put meat, muscles on the bones of that skeleton and to develop, follow up and execute upon it".
Lagarde said leaderes needed to announce "detailed implementation measures as quickly as possible and before the opening of markets if necessary".
Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who met in France on Saturday, said they had prepared "a certain number of decisions" to present at a European summit to try to restore normal flows in blocked credit markets. [ID:nLB553857]
LEADERSHIP QUESTIONMARKS
Sarkozy will meet Brown, European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso at 3.30 p.m. 1330 GMT, before the summit of euro zone leaders kicks off 90 minutes later. Britain's capital London is the largest financial centre in Europe and government sources said Brown had also been invited to sit in on part of the Eurogroup discussions.
Britain's rescue plan makes available 50 billion pounds ($86 billion) of taxpayers' money for injection into its banks and, crucially, calls for underwriting interbank lending, which has all but frozen around the globe.
In an interview with the Observer newspaper on Sunday, Brown said he would try to broker a Europe-wide bail-out of banks modelled on his plan, warning that the 'stakes could not be higher' for jobs, mortgages and the future of the economy."
The Sunday Times newspaper said Britain will launch its biggest retail bank rescue on Monday when the four largest, HBOS, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds TSB and Barclays, ask for a combined 35 billion pound ($60.5 billion) lifeline. [ID:nLC211306].
Other countries are also stepping up their game, with Australia and New Zealand guaranteeing bank deposits.
On Saturday, media reports said Germany was readying a rescue package that could be worth up to $549 billion, including the injection of equity capital worth "double digit" billions into its banks and guarantees for interbank lending. [ID:nLB45144].
Still, question marks over the effectiveness of global efforts remained.
Dutch Finance Minister Wouter Bos criticised the G7 response to the crisis, saying on Saturday that while there was unity over the goals, there was nothing in the final statement from Washington about the instruments that would be used.
Bos lamented a lack of leadership and said the International Monetary Fund should play a leading role in finding solutions. (Additional reporting by James Mackenzie in Washington; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
PARIS, Oct 12 (Reuters) - Leaders of euro zone countries hold an emergency meeting in Paris on Sunday hoping to agree on specific, pan-European measures to prevent market panic from triggering the most severe global downturn in decades.
Government officials have suggested action rather than talk could emerge from the first such gathering of the so-called Eurogroup, hastily arranged by President Nicolas Sarkozy after stock markets around the world plunged last week.
The meeting of the 15 countries which use the euro
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, whose country is not in the euro zone, will also meet Sarkozy on Sunday and a French official said the Eurogroup will likely use a rescue package unveiled by London last week as its reference point.
Speaking just before leaving Washington overnight, French Economy Minister Christine Lagarde said the Eurogroup would go beyond talking about remedies to "put meat, muscles on the bones of that skeleton and to develop, follow up and execute upon it".
Lagarde said leaderes needed to announce "detailed implementation measures as quickly as possible and before the opening of markets if necessary".
Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who met in France on Saturday, said they had prepared "a certain number of decisions" to present at a European summit to try to restore normal flows in blocked credit markets. [ID:nLB553857]
LEADERSHIP QUESTIONMARKS
Sarkozy will meet Brown, European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso at 3.30 p.m. 1330 GMT, before the summit of euro zone leaders kicks off 90 minutes later. Britain's capital London is the largest financial centre in Europe and government sources said Brown had also been invited to sit in on part of the Eurogroup discussions.
Britain's rescue plan makes available 50 billion pounds ($86 billion) of taxpayers' money for injection into its banks and, crucially, calls for underwriting interbank lending, which has all but frozen around the globe.
In an interview with the Observer newspaper on Sunday, Brown said he would try to broker a Europe-wide bail-out of banks modelled on his plan, warning that the 'stakes could not be higher' for jobs, mortgages and the future of the economy."
The Sunday Times newspaper said Britain will launch its biggest retail bank rescue on Monday when the four largest, HBOS, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds TSB and Barclays, ask for a combined 35 billion pound ($60.5 billion) lifeline. [ID:nLC211306].
Other countries are also stepping up their game, with Australia and New Zealand guaranteeing bank deposits.
On Saturday, media reports said Germany was readying a rescue package that could be worth up to $549 billion, including the injection of equity capital worth "double digit" billions into its banks and guarantees for interbank lending. [ID:nLB45144].
Still, question marks over the effectiveness of global efforts remained.
Dutch Finance Minister Wouter Bos criticised the G7 response to the crisis, saying on Saturday that while there was unity over the goals, there was nothing in the final statement from Washington about the instruments that would be used.
Bos lamented a lack of leadership and said the International Monetary Fund should play a leading role in finding solutions. (Additional reporting by James Mackenzie in Washington; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
Finance leaders endorse G7 plan to calm markets
By Lesley Wroughton
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Finance leaders from the International Monetary Fund's 185 member countries on Saturday endorsed a plan by major economies to chart a course out of the credit crisis, hoping the broader support will calm markets.
Egyptian Finance Minister Youssef Boutros-Ghali, who chairs the IMF's policy-steering committee, said the fact that 185 countries, including emerging and developing economies, supported the Group of Seven plan should help restore confidence in financial markets.
"We are committed to the plan of action," Boutros-Ghali said, "This is an essential element for restoring confidence," he added.
The G7 on Friday vowed to take all necessary steps to unfreeze credit markets and ensure banks can raise money, and the IMF warned that concerns about more bank failures was pushing the global financial system to the brink of meltdown.
"This is a systemic crisis and therefore it requires systemic measures," Boutros-Ghali, the new chairman of the International Monetary and Financial Committee, told a news conference.
In a communique, the panel said the size and scale of the crisis called "for exceptional vigilance, coordination, and readiness to take bold action."
The financial crisis has dominated weekend meetings of the IMF and the World Bank, and distracted from Boutros-Ghali's appointment as the first finance minister from an emerging economy to head the IMF panel after years of European dominance.
"The mood in the IMFC was a mood of resolve, of unity, of focus, and of a decision by the membership that this requires cohesion. And that cohesion has been achieved today," Boutros-Ghali told the news conference with IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn.
Strauss-Kahn talked up the significance of the committee's statement supporting G7 action, calling it the first "coordination between advanced and the rest of the world."
Asked whether the G7 plan was enough, Strauss-Kahn said: "In the coming days ... what I expect is that the reaction by the different institutions will be positive enough to unfreeze the different markets and to restore the necessary funding."
TAKING THE REINS AGAIN
He said the committee had agreed the IMF should take the lead in drawing lessons from the crisis and to suggest actions to restore confidence, while also coordinating with other global institutions.
Strauss-Kahn also won member countries' backing for the IMF to activate emergency plans to help the institution respond quickly should a country need help.
Given the fund's universal membership it was the right body for the job, he added.
Strauss-Kahn said the IMF had sufficient resources to help any country in financial peril. Earlier this week he said the fund could also assist major economies, which have traditionally shunned the IMF advice.
In the communique, the IMFC cautioned that the crisis could spill over to emerging economies and pointed to the need for more coordination between advanced and emerging economies.
Earlier in the day, Strauss-Kahn said unprecedented actions by major economies, including simultaneous rate cuts by their central banks, had so far failed to ease panic and fear in markets.
"The measures have not yet achieved the goal of stabilizing markets and bolstering confidence," he said. "Thus, additional moves will likely be needed in the coming months."
He warned that financial conditions were likely to remain very difficult, restraining global growth prospects, while credit conditions should tighten even more.
The IMF has already warned the world economy will slow sharply next year and the recovery will be unusually slow, with Europe and the United States either in or close to a recession.
The immediate challenge for financial policy-makers is to regain control of the financial system, while also nursing economies through the downturn and keeping inflation under control, Strauss-Kahn said.
(Additional reporting by Alister Bull and Emily Kaiser, Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
U.S. space tourist blasts off in Russian rocket
BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan (Reuters) - U.S. business tycoon Richard Garriott blasted off into space aboard a Russian rocket Sunday watched by his father, a NASA astronaut who went into space at the height of the Cold War.
The Russian Soyuz TMA-13 spacecraft lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on the Kazakh steppes as planned just after 1.00 p.m. local time (3 a.m. EDT).
Garriott, a video game developer from Texas, paid $35 million (20.6 million pounds) to fly into space alongside U.S. astronaut Michael Fincke and Russian cosmonaut Yury Lonchakov.
After 10 days in space Garriott, whose father Owen Garriott is a retired NASA astronaut, will return to Earth with the ISS's old crew aboard a Soyuz re-entry vehicle -- a three-man capsule which has malfunctioned on its last two flights.
In April, a Soyuz capsule landed 420 km (260 miles) off course after explosive bolts failed to detonate before re-entry, sending the craft into a steep descent.
Last year, a Soyuz capsule carrying Malaysia's first astronaut also made a so-called "ballistic" landing, similarly blamed on faulty bolts.
(Writing by Maria Golovnina; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
The Russian Soyuz TMA-13 spacecraft lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on the Kazakh steppes as planned just after 1.00 p.m. local time (3 a.m. EDT).
Garriott, a video game developer from Texas, paid $35 million (20.6 million pounds) to fly into space alongside U.S. astronaut Michael Fincke and Russian cosmonaut Yury Lonchakov.
After 10 days in space Garriott, whose father Owen Garriott is a retired NASA astronaut, will return to Earth with the ISS's old crew aboard a Soyuz re-entry vehicle -- a three-man capsule which has malfunctioned on its last two flights.
In April, a Soyuz capsule landed 420 km (260 miles) off course after explosive bolts failed to detonate before re-entry, sending the craft into a steep descent.
Last year, a Soyuz capsule carrying Malaysia's first astronaut also made a so-called "ballistic" landing, similarly blamed on faulty bolts.
(Writing by Maria Golovnina; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
North Korea may resume disablement after deal: South
By Jon Herskovitz
SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea said on Sunday the U.S. decision to remove North Korea from a terrorism blacklist and salvage a faltering nuclear deal could lead Pyongyang to soon resume taking apart its plutonium-producing nuclear plant.
The impoverished and destitute North has longed to be delisted so it can better tap into international finance, see the lifting of many trade sanctions, and use global settlement banks to send money abroad instead of relying on cash-stuffed suitcases.
The decision was made after the North agreed to a series of verification steps of its nuclear plant, a State Department spokesman said in Washington on Saturday.
One hawkish Japanese minister called it regrettable because it left unresolved the fate of Japanese nationals kidnapped by the North.
South Korea's chief nuclear envoy told a Sunday briefing in Seoul: "This government welcomes these moves as an opportunity that would lead to normalization of the six-party talks and North Korea's eventual abandonment of its nuclear programs."
Kim Sook said he believes the North "would be returning to disablement activities," which could be implemented immediately.
Most of the steps, which were started in November, have been completed and were aimed at taking at least a year to reverse.
Last month North Korea lashed out at not being removed by backing away from a disarmament-for-aid deal it made with China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States, and took initial steps to rebuild its plutonium-producing nuclear plant, which was being disabled under the pact's terms.
As part of the deal, North Korea would resume disablement of its nuclear facilities and allow in U.N. and U.S. inspectors who had been ordered out.
ANGRY MINISTER
Japan has a simmering feud with Pyongyang over the fate of its nationals kidnapped decades ago by North Korean agents and still held in the communist state.
"I believe abductions amount to terrorist acts," Japanese Finance Minister Shoichi Nakagawa, a conservative who has taken a hawkish view on the emotive issue, said in Washington, calling the decision "extremely regrettable."
White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Bush spoke to Japan's Prime Minister Taro Aso on Saturday and reaffirmed support for Japan on the abduction of its citizens.
Foreign Minister Hirofumi Nakasone said Tokyo would work with Washington to resolve the abductees issue, and called for a strict verification system.
South Korean envoy Kim, who has asked Japan to contribute to aid incentives given in exchange for disablement, said many countries had bilateral concerns with Pyongyang but the more important issue was ending the North's atomic ambitions.
"PATHETIC"
Some conservatives in Washington wanted a tough verification system that would grant inspectors wide access to any suspected nuclear-linked facility in the secretive state and felt the Bush administration gave away too much for a rare diplomatic success.
Former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton, calling the verification measures agreed on "pathetic."
"North Korea has won about a 95 percent victory here and achieved an enormous political objective in exchange for which the United States has got nothing," Bolton told Reuters.
Under the deal, which still has to be formalized, experts would have access to all declared nuclear sites and "based on mutual consent" to sites not declared by the North, said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.
In addition, the United Nations atomic watchdog body, the IAEA, would play an important role in verifying Pyongyang's atomic activities and the United States could take out samples of nuclear materials to check.
North Korea conducted its only nuclear test two years ago using plutonium. U.S. officials said verification would also check on a suspected program to enrich uranium for weapons as well as proliferation.
If energy-starved North Korea backed away, it would remain on the terror list and stand to lose out on about half a million tonnes of heavy fuel oil, or aid of equal value, that had been pledged to it for previous progress in made in disarmament.
(Additional reporting by Jack Kim in Seoul, and Sue Pleming, Deborah Charles and Jeremy Pelofsky in Washington and the Tokyo bureau; Editing by Jerry Norton)
Chrysler, GM have merger talks: sources
By Kevin Krolicki and Jui Chakravorty Das
DETROIT/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Chrysler LLC has had talks with General Motors Corp about a deal to combine the No. 1 and No. 3 American automakers at a time when both are struggling to cut costs and shore up cash, according to three people familiar with the matter.
Talks between Chrysler's majority owner, Cerberus Capital Management LP, and GM began several weeks ago and were initiated by the private equity fund, according to the people familiar with the talks, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
But the talks got hung up on the question of how to value Chrysler's loss-making auto operations, which include the Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep brands, two of the sources said.
At the center of the proposed deal was a swap with GM that would give the private equity firm the 49 percent stake in GM's finance company GMAC that it does not already own. In exchange, Cerberus would hand over the Chrysler auto business to GM.
But GM rebuffed that offer because it saw it as overpaying for Chrysler. It would also have meant taking on the challenge of cutting overlapping brands, dealerships, factories and union-represented workers, one source said.
Cerberus bought an 80.1 percent stake in Chrysler from Daimler AG in 2007 for $7.4 billion. It paid the same amount to GM in 2006 for a 51 percent stake in GMAC.
Although the Cerberus deal valued the No. 3 automaker at over $9 billion, a current value for Chrysler's auto operations could be less than $1 billion, the source said.
In its efforts to shop all of Chrysler or a stake in it, Cerberus contacted other companies, but those overtures went nowhere, all three sources said. Those companies included Renault-Nissan, Italy's Fiat, India's Tata Motors Ltd and Canada's Magna International, the sources said.
Cerberus also had talks with a number of Chinese automakers, including Chery Automobile Co Ltd, FAW Car Co and SAIC Motor, about access to its U.S. dealer network, two of the sources said.
The GM and Chrysler talks come as Ford Motor Co, the other struggling U.S. automaker, is planning to sell most or all of its $1.4 billion stake in Japan's Mazda Motor Co, according to a person briefed on the plan.
NOT YOUR GRANDFATHER'S BIG THREE
U.S. auto sales have fallen to 15-year lows, leaving Detroit's so-called "Big Three" automakers scratching for market share as they compete with foreign competitors in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
Analysts said GM, Ford and Chrysler could be expected to take urgent measures to safeguard their cash, but they also questioned what GM would gain from a merger with Chrysler.
GM has been burning through about $1 billion per month as it looks to cut costs, sell assets and borrow to raise cash.
"On the surface, it frankly doesn't make sense," said Aaron Bragman, an analyst with Global Insight. "The acquisition of Chrysler wouldn't solve any problems GM has and would only make some existing ones worse."
Cerberus declined to comment.
GM declined to comment on whether it had any talks with Chrysler, but said talks with other automakers were a routine part of business. A Chrysler spokeswoman said the automaker was pursuing a number of potential partnerships, but declined to comment specifically on GM.
Any deal would hinge on completion of the sale of Daimler AG's remaining 19.9 percent stake in Chrysler to Cerberus, two of the sources said. Cerberus last month said it had approached Daimler to buy that stake.
A Daimler spokesman could not be reached for comment.
Global Insight's Bragman said unloading Chrysler would benefit Cerberus since the private equity firm would end up with GMAC just as a $700 billion U.S. government bailout fund to buy distressed debt begins operations.
"They would get rid of an auto company that has weighed on their results, and they would get full control of GMAC just as the government is about to come to the rescue," Bragman said.
BACK TO THE TABLE
Talks between GM and Chrysler revive discussions about a potential merger that started in early 2007 when Daimler began the process of selling off Chrysler. Later that year Chrysler was sold to Cerberus.
GM Chief Executive Rick Wagoner also said last year that he saw some potential for Cerberus to combine GMAC with Chrysler Financial, the finance company affiliated with the automaker.
Analysts have questioned Chrysler's ability to survive as a stand-alone automaker, given its reliance on sales to North America for some 90 percent of its revenue.
A deal to sell Chrysler would clearly benefit Cerberus, said Gerald Meyers, a professor at the University of Michigan business school and former auto executive.
"Cerberus, to begin with, is impatient money. Their way of operating is to get in, make a killing and get out. Well, they got in, they got killed and they've got to get out," he said.
Combining GM with Chrysler would match companies with similar weaknesses, other analysts said. Both GM and Chrysler have been hurt by their reliance on sales of trucks and SUVs.
"It would be taking two cash-burning companies and put them together so they burn cash faster," said Erich Merkle, an auto industry consultant with Crowe Horwath.
GM shares fell to near a 60-year low this week on fears the global financial crisis could derail its turnaround plans. The shares closed Friday at $4.89 and have lost 80 percent since the start of the year.
On Friday, GM and Ford both ruled out bankruptcy protection as an option.
GM, Ford and Chrysler are all eligible for a share of $25 billion in low-cost federal loans to retool factories in order to build more fuel-efficient vehicles.
But the disbursement of those funds is expected to take months as regulators put rules into place that will govern distribution of the funds.
More immediately, GM could seek a direct loan from the U.S. Federal Reserve, business publication Barron's said on Saturday.
A Fed spokesman declined comment. A GM spokesman said it was not actively pursuing loans from the Fed but wanted to keep all of its options open.
(Reporting by Kevin Krolicki in Chicago and Jui Chakravorty Das in New York; Additional reporting by Ben Klayman in Chicago; Editing by Toni Reinhold)
DETROIT/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Chrysler LLC has had talks with General Motors Corp about a deal to combine the No. 1 and No. 3 American automakers at a time when both are struggling to cut costs and shore up cash, according to three people familiar with the matter.
Talks between Chrysler's majority owner, Cerberus Capital Management LP, and GM began several weeks ago and were initiated by the private equity fund, according to the people familiar with the talks, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
But the talks got hung up on the question of how to value Chrysler's loss-making auto operations, which include the Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep brands, two of the sources said.
At the center of the proposed deal was a swap with GM that would give the private equity firm the 49 percent stake in GM's finance company GMAC that it does not already own. In exchange, Cerberus would hand over the Chrysler auto business to GM.
But GM rebuffed that offer because it saw it as overpaying for Chrysler. It would also have meant taking on the challenge of cutting overlapping brands, dealerships, factories and union-represented workers, one source said.
Cerberus bought an 80.1 percent stake in Chrysler from Daimler AG in 2007 for $7.4 billion. It paid the same amount to GM in 2006 for a 51 percent stake in GMAC.
Although the Cerberus deal valued the No. 3 automaker at over $9 billion, a current value for Chrysler's auto operations could be less than $1 billion, the source said.
In its efforts to shop all of Chrysler or a stake in it, Cerberus contacted other companies, but those overtures went nowhere, all three sources said. Those companies included Renault-Nissan, Italy's Fiat, India's Tata Motors Ltd and Canada's Magna International, the sources said.
Cerberus also had talks with a number of Chinese automakers, including Chery Automobile Co Ltd, FAW Car Co and SAIC Motor, about access to its U.S. dealer network, two of the sources said.
The GM and Chrysler talks come as Ford Motor Co, the other struggling U.S. automaker, is planning to sell most or all of its $1.4 billion stake in Japan's Mazda Motor Co, according to a person briefed on the plan.
NOT YOUR GRANDFATHER'S BIG THREE
U.S. auto sales have fallen to 15-year lows, leaving Detroit's so-called "Big Three" automakers scratching for market share as they compete with foreign competitors in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
Analysts said GM, Ford and Chrysler could be expected to take urgent measures to safeguard their cash, but they also questioned what GM would gain from a merger with Chrysler.
GM has been burning through about $1 billion per month as it looks to cut costs, sell assets and borrow to raise cash.
"On the surface, it frankly doesn't make sense," said Aaron Bragman, an analyst with Global Insight. "The acquisition of Chrysler wouldn't solve any problems GM has and would only make some existing ones worse."
Cerberus declined to comment.
GM declined to comment on whether it had any talks with Chrysler, but said talks with other automakers were a routine part of business. A Chrysler spokeswoman said the automaker was pursuing a number of potential partnerships, but declined to comment specifically on GM.
Any deal would hinge on completion of the sale of Daimler AG's remaining 19.9 percent stake in Chrysler to Cerberus, two of the sources said. Cerberus last month said it had approached Daimler to buy that stake.
A Daimler spokesman could not be reached for comment.
Global Insight's Bragman said unloading Chrysler would benefit Cerberus since the private equity firm would end up with GMAC just as a $700 billion U.S. government bailout fund to buy distressed debt begins operations.
"They would get rid of an auto company that has weighed on their results, and they would get full control of GMAC just as the government is about to come to the rescue," Bragman said.
BACK TO THE TABLE
Talks between GM and Chrysler revive discussions about a potential merger that started in early 2007 when Daimler began the process of selling off Chrysler. Later that year Chrysler was sold to Cerberus.
GM Chief Executive Rick Wagoner also said last year that he saw some potential for Cerberus to combine GMAC with Chrysler Financial, the finance company affiliated with the automaker.
Analysts have questioned Chrysler's ability to survive as a stand-alone automaker, given its reliance on sales to North America for some 90 percent of its revenue.
A deal to sell Chrysler would clearly benefit Cerberus, said Gerald Meyers, a professor at the University of Michigan business school and former auto executive.
"Cerberus, to begin with, is impatient money. Their way of operating is to get in, make a killing and get out. Well, they got in, they got killed and they've got to get out," he said.
Combining GM with Chrysler would match companies with similar weaknesses, other analysts said. Both GM and Chrysler have been hurt by their reliance on sales of trucks and SUVs.
"It would be taking two cash-burning companies and put them together so they burn cash faster," said Erich Merkle, an auto industry consultant with Crowe Horwath.
GM shares fell to near a 60-year low this week on fears the global financial crisis could derail its turnaround plans. The shares closed Friday at $4.89 and have lost 80 percent since the start of the year.
On Friday, GM and Ford both ruled out bankruptcy protection as an option.
GM, Ford and Chrysler are all eligible for a share of $25 billion in low-cost federal loans to retool factories in order to build more fuel-efficient vehicles.
But the disbursement of those funds is expected to take months as regulators put rules into place that will govern distribution of the funds.
More immediately, GM could seek a direct loan from the U.S. Federal Reserve, business publication Barron's said on Saturday.
A Fed spokesman declined comment. A GM spokesman said it was not actively pursuing loans from the Fed but wanted to keep all of its options open.
(Reporting by Kevin Krolicki in Chicago and Jui Chakravorty Das in New York; Additional reporting by Ben Klayman in Chicago; Editing by Toni Reinhold)
Obama opens 6-point lead over McCain
By Andrew Quinn
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrat Barack Obama has opened a 6-point lead over Republican rival John McCain in the U.S. presidential race, according to a Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll released on Sunday.
Obama leads McCain by 49 percent to 43 percent among likely U.S. voters in the latest four-day tracking poll, his widest lead since the poll was started on Tuesday. It was up from a 4-point lead on Saturday. The poll has a margin of error of 2.9 percentage points.
Pollster John Zogby said Obama's lead was now statistically significant.
"As we watch each day, it is clear that he has gone from a 2-point lead to a 3-point lead on up to 6 points," Zogby said. "It is certainly trending his way."
With just over three weeks to go before the November 4 election, the poll showed Obama gaining traction among independent voters who now back him by a 21-point margin.
Among women, another crucial group, the Illinois senator held a solid 12-point lead, while the two candidates were tied among male voters at 45 percent apiece.
Obama has widened his lead as weeks of economic turmoil shook financial markets, causing stock markets to plunge and fueling voter concern over pocketbook issues.
Young voters aged 18 to 29 backed Obama by a 20-point margin, and he also held a double-digit lead among those who reported they had registered to vote in the past six months.
McCain had a 10-point lead among white voters, while Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president, won the support of 92 percent of black voters, one of the Democratic Party's most loyal constituencies.
Zogby said McCain, a former Navy pilot and Vietnam prisoner of war, appeared to be failing to connect with many voters on the issue of the economy, and a wave of attacks leveled against Obama by the McCain campaign also fell flat.
"Clearly the negative campaigning isn't working," Zogby said, noting that Obama was winning support among some voters in even the strongest traditional Republican voting blocs.
"He's getting 19 percent support among conservatives and 35 support among born-again or evangelical (Christian) voters, which is pretty substantial. I wonder if the McCain campaign ought to be raising some red flags," he said.
The rolling tracking poll surveyed 1,206 likely voters in the presidential election. In a tracking poll, the most recent day's results are added while the oldest day's results are dropped in an effort to track changing momentum.
(Editing by Peter Cooney)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrat Barack Obama has opened a 6-point lead over Republican rival John McCain in the U.S. presidential race, according to a Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll released on Sunday.
Obama leads McCain by 49 percent to 43 percent among likely U.S. voters in the latest four-day tracking poll, his widest lead since the poll was started on Tuesday. It was up from a 4-point lead on Saturday. The poll has a margin of error of 2.9 percentage points.
Pollster John Zogby said Obama's lead was now statistically significant.
"As we watch each day, it is clear that he has gone from a 2-point lead to a 3-point lead on up to 6 points," Zogby said. "It is certainly trending his way."
With just over three weeks to go before the November 4 election, the poll showed Obama gaining traction among independent voters who now back him by a 21-point margin.
Among women, another crucial group, the Illinois senator held a solid 12-point lead, while the two candidates were tied among male voters at 45 percent apiece.
Obama has widened his lead as weeks of economic turmoil shook financial markets, causing stock markets to plunge and fueling voter concern over pocketbook issues.
Young voters aged 18 to 29 backed Obama by a 20-point margin, and he also held a double-digit lead among those who reported they had registered to vote in the past six months.
McCain had a 10-point lead among white voters, while Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president, won the support of 92 percent of black voters, one of the Democratic Party's most loyal constituencies.
Zogby said McCain, a former Navy pilot and Vietnam prisoner of war, appeared to be failing to connect with many voters on the issue of the economy, and a wave of attacks leveled against Obama by the McCain campaign also fell flat.
"Clearly the negative campaigning isn't working," Zogby said, noting that Obama was winning support among some voters in even the strongest traditional Republican voting blocs.
"He's getting 19 percent support among conservatives and 35 support among born-again or evangelical (Christian) voters, which is pretty substantial. I wonder if the McCain campaign ought to be raising some red flags," he said.
The rolling tracking poll surveyed 1,206 likely voters in the presidential election. In a tracking poll, the most recent day's results are added while the oldest day's results are dropped in an effort to track changing momentum.
(Editing by Peter Cooney)
IMF warns of meltdown; France says Europe to act
By Lesley Wroughton and James Mackenzie
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The IMF warned the world's financial system was near meltdown and France promised that a meeting of European leaders in Paris will detail measures to keep a market panic from triggering the most severe global downturn in decades.
The Sunday Times newspaper said Britain will launch its biggest retail bank rescue on Monday when the four largest, HBOS, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds TSB and Barclays, ask for a combined 35 billion pound ($60.5 billion) lifeline.
The International Monetary Fund said it backed a Group of Seven plan to try to stabilize markets and urged "exceptional vigilance, coordination and readiness to take bold action" to contain a firestorm that pushed global stocks to five-year lows on Friday.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, meeting in France, said they had "prepared a certain number of decisions" to present at a European summit on Sunday to try to restore normal flows in blocked credit markets.
France's Economy Minister, Christine Lagarde, said just before leaving Washington the Sunday gathering would go beyond talking about remedies to "put meat, muscles on the bones of that skeleton and to develop, follow up and execute upon it."
The United States appealed for patience but the IMF said time was short after the Group of Seven industrialized nations failed to agree on concrete measures to end the crisis at a meeting on Friday.
"Intensifying solvency concerns about a number of the largest U.S.-based and European financial institutions have pushed the global financial system to the brink of systemic meltdown," IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn said.
Strauss-Kahn later expressed hope that government actions will prove powerful enough to persuade banks to resume lending and bring an end to a spreading credit crunch.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The IMF warned the world's financial system was near meltdown and France promised that a meeting of European leaders in Paris will detail measures to keep a market panic from triggering the most severe global downturn in decades.
The Sunday Times newspaper said Britain will launch its biggest retail bank rescue on Monday when the four largest, HBOS, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds TSB and Barclays, ask for a combined 35 billion pound ($60.5 billion) lifeline.
The International Monetary Fund said it backed a Group of Seven plan to try to stabilize markets and urged "exceptional vigilance, coordination and readiness to take bold action" to contain a firestorm that pushed global stocks to five-year lows on Friday.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, meeting in France, said they had "prepared a certain number of decisions" to present at a European summit on Sunday to try to restore normal flows in blocked credit markets.
France's Economy Minister, Christine Lagarde, said just before leaving Washington the Sunday gathering would go beyond talking about remedies to "put meat, muscles on the bones of that skeleton and to develop, follow up and execute upon it."
The United States appealed for patience but the IMF said time was short after the Group of Seven industrialized nations failed to agree on concrete measures to end the crisis at a meeting on Friday.
"Intensifying solvency concerns about a number of the largest U.S.-based and European financial institutions have pushed the global financial system to the brink of systemic meltdown," IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn said.
Strauss-Kahn later expressed hope that government actions will prove powerful enough to persuade banks to resume lending and bring an end to a spreading credit crunch.
THE WORLD MUST REPEL CALLS TO CONTAIN COMPETITIVE MARKETS 全球金融安危取决于股市
The surprise of recent months is not that global economic growth is slowing, but that there is any growth at all. The credit crunch of the past year has not followed the path of recent economically debilitating episodes characterised by a temporary freezing up of liquidity – 1982, 1989, 1997-98 come to mind. This crisis is different – a once or twice a century event deeply rooted in fears of insolvency of major financial institutions.
近几个月，令人惊讶的事情并非全球经济增长正在放缓，而是全球经济竟然还在增长。去年的信贷危机并未遵循最近几次经济疲软时期的老路——这几次的特点都是临时性的流动性冻结，如1982年、1989年以及1997年至1998年。这场危机与众不同，它是一次五十年或者百年一遇的事件，深深根植于人们对主要金融机构资不抵债的恐惧。
This crisis was not brought to closure by the world's central banks' injection of huge doses of short-term liquidity. Only when sovereign credits were substituted for private bank credit, first in the case of the UK (Northern Rock) and subsequently in the case of the US (Bear Stearns), was a semblance of stability restored to markets. But the London Interbank Offered Rate spreads on overnight index swaps and credit default swaps of financial institutions have not returned to the modest pre-crisis levels. Fears of insolvency have not, as yet, been fully set aside. There may be numbers of banks and other financial institutions that, at the edge of defaulting, will end up being bailed out by governments.
全球央行向市场注入巨量的短期流动性，并未让这场危机就此终结。只有当主权信用替代了私人银行信用时，市场才恢复了表面上的稳定——最初是英国的北岩(Northern Rock)案，随后是美国的贝尔斯登(Bear Stearns)案。但是，伦敦同业拆借利率(LIBOR)与隔夜指数掉期(Overnight Index Swaps)和金融机构信贷违约掉期(Credit Default Swaps)之间的差值，都没有恢复到危机之前的温和水平。对资不抵债的恐惧仍未完全消除。或许有许多银行及其它金融机构处于债务违约边缘，最终将由政府出面救助。
The insolvency crisis will come to an end only as home prices in the US begin to stabilise and clarify the level of equity in homes, the ultimate collateral support for much of the financial world's mortgage-backed securities. However, US home prices will stabilise only when the absorption of the huge excess of single-family vacant homes that emerged as the US housing boom peaked in 2006 is much further advanced than it is now. New single-family home completions are currently barely under the rate of home demand generated by household formation and replacement needs. Only later this year will the current suppressed level of housing starts be reflected in completion levels consistent with a rapid rate of liquidation of the inventory glut, and this, of course, assumes that current levels of demand for housing hold up.
只有等到美国住房价格开始企稳、住房资产水平开始清晰之时，这场偿付能力危机才会终结——住房资产是金融行业很多抵押担保证券的最终抵押品。不过，2006年美国房地产繁荣顶峰期出现了大量过剩的单户型空置住房，只有当市场的消化吸收远远领先于现在水平之时，美国住房价格才会企稳。目前，新建单户型住房的完工率勉强低于因组建家庭和更换需求产生的住房需求率。只有等到今年晚些时候，新屋完工率才会反映出受压抑的新屋开工率，过剩存量的清理速度才会更快。当然，这是在假设当前的住房需求水平能够维持的前提下。
Pending that outcome, the price of equities worldwide will determine whether the international financial system can maintain a modicum of stability as it eases out of its credit crunch, or falls back into another period of angst and turmoil.
在这一结果出现之前，正在逐渐摆脱信贷危机的国际金融体系能否维持些许稳定，抑或是否又落入另外一个焦虑和混乱期，一切将取决于全球股市。
The optimistic case rests on the business world beyond finance. Given this past year's vast impairment of financial intermediation, nonfinancial corporate business has held up surprisingly well, contributing to a flow of corporate earnings that has helped sustain a stressed global stock market. To be sure, global stock prices are off a fifth from their October 2007 peaks, but still hover at levels last seen in 2006, a demonstrably less fear-ridden period than currently prevails.
乐观情况存在于金融业以外的行业。鉴于金融中介机构在过去一年里的巨额减值，非金融企业的出色表现出人意料，贡献了良好的企业收益，帮助支撑了重重压力下的全球股市。诚然，全球股价已经从2007年10月峰值跌落五分之一，但它仍停留在2006年的水平之上，而那一时期的市场明显不像当前这样普遍为恐惧所驱使。
A sustained level of global equity prices will be critical if banks are to recapitalise themselves at the higher levels daunted investors now require. The pool of capital is being augmented by a reasonably high level of saving (nearly 24 per cent of world gross domestic product), up significantly from earlier this decade. The flow of new saving will provide some support.
如果银行想要遵照担惊受怕的投资者目前的要求，在更高股价水平上对自己进行增资，那么，一个稳定的全球股价水平至关重要。较高的储蓄率（几乎相当于全球GDP的24%）增大了资本池，大大高于本世纪最初几年的水平。新增储蓄流将提供一些支持。
Capital gains, however, are just as important. This can best be observed in the context of the consolidated balance sheet of the world economy. All debt and derivative claims offset in global accounting, leaving real physical and intellectual assets and their market value reflected as net worth. Capital gains cannot finance new physical investment, but do add to global net worth. If, for whatever reason, discounting of prospective future earnings engendered by the world's physical capital stock declines, the market value of that capital stock rises with no offsetting liability. There is accordingly a larger value of equity shoring up the capital of financial or nonfinancial businesses. Should that discount rate reverse, the value of world equity will fall. Consequently, lower global stock prices could impede the recapitalisation of banks and other financial institutions. Debt issuance would also be suppressed as it leverages off the level of equity.
不过，资本利得也同样重要。在世界经济综合资产负债表的字里行间最能观察到这一点。所有债务和衍生品所有权在全球账目下相互抵消，而实物和无形财产以及它们市值则反映为净值。资本利得虽不能为新的实物投资提供融资，但却可以增加全球净值。如果出于某种原因，我们对全球实物资本存量下降引起的预期未来收益进行贴现，那么，该资本存量的市值将出现增长，却无债务可抵消。相应的，将有更大价值的股本来支撑金融业务和非金融业务的资本。一旦贴现率反转，全球股价将出现下跌。因此，更低的全球股价可能会阻碍银行及其它金融机构的增资。由于债务水平基于资产水平，债务发现也会受到抑制。
Globalisation is at the root of the past decade's unprecedented surge in world economic activity. The growth in the volume of global trade has far exceeded the pace of world real GDP growth for decades. Between 2001 and 2007 global cross-border investments (at market values) rose almost two-thirds faster than world nominal GDP, according to data from the International Monetary Fund.
全球化是过去10年全球经济活动史无前例增长背后的根本原因。几十年来，全球贸易量的增速远超过全球真实GDP的增速。国际货币基金组织(IMF)的数据显示，2001年至2007年间，全球跨境投资（以市值计算）的增长几乎比全球名义GDP的增长快三分之二。
The economic edifice – market capitalism – that has fostered this expansion is now being pilloried for the pause and partial retrenchment. The cause of our economic despair, however, is human nature's propensity to sway from fear to euphoria and back, a condition that no economic paradigm has proved capable of suppressing without severe hardship. Regulation, the alleged effective solution to today's crisis, has never been able to eliminate history's crises.
推动上述扩张的经济体系——市场资本主义——现在已被套上了枷锁，它将出现短暂的停歇或部分的删减。不过，是人类在恐惧与兴奋之间摇摆的天性让我们陷于经济困境，没有任何经济模式能够抑制这种情况的出现却不带来严重的后果。监管是人们所谓能有效解决当前危机的方案，但它在历史上从未能够消除过危机。
A financial crisis is heralded, in fact defined, by sharp discontinuities of asset prices. The crisis must thus be unanticipated. The fact that risk was heavily underpriced for much of this decade was broadly recognised in the financial community, but the timing of the sharp price correction was nonetheless a surprise.
资产价格的剧烈波动预告了金融危机的来临，事实上也是对金融危机的定义。因此，这场危机应该在意料之外。这10年的很多时间里，风险被严重低估，这个事实在金融界得到广泛承认，但急剧价格修正选择的时机仍然出乎意料。
Recent history is replete with such underpricing persisting for years. Those market players who withdraw from “long” commitments at the first sign of an excess of exuberance, risk losing market share. They thus continue “to dance” as Chuck Prince, the former Citigroup chairman put it, but always assume they will have time to exit the markets. The vast majority invariably fail. When the current crisis emerged, it was assumed that the weak links would be unregulated hedge and private funds. The losses, however, have been predominately in the most heavily regulated institutions – banks.
近代史充满了这种持续数年低估风险的现象。那些一出现过度繁荣的迹象就收回“长期”承诺的市场参与者，面临失去市场份额的风险。因此，就像花旗集团(Citigroup)前董事长查克?普林斯(Chuck Prince)所说，他们继续“跳舞”，但又总是想当然地认为自己有退出市场的时间。绝大多数不可避免会失败。当前这场危机初露端倪之时，人们认为薄弱的环节会是那些未受管制的对冲基金和私募基金。然而，绝大多数损失都出现在监管最严格的机构——银行。
We may not easily confront or accept the price dynamics of home and equity prices, but we can fend off cries of political despair which counsel the containment of competitive markets. It is essential that we do so. The remarkably strong performance of the world economy since the near universal adoption of market capitalism is testament to the benefits of increasing economic flexibility.
或许，我们无法轻易反对或接受房价和股价的变动，但我们能抵御政治绝望者建议遏制竞争市场的叫喊。我们这样做至关重要。世界经济在市场资本主义几乎普及之后取得的引人注目的强劲表现，证明了日益增加的经济灵活性的益处。
It has become hard for democratic societies accustomed to prosperity to see it as anything other than the result of their deft political management. In reality, the past decade has seen mounting global forces (the international version of Adam Smith's invisible hand) quietly displacing governmentcontrol of economic affairs. Since early this decade, central banks have had to cede control of long-term interest rates to global market forces. Previously heavily controlled economies – such as China, Russia and India – have embraced competitive marketsin lieu of bureaucratic edict. The danger is that some governments, bedevilled by emerging inflationary forces, will endeavour to reassert their grip on economic affairs. If that becomes widespread, globalisation could reverse – at awesome cost.
对于习惯了繁荣的民主社会而言，它们已经很难认识到，这种繁荣不是他们熟稔的政治管理的结果，而是由其它原因造成的。事实上，过去10年间，不断增强的全球力量——亚当?斯密(Adam Smith)“看不见的手”的国际版本——悄悄取代了政府对经济事务的控制。自21世纪初以来，各国中央银行不得不放弃对长期利率的控制，将其交给全球市场力量。之前管控严密的经济体——如中国、俄罗斯和印度——都已接纳竞争性市场，取代官僚法令。如今的危险在于，一些饱受通胀激增之苦的政府会试图重新掌控经济事务。如果上述情况普遍出现，全球化进程可能出现倒退——我们也将为此付出可怕的代价。
The writer is the former chairman of the US Federal Reserve
本文作者是美联储(US Federal Reserve)前主席。
After The Bubble, Ghost Towns Across America 牛市已乘黄鹤去 此地空余烂尾楼
Dennis Pflueger and his wife won a rent-free year in a nice new house in an expensive subdivision not far from the headquarters of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. As part of the prize, they then have the option to buy the four-bedroom home for $452,000.
丹尼斯·弗卢格(Dennis Pflueger)和他的妻子赢得了在一栋漂亮的新居里免房租居住一年的机会。这栋房子位于沃尔玛(Wal-Mart Stores Inc.)总部附近的一处高档住宅区。作为奖励的一部分，他们还可以选择花上45.2万美元买下这栋有四间卧室的居室。
Mr. Pflueger, a telephone-cable installer who describes himself as an 'old redneck,' is in the middle of his free year. But the Pfluegers are a bit lonely. Just one other family lives in any of the 28 new or unfinished houses on Foxboro Court. Up the street, a sign announcing 'Elegant Homes' sits on a lot choked with weeds. The block is as quiet as an old ghost town.
自称“大老粗”的弗卢格是个电话线安装工，目前待业。不过，住在这里的弗卢格夫妇有点儿孤单。因为仅仅还有另外一户人家居住在Foxboro Court 28栋全新或者尚未完工的房子里面。街道那头，标着“高雅住宅”的牌子矗立在一片长满杂草的空地上，整个街区就像一座鬼城般寂静无声。
Since real-estate tanked, many new planned communities across the country are half-empty, with for-sale signs outnumbering residents by a large margin.
自从房地产市场陷入困境之后，美国各地许多新规划的居住区里都人烟稀少，挂着“待售”牌子的房屋远比已经出售的要多得多。
Some of the projects abandoned by bankrupt developers are in places that were hotbeds of new housing construction: Southern California, Atlanta, Las Vegas, Phoenix. As of July, the percentage of vacant housing stock available for sale or rent stood at 4.8% nationally, the highest figure in at least 33 years, according to Zelman & Associates, a real-estate research firm.
在破产的开发商们弃之不管的项目中，有一部分位于新宅建设的热点板块，比如加利福尼亚州南部、亚特兰大、拉斯维加斯和菲尼克斯。房地产调查公司Zelman & Associates的数据显示，今年7月，美国全国待售或待租的空置房比率为4.8%，创下至少33年以来的最高点。
Daily life in these developments seems a bit post-cataclysmic. Children play on elaborate but empty playgrounds. They walk their dogs past rows of shiny houses that have never been lived in. Voices echo up and down the block. Unfinished houses and vacant lots strewn with construction debris clutter the horizon.
这些居住区里的生活呈现出一片有如浩劫过后的萧索景象：孩子们在设施齐备却空空荡荡的游乐场里玩耍；住户们在一排排光鲜亮丽、却从未有人居住过的房子前 狗；声音回荡在小区的上空；一眼望去，到处都是堆放着建筑垃圾的“烂尾房”和空旷的宅基地。
Robert Waltenspiel lives with his wife and two daughters in a unfinished subdivision in Auburn Hills, Mich. Standing in front of his house, he can see more than 30 weed-choked lots where new houses were supposed to go. The developer halted construction more than two years ago.
罗伯特·沃尔顿施皮尔(Robert Waltenspiel)和妻子及两个女儿居住在密歇根州奥本山(Auburn Hills)一处尚未竣工的小区里。站在自家的房前，沃尔顿施皮尔可以望见30多处被杂草覆盖的的宅基地，此处的开发商已停工两年有余。
'As far as working on my yard and saying, 'Hey, neighbor, want a beer?,' that's not going to happen,' says Mr. Waltenspiel, an account manager for Hewlett-Packard Co.
在惠普公司(Hewlett-Packard Co.)担任客会计经理的沃尔顿施皮尔说，“我在院子里干活的时候总想说一句，‘嗨，邻居，来杯啤酒？’可惜这场面不会出现。”
The hot tub at the community center doesn't work. The communal fountains are dry. Mr. Waltenspiel's kids have no one in the subdivision to play with, so he has to take them to a nearby park for social interaction. His 4-year-old 'will walk up to strange girls in the park and say, 'Hey, will you be my friend?'' he says. 'A, it's adorable. B, it's sad.'
社区中心的大池子干了，喷泉也停了。他的孩子们在这里没有玩伴，所以沃尔顿施皮尔要带他们去附近的公园接触“外面”的世界。他四岁的孩子“会在公园里走到陌生女孩儿的面前，对她们说，‘嗨，你愿意做我的朋友吗？’” 沃尔顿施皮尔说，“一、这个举动很可爱；二、这让人感到悲哀。”
In the past year, roughly 15% to 20% of residential developers have gone out of business, suspended operations or changed their line of work, according to an estimate by the National Association of Home Builders.
美国住宅建筑业协会(National Association of Home Builders)预计，在过去的一年，约有15%到20%的住宅开发商破产、歇业或者转行。
The people who bought into these subdivisions encounter all sorts of other unexpected problems, including burglars looking to steal toilets, appliances and copper wiring. And blight. Krista Anderson, an administrative assistant, lives in a subdivision outside Phoenix where the developer suddenly halted construction last fall, leaving behind not just unfinished houses but also scaffolding, piles of cement and construction material that 'is turning yellow and looks bad.'
而住进这些小区的业主们也遇到了各种各样未曾料想到的问题，比如伺机偷盗马桶、生活用具和铜线的小毛偷──还有满眼的惨淡景象。担任行政助理的克里斯塔·安德森(Krista Anderson)住在菲尼克斯郊外的一个居住区，那里的开发商去年秋天突然停工，遗留下来的不单单是未竣工的房屋，还有“正在变黄，看上去让人不快的”脚手架、成堆的水泥和建筑材料。
Many residents aren't sure exactly who is in charge of mowing the weeds, maintaining the street lights, cleaning up when someone uses open space as a dump.
许多居民不知道该由谁来负责修剪杂草、维修路灯，空地上乱扔的垃圾又该由谁负责清理。
Some residents form especially tight bonds with neighbors 10 or 20 doors down the street. Others relish the peace and quiet.
有些居民和住在十几户开外的邻居建立起了相当紧密的关系，也有些人乐于享受这份安宁。
'With my art and my books, I don't need to go outside,' says Miriam Ramirez, who lives with her husband, a retired doctor, in a stalled subdivision in suburban Atlanta. 'But not everybody's like that.'
米里亚姆·拉米雷斯(Miriam Ramirez)住在亚特兰大郊外一处“烂尾”居住区。她说，“我有艺术和书籍做伴，不需要走出屋门，不过并不是每个人都喜欢呆在家里。” 拉米雷斯和丈夫住在一起，她的丈夫是位已经退休的医生。
Her subdivision, Woodbridge Crossing in Smyrna, 15 miles from downtown Atlanta, was supposed to consist of several hundred garden-style houses. Instead, she lives on a street where most of the roughly 30 units have never been lived in. It's the only inhabited street. Paved roads surround acres of empty lots. At night, she says, Woodbridge Crossing can feel a bit like 'a cemetery.' One plus: She usually has the community swimming pool to herself.
她所在的居住区名为Woodbridge Crossing，地处距离亚特兰大市中心15英里的斯迈纳(Smyrna)。这里本应建起数百幢花园洋房，而如今，在她住的那条街上共约30套房子中，绝大多数从未有人居住过。而且这里是该居住区唯一有居民的街道。铺好的路面围绕着大片的空地。她说，在晚上，Woodbridge Crossing感觉有点儿像一片墓地。不过有一个好处：她经常独自享用社区的游泳池。
In overdeveloped Northwest Arkansas, real-estate officials estimate that property values have been steadily declining since 2007. Early in the decade, the region saw a population explosion as more than 1,000 people a month moved to Bentonville, Rogers and several nearby communities to work for Wal-Mart or one of its 1,250 locally based suppliers. Developers began building new houses at a frantic pace, carving up sprawling farmland into fancy developments with names like Stone Meadow and Kensington Hills.
房地产官业人士估计说，在过度开发的阿肯色州西北，地产价格自2007年以来一直在稳步下滑。本世纪初这一地区的人口迅速增长，每个月都有超过1,000人迁入本顿维尔(Bentonville)、罗杰斯(Rogers)和一些邻近社区，他们是来为沃尔玛或是其1,250家当地供应商工作的。开发商开始以疯狂的速度建造新屋，从前绵延的农田变成了拥有“石头牧场”(Stone Meadow)或者“肯辛顿山”(Kensington Hills)这样名字的新潮小区。
Then the housing market collapsed. Soon developers were defaulting on their loans and declaring bankruptcy. In May, federal regulators seized one Northwest Arkansas lender, ANB Financial, whose portfolio was overloaded with bad construction loans.
此后，美国住房市场一落千丈。开发商们很快开始拖欠贷款，并宣布破产。5月份，联邦监管机构查封了阿肯色西北部的放贷机构ANB Financial，这家公司拥有大量难以收回的建筑业贷款。
Now, many of the region's new subdivisions, with houses that can't be rented, much less sold, are forlorn monuments to disastrous real-estate forecasting. A subdivision called Tuscany, five miles west of Bentonville, was envisioned as an enclave of luxury homes with landscaping meant to evoke an old-world Italian village. Developers installed an enormous hand-built stone wall surrounding several hundred acres of what had been cow pasture. So far, only five houses have been built, and just two sold.
眼下，这一地区许多新建的居民区──房子租不出去，卖出去的就更少了──成为了对房地产市场走势严重误判的标志。位于本顿维尔以西5英里的地方是个名为“托斯卡纳”(Tuscany)的居民区，那里本打算建成一片具有传统意大利乡村风格的豪华住宅。开发商修建了一堵人工堆砌的巨大石墙，将几百英亩曾是牧场的土地围绕其间。迄今为止，仅有五栋房子完工，其中两栋找到了买家。
Carol Trees, who paid $570,000 for a 4,800-square-foot house six months ago, admits the solitude is a bit disconcerting. The good news is that her three children have the run of a pasture longer than several football fields. 'We love it right now,' says Mrs. Trees, a nurse practitioner. 'We sit on our back porch and fantasize that we own all this land.'
卡罗尔·特里斯(Carol Trees) 6个月前花57万美元购买了这栋面积4,800平方英尺的房子，她承认这里的安静令人不安。好消息是她的三个孩子能够在面积超过几个足球场的牧场上玩耍。职业是护理医生的特里斯说，“我们现在喜欢住在这儿，我们经常坐在后门廊上，幻想自己拥有这里的整片土地。”
Then there's Quail Ridge, the temporary home of Mr. Pflueger, his wife, Joyce, and their 11-year-old chihuahua, Peaches.
让我们回到弗卢格、妻子乔伊斯(Joyce)和他们11岁的吉娃娃狗皮奇斯(Peaches)的临时家园──Quail Ridge。
Real Estate Company of Arkansas, a local outfit, had been so eager to sell units that it raffled off a year's free rent for one house. On a cold weekend afternoon last December, more than 1,000 people showed up at the subdivision in hopes of winning the prize.
当地的阿肯色房地产公司(Real Estate Company of Arkansas)急于售房，于是使出抽奖的办法，将小区的一栋房子免租金出租一年。去年12月一个寒冷的周末，超过1,000人抱着中奖的希望出现在这个居住区。
As a marketing effort, the event was a total bust. 'We didn't sell one house,' real-estate agent Michael McKinnon says. 'We didn't get diddly.'
作为促销手段，这次活动简直是失败透顶。房地产经纪迈克尔·麦金农(Michael McKinnon)说，“我们一栋房子也没卖出去，我们一无所获。”
But for the Pfluegers, who won, the outcome appeared to be nothing short of divine intervention. Mr. Pflueger had been out of work for eight weeks. Unable to afford the rent for their $475-a-month apartment, the couple was planning to move into a trailer in their daughter's back yard.
不过对于中奖的弗卢格夫妇来说，这个结果真可谓上帝的安排。弗卢格当时已经两个月没有工作。因为负担不起所住公寓每月475美元的租金，两人计划搬进女儿家后院的露营车。
Suddenly they were moving into a new 3,400-square-foot house with an entertainment center, an outdoor hot tub, stainless-steel appliances and more than enough room to store the 61-year-old Mr. Pflueger's collection of guns and antique fishing reels.
突然之间，他们搬进了一栋面积3,400平方英尺的新房子，这里不仅有康乐中心、露天大泳池、不锈钢用具，还有足够的空间储存61岁的弗卢格收藏的枪支和古董渔线轮。
The last seven months have been an odd existence. Chickens wander by from a nearby farm, poking around in the brush. Not long ago, someone broke into one of the unoccupied houses around the corner. Now the Pfluegers say they pay close attention to passing traffic, but hardly anybody passes by.
过去的7个月发生了许多奇怪的事情。小鸡从附近的农场跑出来，在这里的草丛里跑来跑去。不久以前，还有人闯入了街角的一间空屋。弗卢格夫妇说，现在他们非常留意过往的行人，不过几乎没有人经过。
'There's just no noise,' Mrs. Pflueger said.
弗卢格的妻子说，“这里一点儿动静也没有。”
When their 12 months end, the Pfluegers will move on too -- perhaps to that trailer on their daughter's property. Mr. Pflueger recently found a job but still can't afford to buy the house. 'That's way out of my league,' Mr. Pflueger says. Unless someone else moves in, only one family will be left in the 28 houses on Foxboro Court.
当一年的租期结束后，弗卢格夫妇也会搬出小区──或许住到女儿家的露营车里去。尽管弗卢格最近找到了一份工作，不过他还是买不起这栋房子。弗卢格说，“这根本不是我这样的人能住得起的。”除非有别人搬进来，否则Foxboro Court的28栋房子里到时候就只剩下一家人了。
Chinese Shares Sink 5.2% On Concern Over Inflation 中国股市奈何重挫
NEGATIVE ECONOMIC data from China triggered a selloff of mainland stocks, as nervous investors worried that inflationary pressure could hurt earnings growth.
中国消极的经济数据引发大陆股市大卖盘，因为焦虑重重的投资者担心通胀压力会损害收益增长。
The Shanghai Composite Index, which tracks shares sold to domestic investors as well as the so-called Class B shares available to foreigners, sank 5.2% to close at 2470.07, its lowest level in more than 18 months. The fall came despite rises in stock indexes in Tokyo, Singapore, Mumbai and other Asian markets, and defied Friday's 2.6% rise in the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
上证指数下挫5.2%，收于2470.07点，是18个月以来最低水平。东京、新加坡、孟买及其他亚洲股市的股指都有所上扬，道琼斯指数(Dow Jones Industrial Average)上周五也上涨了2.6%。
The stock market's decline came after China's National Bureau of Statistics said the country's producer-price index rose 10% in July from the same month in 2007. The increase clocked in at the high end of economists' expectations of between 8% and 10% and represented the largest growth spurt in 12 years. In June, the PPI rose 8.8%.
中国国家统计局公布7月的生产者价格指数(PPI)较上年同期上涨10%，股市由此下滑。此前经济学家们预计PPI涨幅为8%-10%，而实际增幅达到预测值的上限，也是12年来最大涨幅。6月PPI上涨8.8%。
'The macro environment is definitely turning against China,' said Vincent Lam, a Hong Kong-based portfolio manager at hedge fund Ramius Capital Group LLC. China is set to disclose consumer-price data Tuesday. The two indexes together offer a glimpse into how inflation is affecting margins at manufacturers.
对冲基金Ramius Capital Group LLC驻香港投资组合经理Vincent Lam说，宏观经济显然对中国不利。中国将于周二发布消费者价格指数(CPI)。这两个指数可让人们对通胀如何影响制造厂商的利润空间有些许了解。
'Investors are worried Beijing may soon roll out more macroeconomic control measures,' said Francis Lun, general manager at Fulbright Securities, a Hong Kong firm.
香港的富昌证券有限公司(Fulbright Securities)总经理蔺常念(Francis Lun)说，投资者担心中国政府会很快出台更多的宏观经济调控措施。
In particular, investors are worrying about continued appreciation of the yuan, said Cecilia Melin, a senior adviser to the Asia-focused Panax Fund. Exporters are eager to see an easing of the yuan. Exporters are generally hurt by a stronger currency because it makes their goods more expensive overseas.
重点关注亚洲的Panax Fund的资深顾问塞西莉亚?梅林(Cecilia Melin)表示，投资者最担心的是人民币继续升值。出口商迫切希望人民币汇率回落。人民币走强会令出口商品在海外价格更贵，因而损害出口商。
Some investors say Monday's selloff may have been exacerbated by disappointment that the government didn't intervene to prop up shares while the Beijing Olympics were under way. On Aug. 1, Chinese President Hu Jintao said at a news briefing that the government will work to maintain economic growth -- a statement that sent the Shanghai index up nearly 1%, because many took the comment as a hint of support for the stock market.
一些投资者表示，由于政府没有在北京奥运会期间托市造成投资者的失望情绪，从而加剧了周一的卖盘。8月1日，中国国家主席胡锦涛在一个新闻发布会上表示，政府将努力保持经济增长──许多人认为这番话中暗含政府将托市之意，进而推动上证指数上涨近1%。
Beyond the short-term swings, there are starker challenges for Chinese stocks, investors say. The low-cost manufacturing model is proving inadequate for public companies that need to deliver higher-than-expected earnings to attract shareholders. While the government has tried to encourage economic growth in the inland provinces, such as Anhui and Hunan, a transfer of operations inland is only beginning to occur. In the meantime, coastal companies are suffering from higher costs, including wage growth as well as rising expenses for raw materials.
投资者们表示，除了短期振荡，中国股市还面临更为严峻的挑战。低成本生产模式越来越不适用于需要产生高于预期的收益以吸引股东的上市公司。虽然政府极力鼓励安徽和湖南等内陆省份的经济增长，但将业务向内陆地区转移还只是刚刚开始。与此同时，沿海公司饱受成本上涨之苦，包括工资的增长以及日渐高涨的原材料成本。
In addition, the mainland market is dominated by retail investors. Known for whipsaw fickleness -- not just in China but in other emerging markets -- small individual investors who drove up prices during last year's euphoria have reacted with similar vehemence on the downside, dumping shares at the slightest provocation.
此外，大陆市场中散户占了绝大多数。散户投资者以变化无常著称──不光是中国，其他新兴市场也是如此。他们在去年的股市大好形势中推动了股票价格高涨，现在则以同样的激烈程度推动股市下行，就算只有最微小的刺激也会大肆抛售。
Finally, mainland investors don't have ways of hedging their stock positions, such as shorting or derivatives. An outright sale of shares is the only method for reducing an investor's risk.
最后，大陆的股票投资者没有对冲手段，比如卖空或衍生产品。因此割肉是减少投资者风险的唯一途径。
The intensity of Monday's selloff prompted some investors to question whether shares are ripe for a turnaround. With its rich foreign-exchange reserves, China is better positioned than other export-driven economies in Asia to weather a global slowdown. Flagging local sentiment about the economy could result in surprises on the upside in terms of the economy as well as corporate earnings.
周一抛盘的强度使一些投资者怀疑股市是否已濒临回弹边缘。中国拥有大量外汇储备，因此比亚洲其他出口导向型经济体更能经受全球经济下滑的压力。国内对经济的敏感情绪衰减可能产生宏观经济和公司收益好转的惊喜结果。
Beijing intervenes to prop up Shanghai market 中国政府出手干预以提振股市
Dramatic steps to prop up the Chinese stock market were unveiled by Beijing yesterday after a 70 per cent in stock prices since last October.
中国政府昨日公布重大举措以提振股市。自去年10月份以来，中国股市已下跌70%。
The stamp duty on stock purchases will be scrapped and government money will be used to buy shares to support the market, state media said. Beijing said Central Huijin, an arm of the country’s sovereign wealth fund, would buy into listed companies, including state-owned banks Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Bank of China and China Construction Bank.
中国官方媒体称，股票受让方的印花税将被取消，同时将动用政府资金买进股票托市。中国政府表示，中国主权财富基金旗下的中央汇金公司(Central Huijin)将购入上市企业的股票，其中包括国有的中国工商银行(ICBC)、中国银行(Bank of China)和中国建设银行(China Construction Bank)。
Chinese bank shares have fallen steeply in response to the global financial crisis, helping drive the Shanghai Composite index to a 22-month low of 1,896 yesterday. The market peaked last October at 6,092.
受全球金融危机的影响，中国银行类股价大幅下跌，推动上证综指于昨日跌至1896点的22个月低点。该指数去年10月曾达到6092点的峰值水平。
Earlier this week, the Shanghai index breached the important psychological barrier of 2,000, triggering widespread rumours the government would intervene.
本周早些时候，上证综指跌破2000点的重要心理关口，引发了有关政府将进行干预的广泛传言。
Several Shanghai stockbrokers said they believed government-sanctioned share purchases began even before the official announcement last night, helping Shanghai to recover from a 6 per cent early decline to close 1.72 per cent down on the day.
几位上海的证券经纪人表示，他们认为政府授权的股票购买行动甚至在昨晚官方公告前就已开始，帮助上海股市从昨日早盘时的下跌6%，回升至收盘时的跌1.72%。
Beijing was trying to provide a floor for the market, which had seemed in free-fall since the weekend crisis on Wall Street, China market experts said last night. But it is not clear if the government will succeed in stopping the market slide, they said.
中国市场专家昨夜表示，政府试图为市场提供一个底部，自上周末华尔街危机爆发以来，中国股市似乎出现了自由落体式的下跌。但他们表示，目前尚不清楚政府能否成功阻止股市下滑。
Previous such efforts – including an April cut in stamp tax – have yielded only a brief recoveries. “There will be a quick rebound of the market but the impact tends to be shortly phased,” said Mu Qiguo of Guangda Securities in Shanghai.
此前的类似努力——包括在4月份调低印花税——只是使市场出现了短暂的反弹。“市场将出现迅速反弹，但这些措施的影响往往是短期的，”上海光大证券(Guangda Securities)的穆启国表示。
Qian Qimin, of Shenyin Wanguo Securities in Shanghai, said he expected further intervention if the reaction to Thursday’s measures was only “lukewarm”.
上海申银万国证券(Shenyin Wanguo Securities)的钱启敏预计，如果市场对周四出台的措施只作出“冷淡”的反应，那么政府将采取进一步的干预举措。
GLOBAL MARKETS ROAR IN APPROVAL 全球股市周五大幅飙升
Stock markets around the world roared their approval on Friday, staging huge rallies as the US authorities moved towards agreement on a programme of government intervention that would put hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayers' money at risk in an effort to quell the credit crisis.
世界各地的股市周五均呈现大幅飙升，反映出市场赞许美国官方采取行动制定一套政府干预方案，冒险动用数千亿美元的纳税人资金来平息信贷危机。
Shanghai surged 9.5 per cent, in the biggest daily gain for seven years, to 2,075.091. Hong Kong 's Hang Seng gained 9.6 per cent to 19,327.73, breaking a seven-day losing streak. In London the FTSE 100 had its biggest daily gain in its 24-year history, jumping 8.8 per cent, while in New York the S&P 500 closed up 4.0 per cent, having risen 4.3 per cent on Thursday. The rallies in London and the US were partially fuelled by bans on short-selling in financial stocks announced on Thursday night.
上海股市飙升9.5%，呈现7年来最大单日涨幅，至2075.091点。香港恒生指数(Hang Seng)飙升9.6%，至19327.73点，扭转连续7天的跌势。伦敦富时100指数(FTSE 100)呈现其24年历史上最大单日涨幅，大涨8.8%，而纽约标普500指数(S&P 500)在周四大涨4.3%的基础上，周五收盘再涨4.0%。在伦敦和美国出现的股市飙升，在一定程度上也受到周四晚间宣布的禁止卖空金融类股票的规定推动。
The political negotiations on the rescue plan, which followed a week of unprecedented stress in global financial markets, envisage the most extensive peacetime expansion of the role of government in the financial system since the Great Depression and appeared to many to mark the end of an era of Reaganite deregulation.
在全球金融市场承受空前沉重的压力一周后，美国官方围绕政府救助计划展开政治谈判。按照该计划的设想，美国政府将在金融体系中扮演自20世纪30年代“大萧条”(Great Depression)以来和平时期的的最大角色，在许多人眼里，这似乎标志着里根式放松管制时代的终结。
At the core of the plan is the proposal to create a government-sponsored vehicle loosely modelled on the 1989 Resolution Trust Corporation, which would take on the toxic assets in the financial system, allowing banks to stem their losses, recapitalise and return to business.
该计划的核心，是提议创建一个由政府支持的实体，大体上采用1989年清债信托公司(Resolution Trust Corporation, RTC)的模式，由该实体接管金融体系内的有毒资产，让各银行得以遏制亏损，重组资本结构，恢复业务。
Hank Paulson, the US Treasury secretary, said the programme would initially cost “hundreds of billions of dollars.” But he added it was far cheaper than the alternative – “a continuing series of financial institution failures and frozen credit markets unable to fund economic expansion”.
美国财政部长汉克·保尔森(Hank Paulson)表示，这套方案最初将花费“数千亿美元。”但他补充说，这一代价远低于另一种选择，即“金融机构接二连三瘫痪，信贷市场冻结，无法为经济扩张提供资金”。
In addition, the Bush administration also announced a blanket guarantee on all money market mutual funds, in an effort to curtail a brewing crisis in the $3,500bn (€2,422bn) sector. The Federal Reserve announced new plans to support liquidity in the mutual fund sector.
此外，布什政府还宣布全面担保所有货币市场共同基金，力求遏制这一3.5万亿美元行业正在酝酿的危机。美联储(Federal Reserve)宣布了新计划，支持共同基金行业的流动性。
Some private sector analysts estimated the programme could require up to $1,000bn upfront, although the government might ultimately make a profit on the distressed assets.
某些私营部门的分析师估计，美国政府的救助方案有可能需要1万亿美元的初期投入，尽管最终美国政府有可能从困境资产盈利。
US financial stocks rose more than 10 per cent on the news, led by Morgan Stanley, Wachovia and Goldman Sachs, while the cost of insuring banks against a future default eased sharply.
受这一利好消息推动，美国金融类股票飙升逾10%，摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)、瓦乔维亚银行(Wachovia)和高盛(Goldman Sachs)领涨，与此同时，针对银行未来违约的保险成本大幅放缓。
The breakthrough came in a crisis meeting between Mr Paulson, Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke and legislators on Capitol Hill on Thursday evening. Mr Paulson said he would work with Congress to pass the required legislation “over the next week”.
这一突破是在周四晚间保尔森、美联储主席本·伯南克(Ben Bernanke)和美国国会议员召开危机会议期间取得的。保尔森表示，他将与国会共同努力，“在今后一周”通过相关立法。
Heard On The Street: No Fundamental Shift 股市上扬 基本面没变
Sentiment, not fundamentals, changed Friday. Investors should remember that when assessing the broad market rally that sent even long out-of-favor stocks soaring.
改变了上周五股市走势的是市场情绪，而非基本面因素。投资者在评估市场大范围上扬、乃至长期“失宠”的股票也纷纷飙升的时候，应该谨记这一点。
Behind the upward moves was a mixture of hedge funds unwinding a host of short positions and sheer relief among investors who felt a market crash could be imminent. None of that, though, changed fundamentals affecting companies' underlying businesses, whether in retail, media, autos or technology.
股市上行走势的背后推动力量是对冲基金大量平空仓，以及那些认为股市崩盘迫在眉睫的投资者长舒了一口气。但是，这些都没有改变影响着公司主要业务的基本面，无论是零售、媒体、汽车还是科技行业。
True, the risk of the financial system imploding, with huge collateral damage to the real economy, has receded in the wake of the government's proposed bailout for distressed financial institutions. But there is still a strong chance economic weakness will crystallize into a recession in coming months.
诚然，在美国政府提出针对陷入财政困难的金融机构的救助计划后，金融体系崩塌的风险已经减退，不会因抵押品问题而对实体经济造成严重破坏。但是，在未来的几个月里经济疲弱升级为衰退的可能性仍很大。
More to the point, any secular decline hurting industries -- such as newspapers -- isn't going away.
更重要的是，对报纸等行业造成损害的持续下滑仍没有消除。
So Friday's 22% jump in stock of McClatchy, for instance, isn't a sign that the company was better off Friday than it was Thursday. It is struggling under a heavy debt load amid inexorably declining ad revenue. That raises serious questions about its long term prospects.
所以，上周五报业集团McClatchy股票暴涨22%，并不意味着该公司周五的运营情况比周四好，它仍在巨额债务和广告收入不断下滑的重压之下苦苦挣扎。该公司的长期前景仍会受到严重质疑。
Not surprisingly then, it has been heavily shorted. While the short-covering hopefully will correct over-sold stocks, the result doesn't always make a lot of sense. McClatchy traded today at 5.7 times 2009 earnings, compared with 5.5 for Gannett, which doesn't have the same debt concerns and hasn't been as beaten up on Wall Street.
McClatchy的股票一直被大量作空就不足为奇了。虽然空头回补有望纠正超卖的股票，但是结果却并不总是合情合理的。McClatchy上周五基于2009年收益的市盈率为5.7倍，另一报业集团Gannett为5.5倍；但实际上，无论是债务问题还是损失情况，后者都要比前者好。
This topsy-turvy world extends to those stocks likely to benefit from tougher economic times. Wal-Mart Stores, which has long outperformed because of its relatively defensive business, was down Friday as the panic abated.
这种颠倒的状况还延伸到了那些有可能会在经济困难时期受益的股票。沃尔玛连锁公司(Wal-Mart Stores Inc.)因其业务相对以防守为主而长期强于大盘，不过上周五随着恐慌的减弱，该公司股票下挫。
With hedge fund dislocation likely to continue for days, similarly strange moves, and volatility, could be the norm.
由于对冲基金的混乱很可能还会持续数天的时间，类似的奇怪走势和动荡可能会变得司空见惯。
Bailout's Flaw of Large Numbers 救助计划巨额数目的软肋
Berkshire Hathaway's investment in Goldman Sachs Group provides a template for how to get the financial system back on its feet.
Berkshire Hathaway投资高盛集团(Goldman Sachs Group)的交易为美国金融体系如何东山再起提供了一个模板。
The problem is, the Bush administration's $700 billion bailout plan ignores some of the key lessons of Warren Buffett's deal. Most notably: Capital, or lack of it, is at the heart of the crisis.
问题是，布什政府7,000亿美元的拯救方案少了沃伦•巴菲特(Warren Buffett)这桩交易的一些关键经验。最显而易见的就是资本问题，资本匮乏正是这场危机的核心问题。
The proposed bailout only goes a certain distance in addressing that, so it mightn't spark the sort of quick confidence rebound its proponents are hoping for. That explains Wednesday's renewed stress in debt markets.
鉴于拯救方案只朝着解决这一问题方向迈出了一小步，因此或许难以像方案支持者所希望的那样迅速提振市场信心。这也是周三债市再次承压的原因所在。
The realism of the Goldman/Buffett deal is instructive. The market was getting nervous about funding Goldman's highly leveraged balance sheet. The bank had to adjust and raise expensive capital quickly.
巴菲特与高盛交易的现实意义能带给我们一些启发。市场对高盛集团杠杆比例过高的资产负债表越来越感到忧虑，不愿为此提供融资。在这种状况下，高盛不得不作出调整，迅速筹集高成本资本。
First, Goldman agreed to become a bank-holding company Sunday, giving it greater access to Federal Reserve credit. Then it reduced leverage markedly by raising $10 billion in fresh capital from Berkshire and other investors. It did so even though it meant diluting shareholders by as much as 20%.
首先，高盛周日同意成为一家银行控股公司，提高了从联邦储备委员会(Fed)获得的借贷额度。接着，高盛从Berkshire和其他投资者那里筹集了100亿美元新资本，显著降低了杠杆比例。即便此举导致股东权益稀释了至多20%，高盛也在所不惜。
In contrast, the government's bailout plan contains no explicit demands that banks raise capital. If Goldman needed to, others surely do.
相比之下，政府的拯救计划没有包括与银行筹资有关的明确要求。如果高盛都需要资本，那么其他公司肯定也一样。
Instead, the government plan aims to repair balance sheets just by taking large amounts of distressed assets from the banks. True, this could allow banks to reverse losses, depending on the price at which the government buys them. That would boost capital to an extent. But, on its own, not by enough to soothe credit markets, which want to see balance sheets cleaned up more definitively.
相反，政府的拯救计划剑走偏锋，只是从各家银行收购数额巨大的问题资产，以此修复他们的资产负债状况。诚然，这样或许能使银行挽回损失，不过这还取决于政府的收购价格。拯救方案或许能在一定程度上提振银行资本。但该计划本身可能不足以平定信贷市场，市场想看到的是干干净净的银行资产负债表。
Indeed, Mr. Buffett likely made a bet on Goldman because he felt comfortable with the valuations on its balance sheet. Investors looking at the U.S. financial system overall need to feel the same level of comfort before things return to anything like normal.
实际上，巴菲特之所以会投资高盛，可能是因为他对高盛的资产负债表的估值感到满意。只有投资者对美国金融体系整体状况达到同样的满意程度，情况才能逐渐恢复正常。
The bailout plan might not achieve that if the government buys bad assets at prices higher than they would fetch in the market. This would allow banks to maintain inflated valuations for the assets they retain. The possible result: continued mistrust of banks' balance sheets.
如果政府以高于市价的价格收购不良资产，那么拯救方案可能就无法达到效果。这会导致银行保留下来的资产维持虚高估值。可能的结果就是，市场仍然不信任银行的资产负债状况。
The alternative -- buying at conservative mark-to-market levels -- could trigger further financial losses in the system, exacerbating the need for capital.
但如果政府以保守的市值价位收购这些资产，就可能会引发金融体系更多的损失，从而加剧资本需求。
A multipronged approach could address that dilemma. Like Mr. Buffett, the government needs to focus its resources on shoring up institutions that can survive the crisis. This could take the form of asset purchases, equity investments or a combination.
或许多头并进的手段可以化解这个难题。和巴菲特一样，政府需要集中资源支持那些能够挺过危机的金融机构。这可以通过收购资产、进行股份投资或齐头并进的方式进行。
Meanwhile, it should leave the weakest to be euthanized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., beefed up by a portion of the bailout funding.
另一方面，政府应该拨出一部分拯救资金给联邦存款保险公司(FDIC)，由该机构负责对回天乏术的公司实施安乐死。
A big number, by itself, won't restore confidence. Any solution that doesn't directly address the capital shortfall is likely to fail.
靠一笔巨款本身无法恢复市场信心。任何拯救方案如果不能直接解决资本短缺的问题，就有可能失败。
Berkshire Hathaway投资高盛集团(Goldman Sachs Group)的交易为美国金融体系如何东山再起提供了一个模板。
The problem is, the Bush administration's $700 billion bailout plan ignores some of the key lessons of Warren Buffett's deal. Most notably: Capital, or lack of it, is at the heart of the crisis.
问题是，布什政府7,000亿美元的拯救方案少了沃伦•巴菲特(Warren Buffett)这桩交易的一些关键经验。最显而易见的就是资本问题，资本匮乏正是这场危机的核心问题。
The proposed bailout only goes a certain distance in addressing that, so it mightn't spark the sort of quick confidence rebound its proponents are hoping for. That explains Wednesday's renewed stress in debt markets.
鉴于拯救方案只朝着解决这一问题方向迈出了一小步，因此或许难以像方案支持者所希望的那样迅速提振市场信心。这也是周三债市再次承压的原因所在。
The realism of the Goldman/Buffett deal is instructive. The market was getting nervous about funding Goldman's highly leveraged balance sheet. The bank had to adjust and raise expensive capital quickly.
巴菲特与高盛交易的现实意义能带给我们一些启发。市场对高盛集团杠杆比例过高的资产负债表越来越感到忧虑，不愿为此提供融资。在这种状况下，高盛不得不作出调整，迅速筹集高成本资本。
First, Goldman agreed to become a bank-holding company Sunday, giving it greater access to Federal Reserve credit. Then it reduced leverage markedly by raising $10 billion in fresh capital from Berkshire and other investors. It did so even though it meant diluting shareholders by as much as 20%.
首先，高盛周日同意成为一家银行控股公司，提高了从联邦储备委员会(Fed)获得的借贷额度。接着，高盛从Berkshire和其他投资者那里筹集了100亿美元新资本，显著降低了杠杆比例。即便此举导致股东权益稀释了至多20%，高盛也在所不惜。
In contrast, the government's bailout plan contains no explicit demands that banks raise capital. If Goldman needed to, others surely do.
相比之下，政府的拯救计划没有包括与银行筹资有关的明确要求。如果高盛都需要资本，那么其他公司肯定也一样。
Instead, the government plan aims to repair balance sheets just by taking large amounts of distressed assets from the banks. True, this could allow banks to reverse losses, depending on the price at which the government buys them. That would boost capital to an extent. But, on its own, not by enough to soothe credit markets, which want to see balance sheets cleaned up more definitively.
相反，政府的拯救计划剑走偏锋，只是从各家银行收购数额巨大的问题资产，以此修复他们的资产负债状况。诚然，这样或许能使银行挽回损失，不过这还取决于政府的收购价格。拯救方案或许能在一定程度上提振银行资本。但该计划本身可能不足以平定信贷市场，市场想看到的是干干净净的银行资产负债表。
Indeed, Mr. Buffett likely made a bet on Goldman because he felt comfortable with the valuations on its balance sheet. Investors looking at the U.S. financial system overall need to feel the same level of comfort before things return to anything like normal.
实际上，巴菲特之所以会投资高盛，可能是因为他对高盛的资产负债表的估值感到满意。只有投资者对美国金融体系整体状况达到同样的满意程度，情况才能逐渐恢复正常。
The bailout plan might not achieve that if the government buys bad assets at prices higher than they would fetch in the market. This would allow banks to maintain inflated valuations for the assets they retain. The possible result: continued mistrust of banks' balance sheets.
如果政府以高于市价的价格收购不良资产，那么拯救方案可能就无法达到效果。这会导致银行保留下来的资产维持虚高估值。可能的结果就是，市场仍然不信任银行的资产负债状况。
The alternative -- buying at conservative mark-to-market levels -- could trigger further financial losses in the system, exacerbating the need for capital.
但如果政府以保守的市值价位收购这些资产，就可能会引发金融体系更多的损失，从而加剧资本需求。
A multipronged approach could address that dilemma. Like Mr. Buffett, the government needs to focus its resources on shoring up institutions that can survive the crisis. This could take the form of asset purchases, equity investments or a combination.
或许多头并进的手段可以化解这个难题。和巴菲特一样，政府需要集中资源支持那些能够挺过危机的金融机构。这可以通过收购资产、进行股份投资或齐头并进的方式进行。
Meanwhile, it should leave the weakest to be euthanized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., beefed up by a portion of the bailout funding.
另一方面，政府应该拨出一部分拯救资金给联邦存款保险公司(FDIC)，由该机构负责对回天乏术的公司实施安乐死。
A big number, by itself, won't restore confidence. Any solution that doesn't directly address the capital shortfall is likely to fail.
靠一笔巨款本身无法恢复市场信心。任何拯救方案如果不能直接解决资本短缺的问题，就有可能失败。
Stocks Give Muddled View Of Crisis股市行情与金融危机现状严重脱节
For generations, the way to answer the question 'How'd the market do today?' was easy: Just say what the Dow Jones Industrial Average did. But not now.
对好几代美国人来说，要回答“市场今天表现如何？”这个问题很容易，只要说“看看道琼斯指数去”就行了。可这招现在不灵了。
Now, the stock market often seems out of sync with the credit crisis embroiling the financial system. Thursday was a case in point. The Dow Jones Industrial Average shot higher when the stock market opened, on hopes the bailout plan getting hashed out in Congress would offer a salve to the financial system.
眼下，股市表现似乎常常与正困扰整个金融体系的信贷危机是脱节的。周四就可以看出这一点。道琼斯工业股票平均价格指数开盘走高，投资者希望国会即将通过的拯救计划将给金融体系送上一副良药。
But the short-term credit markets that lie at the center of the crisis were telling a different story. Libor, a widely followed benchmark interest rate for many dollar loans between banks that is set each morning in London, jumped by the largest amount since 1999, rising to 3.77% from 3.48%. A similar measure set in the morning in New York, NYFR, also registered a sharp gain.
但处于当前这场金融风暴中心的短期信贷市场却是另一番景象。作为银行间市场美元贷款的基准利率，伦敦银行同业拆息(Libor)从3.48%跃升至3.77%，幅度之大为1999年以来所仅见。与之类似的基准利率纽约银行同业拆息(NYFR)同样大幅上升。
Jumps in Libor and NYFR are a sign that banks are becoming increasingly wary of doing business with one another. Thursday's moves could have been a sign that credit-market participants didn't think Washington was moving ahead fast enough with its bailout plan, thought it is moving in the wrong direction, or that a major player is in deep trouble, said Michael Darda, chief economist at MKM Partners.
Libor和NYFR的跃升显示，各银行越来越不愿意与同行进行业务往来。MKM Partners的首席经济学家迈克尔•达达(Michael Darda)说，从这两个基准利率周四的动向看，或是信贷市场参与者认为华盛顿推出其救助计划的速度够快（尽管方向不对），或是一家主要参与者目前陷入了大麻烦。
'It's very disconcerting,' he said. 'There have been several occasions when the credit market and the equity market diverged over the past year and in virtually every case it was the stock market that was wrong.'
他说，这让人非常不安，过去一年中已出现过几次信贷市场与股票市场走势背离的情况，实际上每一次事后都证明股市的方向是错的。
In mid-July, for example, the stock market began a monthlong move higher. But the difference between Libor and three-month overnight index swaps, which represent what the market thinks the Federal Reserve's overnight lending rate will average over the next three months, shifted higher, reflecting rising concern in the credit markets. Thursday, the difference between the two reached two percentage points, up from 0.8 point at the start of the month.
以今年7月为例，当时股市开始了一轮长达一个月的上涨行情。但Libor与三个月期隔夜拆息指数掉期之间的息差却在扩大，后者反映了市场对美国联邦储备委员会(Federal Reserve)隔夜拆款利率未来三个月平均水平的预期。这表明信贷市场的担忧情绪正在上升。周四，这二者之间的息差达到了两个百分点，而本月初时仅为0.8个百分点。
'We still have massively dysfunctional credit markets,' said Douglas Cliggott, chief investment officer at Dover Capital Management. 'Debt is still the oxygen of this economy, so if we can't find a way to get the credit engine going, we're going to have a pretty nasty recession.'
Dover Capital Management的首席投资长道格拉斯•克里格特(Douglas Cliggott)说，我们的信贷市场仍然存在着严重的功能缺陷，债务依然是经济运行的氧气，所以如果我们无法使信贷引擎发动起来，我们将遭遇一场严重衰退。
Stocks have never been a perfect window into the health of the financial system. But during other crises they were a better reflection of what was happening because they were closer to the action. In the 1987 crash, problems with quick-fire stock-trading strategies played a major role. The 1998 financial crisis began as a debt problem, but because Long Term Capital Management -- the hedge fund at the center of the storm -- was forced to sell large stock positions, stocks soon reflected the magnitude of the crisis. The 2000 bust was a stock-centered phenomenon that came with the bursting of the dot-com bubble.
虽然股市从不是反映金融体系健康状况的灵敏晴雨表，但在以往的金融危机期间，股市对金融市场真实情况的反映却比这次要强，因为股市与市场行为的关系更紧密。比如速买速卖的股票交易策略就对1987年那场股灾负有重要责任。而1998年的金融危机虽然发端于债务问题，但由于身处风暴中心的对冲基金长期资本管理公司(Long Term Capital Management)被迫大量抛售股票，这场危机的危害很快便在股市上反映了出来。2000年那场因互联网泡沫破裂而产生的金融危机股市更是整个事件的主角。
The role of stocks in the current crisis is less direct. Investors are attempting the difficult calculus of gauging how credit problems will affect the economy, and thereby profits. Measures of financial stress are often opaque and information is scant -- making for an uncertain environment where a lot of stock market activity has come down to 'me wondering what you're wondering about what I'm wondering,' said William Sterling, chief investment officer at Trilogy Global Advisors.
而股市在当前这场危机中所扮演的角色却不那么直接。投资者目前都在试图破解信贷问题将在多大程度上影响经济增长和企业利润这一难题。人们缺乏衡量金融状况恶化程度的明确指标，相关信息也嫌不足，用Trilogy Global Advisors首席投资长威廉•斯特林(William Sterling)的话说，这营造了一种不明朗氛围，这种状况下股市活动很大程度上变成了一种投资者相互猜对方心思的游戏。
In addition to the uncertain environment, many financial firms have become so stressed that their shares are now little more than all-or-nothing bets on whether they will be able to survive. That makes them incredibly volatile, giving confusing signals to investors who watch them to gauge what is happening in the financial system.
此外，许多金融公司的处境目前是如此险恶，现在买进或卖出它们的股票几乎可以和赌它们能否生存下去划等号。这都使金融公司的股票具有令人难以置信的高波动性，不时向希望通过观察这些股票走势来判断金融市场状况的投资者传递各种令人困扰的信号。
Many investors watch Libor to gauge market stress. Typically, it is compared with other rates that it would normally trade in line with, such as overnight index swaps and the yield on the three-month Treasury bill. Other measures include rates on short-term IOUs issued by banks and companies known as 'commercial paper,' the Markit CDX index, which moves based on the cost of insuring against the default of 125 investment-grade companies and the fed-funds rate.
新多投资者通过观察Libor来评估金融市场压力。他们通常关注Libor与隔夜拆款利率指数掉期和三个月期美国国债收益率等相关利率的息差。投资者关注的其他指标还有银行和企业所发行商业票据的利率，以及Markit CDX指数，后者是基于防范125家投资级公司出现信贷违约的保险成本以及联邦基金利率的变动情况计算出来的。
But the measure to watch can be a moving target. For some time, credit analysts were glued to the ABX, an index of credit-default swaps tied to different subprime mortgage-backed securities, which began signaling the extent of the subprime problem in late 2006. But the index has now fallen by so much, and has become so volatile, that its value as a predictor has fallen.
但这些投资者关注的指标却都不大靠得住。有段时间信贷分析师们曾很看重ABX指数，它反映了各种次级抵押贷款支持证券相关信用违约掉期的价格变动情况。该指数从2006年起就反映出次贷问题的波及范围。但这个指数目前已经跌得一塌糊涂，而且波动非常厉害，因此它作为预测指标的价值也就下降了
When Stocks Tank, Some Investors Stampede To Alpacas 股市流年不利 投资者另辟蹊径
Who can blame an investor for taking to the bottle?
如果有位投资者迷上了美酒，谁又能责怪他呢？
Andy Pick, a 49-year-old stay-at-home father in Atlanta, recently bypassed the stock market for liquid assets -- $120,000 in champagnes. He bought 400 bottles, mostly 1996 vintage, that he says he plans to 'sit on' for 10 or 15 years and then sell at a profit.
现年49岁、家住亚特兰大的家庭主夫安迪·皮克(Andy Pick)最近避开股市，转向“流动资产”──在香槟酒上投资12万美元。他买了400瓶香槟，大多是1996年产的陈年佳酿，他说计划把这些酒在自己手里一直搁上10年或者15年，然后卖掉赚上一笔。
'It sure beats looking at a Merrill Lynch monthly statement,' he says, adding, 'The worst thing that could happen is that I drink all of it.'
他还说，收益肯定比看着美林(Merrill Lynch)的月度报告要高；可能发生的最糟糕的情况就是，我自己把这些酒喝光了。
Given the gyrations in the financial markets, some investors are abandoning stocks and bonds and seeking refuge in unusual alternatives -- parking spaces, for instance, and condos in Peru. Sales of exotic livestock are up. The U.S. Mint has seen a gold-coin rush.
考虑到金融市场的动荡，一些投资者开始摒弃股票和债券，转而在另类投资中寻求避风港，比如停车位，或是秘鲁的公寓。新奇牲畜的销售有所上升。美国丹佛造币厂经历了一场抢购金币的热潮。
Investors have long turned to hard assets in market downturns, the idea being that if you invest in something real, it won't disappear, even if its value declines. But analysts say this downturn is different in that real estate, the most traditional safe haven, is also sinking. Between July 2006 and July this year, home prices dropped 19.5%, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller 20-city composite home price index.
市场不景气的时候，投资者们常常会转而投资硬资产，因为如果你投资看得见、摸得着的实物，就算其价值下滑，东西也不会消失。但是分析师们说，这次的低迷不同以往之处在于，最传统的安全避风港房地产业也下滑了。据S&P/Case-Shiller全美20大城市综合房价指数，2006年7月至今年7月之间，房价跌了19.5%。
After the market dropped in January, Steve Borter, the 56-year-old president of a heating-and-air-conditioning company, did invest in real estate, but not the usual sort. He became landlord of a single parking space in Chicago. He bought a 12-by-20-foot spot in the Field Harbor Parking Garage for $29,000 and rents it out. 'The stock market is indicative of a lot of uncertainty. With a parking space, at least you end up with something,' he says.
在1月份市场下挫后，供暖空调公司的总裁、现年56岁的史蒂夫·波尔特(Steve Borter)的确投资了房地产，但却不是常见的房地产种类。他成了芝加哥一块停车位的所有者。他用2.9万美元在Field Harbor Parking Garage买了一块12英尺x20英尺见方的停车位，然后向外出租。他说，股市表现出很多的不确定性；而投资停车位，最后你至少会剩下点儿实际的东西。
Peggy Parks, a 49-year-old auditor in Johnstown, Pa., turned to an unusual farm animal. 'I've lost a fortune in stocks, and my 401(k) is falling through the floor. I feel comfortable in alpacas,' she says. She invested $56,000 in a small herd that she believes has a better outlook than most mutual funds because of the animals' breeding potential.
现年49岁、家住宾夕法尼亚州约翰斯顿的审计师佩吉·帕克斯(Peggy Parks)转而投资一种不同寻常的牲畜。她说，我在股市上赔了很多钱，我的401(k)退休计划也跌到了底；我感觉投资羊驼不错。她投资5.6万美元买了一小群羊驼，她认为羊驼比大部分共同基金的前景都要好，因为这种动物有极强的繁殖能力。
The national Alpaca Registry Inc., in Lincoln, Neb., says registrations are on pace to rise 7% this year and currently stand at 140,297. Ms. Parks says a female of 'medium quality' can fetch $10,000 and that prices have been rising, supporting her hopes that she'll see a profit on her alpaca portfolio in five years.
内布拉斯加州林肯的全国羊驼机构Alpaca Registry Inc.称，今年羊驼的登记数量有望增长7%，目前有140,297头。帕克斯说，一头中等质量的雌性羊驼价格为1万美元，而且还在不断涨价，这也让她增强了5年内在羊驼投资组合上获利的希望。
Financial firms are reporting that a growing number of retirees are rolling their money out of ordinary individual retirement accounts -- commonly stocks, bonds and mutual funds -- and into self-directed IRAs, where almost anything goes. 'We've had people invest in a cypress farm in Costa Rica, and a condo in Croatia,' says Tom Anderson, president of Pensco Inc., a San Francisco firm that has $3.3 billion in self-directed IRAs under custody. He says 20% more assets flowed in over the past three months than in the same period a year ago.
金融公司报告称，越来越多的退休人员把钱撤出普通的个人退休帐户──通常是股票、债券和共同基金──转而投向自我导向的个人退休帐户，这类投资包罗万象、无奇不有。Pensco Inc.总裁汤姆·安德森(Tom Anderson)说，我们有人投资哥斯达黎加的柏树林场，还有人投资克罗地亚的公寓。该公司位于旧金山，托管着33亿美元的自我导向个人退休帐户。他说，过去3个月资产流入量较去年同期增加了20%。
In Centennial, Colo., Tim Boykin, 56, a retired engineer, says he pulled his entire nest egg of nearly $1 million out of stock and bond funds in August and put it into a self-directed IRA. He invested some of the money in his niece's company -- which is building condos in Lima, Peru. While analysts warn that real-estate investments in emergng markets are risky, Mr. Boykin says he has done his research and remains confident: 'I can see pictures of the land. I can see steel. I can see people working. When I put my money in a fund, I see a big list of things that don't sound good.'
在科罗拉多州百年市，56岁的退休工程师蒂姆·波依金(Tim Boykin)说，8月份他把自己将近100万美元的资产尽数撤出了股票和债券基金，转投自我导向的个人退休帐户。他将其中的一部分投到自己侄女的公司，该公司正在秘鲁首都利马盖公寓。虽然分析师警告说，在新兴市场进行房地产投资是有风险的，但是波依金说，他已经进行了调查研究，对此非常有信心。他说，我能看见这块地的图片，看见钢材，看见人们在工作；当我把钱投入一只基金的时候，我看到的是一张长长的清单，上面的东西都看起来不妙。
Copyright (c) 2008 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.Not everyone thinks alternative investments are a great idea. The Alabama Securities Commission over the weekend issued an 'investor alert' urging caution. People are 'panicking,' says securities director Joseph Borg. He worries that investors who yank their money out of the stock market are prey for con artists hawking things like phantom oil wells.
并不是所有人都认为替代投资是个好主意。阿拉巴马证券委员会周末公布了一份“投资者警示”，督促投资者保持谨慎。证券主管博格(Joseph Borg)表示，投资者处于恐慌之中。他担心，从股市大举撤资的投资者会成为骗子的目标。
Mr. Borg, past president of the North American Securities Administrators Association, adds that in past market downturns he saw people turn to chinchillas, worm farms and super-breeds of rabbits. Emus, too, were big. 'Eventually, people got tired of them and just let them go,' he says. 'To this day, you'll be in West Texas and a big emu running wild will just come up next to your car.'
博格曾担任北美证券管理者协会(North American Securities Administrators Association)总裁。他还说，在过去市场下滑时，他见过人们转养龙猫、蚯蚓和兔子，还有火鸟。他表示，最后人们对这些东西感到厌倦，于是就放生了。今日你去西得克萨斯，还能看到火鸟在你的车边狂奔。
Hard-asset gurus like Howard Ruff, a best-selling author who rose to fame in the inflationary 1970s, are convinced their moment has come again. 'This is a big, big time, a very big time -- and this is just the beginning,' says Mr. Ruff. He has been advising people to buy bags of pre-1965 U.S dimes and quarters, which are 90% silver and in limited supply.
在七十年代通货膨胀时期名声大噪的畅销书作者鲁夫(Howard Ruff)等鼓吹投资硬资产的旗手相信，他们的时代再次来临了。鲁夫表示，这是个大时代，而且是刚刚开始。他建议人们大举收购1965年以前的美国一角硬币和25分硬币，这些硬币含有90%的银，而且是限量供应。
Gold coins also are in great demand. Last week, the mint suspended sales of American Buffalo 24-karat gold coins because it can't keep up with soaring sales. Last month, a record 14,000 bidders -- 17% more than the previous high -- turned out for a coin-and-currency auction in Long Beach, Calif., that generated $35 million in sales.
金币也面临着巨大需求。由于需求飙升导致供不应求，上周美国造币局停止销售24K“美国水牛”金币。上个月，有14,000名竞标者参加了加州长滩的一个钱币拍卖会，这一人数较此前纪录多出了17%；此次拍卖会销售金额高达3,500万美元。
Bob Sale, a Blue Bunny brand ice-cream distributor in Colorado Springs, Colo., says he purchased American Eagle gold coins last week after his 401(k) retirement account tanked. 'Holding them in your hand is like no other feeling,' he says.
科罗拉多泉市Blue Bunny品牌冰激凌经销商赛尔(Bob Sale)表示，在401(k)退休金帐户投资失败后，自己上周投资购买了“美国鹰”金币。他表示，拿着金币的感觉真是难以形容。
Mark Craddock, manager of Comic Book World, in Florence, Ky., says stock-market investors also are turning to superheroes. 'There's kind of a buying frenzy' in vintage comic books, he says.
肯塔基州佛罗伦斯的Comic Book World经理克拉多克(Mark Craddock)表示，股市投资者也把目光转向了漫画里的超级英雄们。他说，老漫画书也遭遇了收购狂热。
The 'Silver Age Comic Book Pricing Index' of 32 frequently traded '60s comics, was up 14.2% in the 18 months ending in July, while the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index was down 11% in the same period. Mark Haspel, president of Certified Guaranty Co. in Sarasota, Fla., which grades comic books, often for investors, says it's on track to handle 200,000 books this year, up from 150,000 in 2007.
截至7月份的18个月，包括32种经常交易的60年代漫画书的“白银时代漫画书价格指数”上涨了14.2%，而标准普尔500指数同期却下滑了11%。佛罗里达州萨拉索塔的Certified Guaranty Co.主要为投资者进行漫画书评级。该公司总裁哈斯佩尔(Mark Haspel)表示，今年公司估计要处理20万册漫画书，明显高于去年的15万册。
'Spiderman is going to be here in 20 years -- he's not going away,' Mr. Haspel says.
哈斯佩尔表示，蜘蛛侠20年后还会回来，他不会离开。
Summon Your Courage and Buy Stocks 鼓起勇气 冲进股市
During the Great Depression, an entire generation became convinced that owning stocks was dangerous. But if you were among the courageous few who bought and held stocks during and after the Depression, you earned spectacular returns.
在大萧条时期，整整一代人都相信持有股票充满着危险。但如果你是在大萧条期间或刚刚结束后买进并持有股票的极少数勇敢者之一，你就会获得可观的回报。
Depression-level stock phobia might be making a comeback. Will you suffer from it or conquer it?
大萧条时般剧烈的股票恐惧症可能已重新蔓延开来。你是要放任它在心头肆虐，还是要将其克服？
This past Monday, a team of researchers conducted an online survey of nearly 600 people nationwide. The results constitute a unique real-time recording of what was running through people's minds from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern time on the day the Dow was shedding nearly 778 points in a ragged panic.
上周一，一组研究人员对全美各地近600人进行了一个网上调查。调查结果中独特地实时记录了当天美东时间下午1时至5时人们的心理变化；当天道琼斯指数在恐慌性抛盘中暴跌了将近778点。
First and foremost, Americans are afraid.
最直观的印象是，美国人的确感到害怕了。
Asked whether 'the financial challenges the country is facing now pose a greater threat to the quality of my life' than major natural disasters, 87% agreed; 83% were more worried about the financial crisis than a terrorist attack.
在问到美国目前金融业的挑战对生活质量造成的威胁是否大于严重自然灾害时，有87%的受访者给予了肯定回答；83%的受访者更担心的是金融危机，而非恐怖袭击。
Psychologist Paul Slovic of the University of Oregon, who led the study, had investors estimate the performance of their stocks and stock funds over the next 12 months and the decade to come. When Dr. Slovic last asked this question, in early 2001, only 6.7% of investors expected a zero or negative return during the coming year and a mere 1.3% thought they would have no gains over the next 10 years. This past Monday, however, 36% foresaw no profits in the next 12 months and fully 5% predicted that their portfolios would go absolutely nowhere for a decade.
领导这项研究的俄勒冈大学心理学家保罗•斯洛维奇(Paul Slovic)让投资者预测一下他们所持的股票和股票型基金在未来12个月乃至下一个10年中的表现。当上一次斯洛维奇在2001年初问这个问题时，只有6.7%的投资者认为下一年会是零回报或负回报，只有1.3%的受访者认为他们的投资在未来10年里不会增值。然而，在上周一的调查中，36%的受访者预计未来12个月无法盈利，足有5%的受访者认为他们的投资组合在今后10年里不会增值。
Investors seem riveted by what is happening, as if they were the witnesses to a fatal accident unspooling in slow motion before their eyes.
投资者似乎被眼下发生的事情定格了，就好像他们的眼前正以慢镜头回放着一起伤亡事故惨状。
The closeness with which Americans say they have tracked events 'is really kind of astounding,' says Dr. Slovic's collaborator at the University of Oregon, psychologist Ellen Peters. Asked how long they had watched the financial news on television each day in the past week, 74% said at least one hour and 15% said four hours or more.
斯洛维奇在俄勒冈大学的合作者、心理学家艾伦•彼得斯(Ellen Peters)称，美国人对其正追踪的重要事件的密切关注程度着实令人吃惊。在问到过去一周里他们每天在电视上收看多长时间的财经新闻时，有74%的人回答至少1小时，15%的人回答4小时或更长。
In short, investors' view of the decade to come is being shaped by the events of the last few days. Peering into the future, all they can see is the immediate past, which is full of anger, pain and distrust. As finance professor Meir Statman of Santa Clara University says, 'Fear increases pessimism.'
简而言之，投资者对下一个10年的看法因过去几天所发生的重要事件而不断改变。面对未来，他们所有人看到的都是过去刚刚发生的事情，充满了愤怒、痛苦和怀疑。正如圣克拉拉大学金融学教授梅尔•斯特曼(Meir Statman)所言，恐惧助长悲观。
Add it all up, and it is hard not to be bullish. As an intelligent investor, you must always ask: What is my edge? What information or skill do I possess that the people on the other side of the trade don't? In normal times, that is a high hurdle. Today, however, you need only two things in order to have an automatic edge: cash and courage.
把上述所有因素累加到一起，人们应该乐观才对。作为一个明智的投资者，你必须常常反问自己：我的优势在哪里？哪些信息或技能是我有而交易对手没有的？正常情况下，处于优势地位实属难事。不过现在，你只需要两样东西就能自然而然地获得优势；那就是现金和勇气。
This past Thursday, Columbia Business School held a conference on value investing to commemorate the publication of the revised edition of Benjamin Graham's classic volume, 'Security Analysis.' Seth Klarman of Baupost Group in Boston is an editor of the book and one of the leading value investors in the country.
上周四，哥伦比亚商学院举行了一场价值投资会议，以纪念本杰明•格雷厄姆(Benjamin Graham)的经典著作《证券分析》(Security Analysis)修订版的出版。波士顿Baupost Group的塞思•卡拉曼(Seth Klarman)是本书的编辑，他也是美国赫赫有名的价值投资者之一。
'Normally, as a buyer you have to compete with a lot of very, very smart competitors,' said Mr. Klarman. 'But many of the smartest people are on the sidelines now because of redemptions, margin calls or panicked-out-of-their-mind selling. So you don't have to be as smart as you did before. You just have to be in the game.'
卡拉曼说，一般来说，作为一名买家，你必须要同许多非常、非常聪明的对手竞争。但现在许多最聪明的人已经由于赎回、保证金吃紧或过于恐慌而卖出并离场了。因此你不必像以前那么聪明。你要做的就是还在这个游戏之中。
The day Mr. Klarman spoke, the Dow fell an additional 348 points, and 658 stocks, or more than 15% of the total, hit new 52-week lows on the New York Stock Exchange. Yet the word Mr. Klarman and several other speakers kept using was 'excited.'
在卡拉曼讲话的当天，道琼斯指数又下跌了348点，纽约证交所共有658只股票创出了52周新低，占全部股票数量的15%以上。不过卡拉曼和其他几位讲话者不断使用的一个词却是“激动人心”。
That is because investments everywhere are priced as if the whole solar system were going out of business. U.S. stocks have lost 24% since Jan. 1; foreign stocks are off 32%; emerging markets, nearly 40%; junk bonds are down 13%; even municipal bonds have fallen almost 10%. Money is pouring into U.S. Treasury debt -- so much so that stocks now offer more income than bonds do. The dividend yield on the Dow Jones Industrial Average is currently at 3.14%, higher than the 2.68% yield on the five-year Treasury note.
这是因为各地的投资价格都在暴跌，就彷佛整个太阳系都要崩溃一般。美国股市自1月1日以来已下跌了24%；海外股市下跌了32%；新兴市场股市的跌幅接近40%；垃圾债券下跌了13%；甚至是市政债券也下跌了约10%。资金正在蜂拥至美国国债市场，规模是如此之大以至于股票现在带来的收益已经超过了债券。道琼斯工业股票平均价格指数成份股的股息收益率目前为3.14%，高于五年期美国国债目前2.68%的收益率。
With so many professional money managers afraid to act, with most of the public in the grip of fear and anger, you should put your cash and your courage to work. If you have no cash, use your courage: Rebalance by selling a little of anything that's gone up and buying more of whatever's gone down.
由于现在有这么多的专业基金经理都一动不敢动，而且绝大多数人都深陷恐惧和愤怒，此时的你就应该让你的现金和勇气发挥作用。如果你没有现金，就亮出你的勇气来：重新平衡一下，卖出一点一直在上升的投资品种，多买一些一直在下跌的品种。
If you have both cash and courage, make a list of 10 stocks you've always wanted to own at 'the right price.' Chances are, they are cheap. Better yet, think of an investment category you've long wanted to venture into, like emerging markets. Chances are, it is on sale. Just about everything is.
如果你既有现金，又有勇气，那就列出你一直想以“合适的价格” 拥有的10只股票吧。机会就在于它们的价格很便宜。如果能考虑一下早就想进入的投资领域，比如新兴市场，那就更好了。机会就在于它们都在低价出售。放眼望去，几乎所有一切都是如此。
在大萧条时期，整整一代人都相信持有股票充满着危险。但如果你是在大萧条期间或刚刚结束后买进并持有股票的极少数勇敢者之一，你就会获得可观的回报。
Depression-level stock phobia might be making a comeback. Will you suffer from it or conquer it?
大萧条时般剧烈的股票恐惧症可能已重新蔓延开来。你是要放任它在心头肆虐，还是要将其克服？
This past Monday, a team of researchers conducted an online survey of nearly 600 people nationwide. The results constitute a unique real-time recording of what was running through people's minds from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern time on the day the Dow was shedding nearly 778 points in a ragged panic.
上周一，一组研究人员对全美各地近600人进行了一个网上调查。调查结果中独特地实时记录了当天美东时间下午1时至5时人们的心理变化；当天道琼斯指数在恐慌性抛盘中暴跌了将近778点。
First and foremost, Americans are afraid.
最直观的印象是，美国人的确感到害怕了。
Asked whether 'the financial challenges the country is facing now pose a greater threat to the quality of my life' than major natural disasters, 87% agreed; 83% were more worried about the financial crisis than a terrorist attack.
在问到美国目前金融业的挑战对生活质量造成的威胁是否大于严重自然灾害时，有87%的受访者给予了肯定回答；83%的受访者更担心的是金融危机，而非恐怖袭击。
Psychologist Paul Slovic of the University of Oregon, who led the study, had investors estimate the performance of their stocks and stock funds over the next 12 months and the decade to come. When Dr. Slovic last asked this question, in early 2001, only 6.7% of investors expected a zero or negative return during the coming year and a mere 1.3% thought they would have no gains over the next 10 years. This past Monday, however, 36% foresaw no profits in the next 12 months and fully 5% predicted that their portfolios would go absolutely nowhere for a decade.
领导这项研究的俄勒冈大学心理学家保罗•斯洛维奇(Paul Slovic)让投资者预测一下他们所持的股票和股票型基金在未来12个月乃至下一个10年中的表现。当上一次斯洛维奇在2001年初问这个问题时，只有6.7%的投资者认为下一年会是零回报或负回报，只有1.3%的受访者认为他们的投资在未来10年里不会增值。然而，在上周一的调查中，36%的受访者预计未来12个月无法盈利，足有5%的受访者认为他们的投资组合在今后10年里不会增值。
Investors seem riveted by what is happening, as if they were the witnesses to a fatal accident unspooling in slow motion before their eyes.
投资者似乎被眼下发生的事情定格了，就好像他们的眼前正以慢镜头回放着一起伤亡事故惨状。
The closeness with which Americans say they have tracked events 'is really kind of astounding,' says Dr. Slovic's collaborator at the University of Oregon, psychologist Ellen Peters. Asked how long they had watched the financial news on television each day in the past week, 74% said at least one hour and 15% said four hours or more.
斯洛维奇在俄勒冈大学的合作者、心理学家艾伦•彼得斯(Ellen Peters)称，美国人对其正追踪的重要事件的密切关注程度着实令人吃惊。在问到过去一周里他们每天在电视上收看多长时间的财经新闻时，有74%的人回答至少1小时，15%的人回答4小时或更长。
In short, investors' view of the decade to come is being shaped by the events of the last few days. Peering into the future, all they can see is the immediate past, which is full of anger, pain and distrust. As finance professor Meir Statman of Santa Clara University says, 'Fear increases pessimism.'
简而言之，投资者对下一个10年的看法因过去几天所发生的重要事件而不断改变。面对未来，他们所有人看到的都是过去刚刚发生的事情，充满了愤怒、痛苦和怀疑。正如圣克拉拉大学金融学教授梅尔•斯特曼(Meir Statman)所言，恐惧助长悲观。
Add it all up, and it is hard not to be bullish. As an intelligent investor, you must always ask: What is my edge? What information or skill do I possess that the people on the other side of the trade don't? In normal times, that is a high hurdle. Today, however, you need only two things in order to have an automatic edge: cash and courage.
把上述所有因素累加到一起，人们应该乐观才对。作为一个明智的投资者，你必须常常反问自己：我的优势在哪里？哪些信息或技能是我有而交易对手没有的？正常情况下，处于优势地位实属难事。不过现在，你只需要两样东西就能自然而然地获得优势；那就是现金和勇气。
This past Thursday, Columbia Business School held a conference on value investing to commemorate the publication of the revised edition of Benjamin Graham's classic volume, 'Security Analysis.' Seth Klarman of Baupost Group in Boston is an editor of the book and one of the leading value investors in the country.
上周四，哥伦比亚商学院举行了一场价值投资会议，以纪念本杰明•格雷厄姆(Benjamin Graham)的经典著作《证券分析》(Security Analysis)修订版的出版。波士顿Baupost Group的塞思•卡拉曼(Seth Klarman)是本书的编辑，他也是美国赫赫有名的价值投资者之一。
'Normally, as a buyer you have to compete with a lot of very, very smart competitors,' said Mr. Klarman. 'But many of the smartest people are on the sidelines now because of redemptions, margin calls or panicked-out-of-their-mind selling. So you don't have to be as smart as you did before. You just have to be in the game.'
卡拉曼说，一般来说，作为一名买家，你必须要同许多非常、非常聪明的对手竞争。但现在许多最聪明的人已经由于赎回、保证金吃紧或过于恐慌而卖出并离场了。因此你不必像以前那么聪明。你要做的就是还在这个游戏之中。
The day Mr. Klarman spoke, the Dow fell an additional 348 points, and 658 stocks, or more than 15% of the total, hit new 52-week lows on the New York Stock Exchange. Yet the word Mr. Klarman and several other speakers kept using was 'excited.'
在卡拉曼讲话的当天，道琼斯指数又下跌了348点，纽约证交所共有658只股票创出了52周新低，占全部股票数量的15%以上。不过卡拉曼和其他几位讲话者不断使用的一个词却是“激动人心”。
That is because investments everywhere are priced as if the whole solar system were going out of business. U.S. stocks have lost 24% since Jan. 1; foreign stocks are off 32%; emerging markets, nearly 40%; junk bonds are down 13%; even municipal bonds have fallen almost 10%. Money is pouring into U.S. Treasury debt -- so much so that stocks now offer more income than bonds do. The dividend yield on the Dow Jones Industrial Average is currently at 3.14%, higher than the 2.68% yield on the five-year Treasury note.
这是因为各地的投资价格都在暴跌，就彷佛整个太阳系都要崩溃一般。美国股市自1月1日以来已下跌了24%；海外股市下跌了32%；新兴市场股市的跌幅接近40%；垃圾债券下跌了13%；甚至是市政债券也下跌了约10%。资金正在蜂拥至美国国债市场，规模是如此之大以至于股票现在带来的收益已经超过了债券。道琼斯工业股票平均价格指数成份股的股息收益率目前为3.14%，高于五年期美国国债目前2.68%的收益率。
With so many professional money managers afraid to act, with most of the public in the grip of fear and anger, you should put your cash and your courage to work. If you have no cash, use your courage: Rebalance by selling a little of anything that's gone up and buying more of whatever's gone down.
由于现在有这么多的专业基金经理都一动不敢动，而且绝大多数人都深陷恐惧和愤怒，此时的你就应该让你的现金和勇气发挥作用。如果你没有现金，就亮出你的勇气来：重新平衡一下，卖出一点一直在上升的投资品种，多买一些一直在下跌的品种。
If you have both cash and courage, make a list of 10 stocks you've always wanted to own at 'the right price.' Chances are, they are cheap. Better yet, think of an investment category you've long wanted to venture into, like emerging markets. Chances are, it is on sale. Just about everything is.
如果你既有现金，又有勇气，那就列出你一直想以“合适的价格” 拥有的10只股票吧。机会就在于它们的价格很便宜。如果能考虑一下早就想进入的投资领域，比如新兴市场，那就更好了。机会就在于它们都在低价出售。放眼望去，几乎所有一切都是如此。
To Panic Or Not To Panic? 恐慌时期的股市之道
Have you had enough yet?
你受够了吗？
You probably are good and panicked by now. Smiling bravely that this too shall pass as your hand gropes for the exit door. Sure, you will be poorer, but you won't be penniless.
你可能现在惊慌失措。在你摸索着准备退场的时候，勇敢地微笑，这一切也会过去的。当然，你的资产会缩水，但你不会血本无归。
Now, just hold on a bit longer. Take a deep breath and think about some of your choices.
现在，再稍微坚持一下吧。做个深呼吸，然后想想你的一些选择。
- Choice No.1: You can either buy or sell U.S. bank stocks.
选择之一：你可以买进或抛售美国银行类股。
At Monday's close, the combined common equity of JP Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM), Bank of America Corp. (BAC), Citigroup Inc. (C), Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC) and U.S. Bancorp (USB) had a total market value of less than $500 billion.
截至周一收盘时，摩根大通(JP Morgan Chase & Co.)、美国银行(Bank of America Corp.)、花旗集团(Citigroup Inc.)、富国银行(Wells Fargo & Co.)以及U.S. Bancorp的市值加起来都不到5,000亿美元。
Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM), the largest U.S. company by market capitalization, has a value of a little more than $400 billion.
目前美国市值最大的公司埃克森美孚(Exxon Mobil Corp.)总市值也仅略高于4,000亿美元。
Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd., or ICBC, (1398.HK) still carries a market value of more than $300 billion.
中国工商银行(ICBC)目前市值超过3,000亿美元。
The case to buy is straightforward. Buy the banks and you are buying a government-funded oligopoly. The TARP program, Fed commercial paper program and today's historic global interest rate cut all are designed to keep the banks afloat.
买进的理由显而易见。买进银行类股，就等于买进政府资助的寡头垄断股票。不良资产救助计划(TARP)、美国联邦储备委员会(Fed)的商业票据计划以及周三历史性的全球携手减息举措都是为了提振银行类股。
This isn't to say the U.S. banks are a great bargain. But to sell at this level, essentially means you believe the U.S. financial system is bankrupt-that the bad debts and capital requirements of the banks swamp all their assets.
这并不是说现在买美国银行类股是个好买卖。但在现在的价位抛售，基本上就意味着你认为美国金融体系已经崩溃，认为不良债券和银行资本要求已经侵蚀了它们所有的资产。
Of course, that is plausible. But likely? With all of the Federal Reserve's actions, isn't it just a matter of time before credit starts to flow?
当然，这似乎有点道理。但有可能吗？在Fed采取了这么多举措之后，信贷重新开始流动难道不就是个时间问题？
Buy or sell: it's your choice.
买进还是抛售：这是你的选择。
- Choice No. 2: You can either buy U.S. pharmaceutical stocks or sell them.
选择之二：你可以买进或者抛售美国制药类股。
XLV, the health-care exchange-traded fund, comprised principally of U.S. pharmaceutical companies, traded Monday at under $28 - about 30% off the 52-week high. Nearly 10% of the XLV is comprised of Pfizer, a pharmaceutical giant with $48 billion in revenue and more than $10 billion in net cash on its balance sheet. Pfizer trades at a price of less than seven times next year's expected earnings and sports a 7% dividend.
医疗交易所买卖基金(ETF) XLV主要由美国制药公司股票组成。该基金周一跌破28美元，较52周高点下挫了大约30%。XLV投资组合中有将近10%是辉瑞公司(Pfizer)股票，后者是年收入480亿美元的制药巨头，资产负债表上现金净额超过100亿美元。相对于下一财年的预期收益，目前辉瑞股价市盈率不足7倍，股息率为7%。
Pfizer Inc.'s (PFE) share price is down by a third over the past year because of flat growth and a weak product pipeline. But it also is down because of panic selling. The 7% dividend appears safe. And certainly in our troubled times demand for Pfizer's Ben-Gay cream or its panic-attack medicine Xanax should hold steady.
过去一年，辉瑞公司股价下跌了三分之一，主要受增长乏力和产品线疲软拖累。不过，恐慌性抛售也是该股下挫的重要原因。7%的股息率似乎安全可靠。当然，在经济困难时期，辉瑞公司的Ben-Gay药膏和抗焦虑药Xanax应该会有稳定的需求。
Buy or sell: It's your choice.
买进还是抛售：这是你的选择。
- Choice No. 3: You can either buy U.S. tech stocks or sell them.
选择之三：你可以买进或抛售美国科技类股。
Do you admire International Business Machines Corp. (IBM), Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ), Intel Corp. (INTC) and Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO)? These are the world's leading technology companies. All profitable. All carry little to no debt or have cash surpluses. And all are now priced at less than 15 times next year's expected earnings.
你仰慕国际商业机器公司(IBM)、微软(Microsoft)、惠普公司(Hewlett-Packard Co.)、英特尔(Intel Corp.)以及思科系统(Cisco Systems Inc.)这些科技巨头吗？这些都是世界顶尖的科技公司。他们都收益丰厚，负债很少或者没有负债，或持有现金盈余。相对于下财年预期收益，这些公司目前市盈率都不到15倍。
Not enough growth? How about Apple Inc. (AAPL), which at $90 is trading at less than half its 52-week high? Based on analyst projections, Apple trades at just over 15 times next year's earnings.
这些股票增长不够？那苹果公司(Apple Inc.)怎么样，该股目前报90美元，还不到其52周高点的一半。根据分析师的预计，较之下财年预期收益，苹果公司目前市盈率略高于15倍。
For years, tech companies that increased earnings by double-digit percentages typically traded at north of 20 or even 30 times earnings.
多年以来，收益呈现两位数增幅的科技公司一般市盈率都超过20倍甚至高达30倍。
But wait a second, you may say. The panic is driven by fear of a global recession or even depression. And that will wipe out demand for the tech company products and erase their earnings.
但你可能会说，等一下。恐慌主要是因为市场担心全球经济陷入衰退甚至萧条。这种状况会拖累科技产品的需求，打压科技公司的收益。
True. A recession will knock down their earnings. But by how much? You can always paint a scenario to justify any stock price no matter how high or low. The question you should ask yourself is, how bad will things get?
没错，经济衰退的确会影响科技公司的收益状况。但这种影响程度有多高？无论股价高还是低，你都可以设想一下，来判定公司股价是否合理。你应该问问自己，情况会有多糟呢？
If you think bad enough to wipe out the profits of tech companies for many years to come, you know what to do.
如果你认为情况实在是太糟糕了，科技公司未来多年的收益都会因此泡汤，那你知道该怎么做了。
Buy or sell: It's your choice.
买进还是抛售：这是你的选择。
Nobody knows where this stock market may bottom in the next few days. Will the Dow fall to 9000? To 8000? 7000? Sure, it could go that low. But it probably won't.
没人知道当前的股市将来会在何处触底？道琼斯指数会跌到9000点、8000点还是7000点？当然，道指也有可能会跌到那么低，但这种情况还是不太可能出现。
Most of the recent selling is done by investors who have little choice. Hedge funds and mutual funds are selling based on redemptions. Fast-money traders are selling as they are stopped out of short-term positions. The selling begets selling, which is what a panic is all about.
最近大多数抛售举动都来自没什么选择的投资者。对冲基金和共同基金在抛售，是因为他们需要应对赎回。投机者在抛售，是因为他们正从短期头寸脱身。抛售引发抛售，这正是恐慌之所在。
But for long-term investors, panics are a time for thought and choice. Turn off the TV and take a view. What will it be: buy or sell?
但对长线投资者来说，恐慌时期正是他们思考和选择的时机。关掉电视，冷静分析一下，你究竟该买进还是抛售？
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