Emerging markets

　　All fall down都跌了

　　Oct 9th 2008

　　From The Economist print edition

　　Firms in developing countries struggle to escape their roots發(fā)展中國(guó)家中的公司掙扎著逃命

　　STOCKMARKET bubbles often take a genuine improvement in economic orcorporate performance, and then vastly overestimate its effect. Equityinvestors in emerging markets must wonder if they have once again beensuckered into giving developing countries the benefit of the doubt.Prices have fallen by almost half this year. On October 6themerging-market shares recorded their biggest one-day fall in at least20 years, prompting all-too-familiar scenes of chaos followed byenforced inactivity, as trading at some bourses was suspended.

　　股市泡沫常常帶來(lái)真正的經(jīng)濟(jì)或公司經(jīng)營(yíng)改進(jìn)，接踵而來(lái)的是大規(guī)模過(guò)高估計(jì)其效果。新興市場(chǎng)的股市投資者肯定在疑問(wèn)著他們是否又被騙入,因?yàn)榘l(fā)展中國(guó)家原來(lái)就是疑團(tuán)。這些國(guó)家的股市今年已經(jīng)下跌近一半。10月6日，新興市場(chǎng)的股價(jià)下跌創(chuàng)了20年來(lái)的最大跌幅，導(dǎo)致了人們太熟悉的混亂場(chǎng)面，跟著來(lái)到是強(qiáng)制性停止活動(dòng)，例如在一些交易所停止了交易。

　　For bullish investors one attraction of emerging economies was thefact that they had started with better public finances andbalance-of-payments positions than in previous cycles. How resilientthose positions are is now being tested, as plunging commodity pricessap export earnings and capital flows dry up. Even sound economies maystill be dragged down. As Stephen Jen, an economist at Morgan Stanley,points out, in a crisis “bad things happen to good countries”.

　　對(duì)于那些看好的投資人來(lái)講，與以前各次循環(huán)相比，此次新興經(jīng)濟(jì)一個(gè)吸引人地方在于他們以更好的公共債務(wù)及收支平衡作為起始。當(dāng)大宗商品價(jià)格暴跌，使得出口收入受到影響，且資本流處于枯竭，這些國(guó)家的那些狀況有強(qiáng)勁目前正受到考驗(yàn)。即使那些最健康的經(jīng)濟(jì)也可能被拉下水。大摩的經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)家Stephen Jen指出，在危機(jī)中“好的國(guó)家會(huì)發(fā)生壞事情”。

　　Equity investors’ enthusiasm also reflected a more novel idea—thatthe quality of emerging-market companies had improved. Rather than anold guard of conglomerates with hazy ownership and accounting, thethesis ran, there was a new generation of large, well run, globallycompetitive “mega-cap” firms. Indeed, these might even be less riskythan their homelands’ governments. And just as the Dutch economy haslittle bearing on Royal Dutch Shell’s share price, or the Britisheconomy on Vodafone’s, the hope was that these firms might eventuallytranscend their domestic markets.

　　股票投資人的興高采烈也反映了更新穎的看法—新興市場(chǎng)里的公司質(zhì)量已經(jīng)改善了。相當(dāng)普遍的看法是，這些公司已經(jīng)不是老式那種擁有者及會(huì)計(jì)制度模糊不清的國(guó)際集團(tuán)，替代而來(lái)的是新一代大型，運(yùn)營(yíng)良好，世界范圍中有競(jìng)爭(zhēng)力的“超大型”公司。真的，這些公司的風(fēng)險(xiǎn)可能比他們所在國(guó)的政府都少。正如荷蘭經(jīng)濟(jì)不會(huì)影響皇家殼牌石油公司的股價(jià)一樣，或是英國(guó)經(jīng)濟(jì)與Vodafone并不緊連，希望是這些公司可能已經(jīng)超越了其國(guó)內(nèi)市場(chǎng)。

　　Some of the claims were over the top. In April 2007 Gazprom, anenergy firm controlled by the Kremlin, made a Dr-Evil-style predictionthat its market value would reach $1 trillion (ten times today’slevel). But there was substance too, exemplified by the wave ofcredible bids for Western companies before the credit crunch, such asthe multibillion approach by Vale, a Brazilian miner, for Xstrata.

　　有些叫法有些太過(guò)頭。在2007年月，由俄國(guó)政府控制的能源公司Gazprom宣布了一個(gè)惡魔式的預(yù)測(cè)，估計(jì)其市值將達(dá)到一萬(wàn)億美金(是目前市值的10倍)。但是這些公司也有行動(dòng)，在信貸緊縮前不斷出價(jià)收購(gòu)西方公司，例如巴西的礦業(yè)公司Vale出手上千億美金收購(gòu) Xstrata就是實(shí)例。

　　EPAJust like the old days

　　跟過(guò)去一樣

　　Why then, have most emerging stockmarkets fallen by more thanWestern ones, particularly in the past month? There are some plausiblefundamental explanations. They may have been more overvalued to startwith. Even after their tumble, the aggregate price-earnings ratio is inline with developed markets, rather than at the discount that has beenthe historical norm. The composition of most indices also makes themvulnerable. Almost two-fifths of the earnings of the FTSEemerging-markets benchmark are from highly cyclical energy orbasic-materials companies—twice the share in developed markets—soearnings forecasts are falling faster than for developed peers. Mostindices under-represent mainland China, which has been relativelyresilient in recent weeks, on the grounds that it is hard forforeigners to invest there. And the top 20 companies account for justover a quarter of the FTSE emerging-markets index. Although that is ahigher proportion than in developed economies, it still leaves a longtail of smaller firms which may be less well run.

　　那么為什么多數(shù)新興股市下跌幅度超過(guò)西方國(guó)家的股市跌幅，特別是上個(gè)月的下跌呢?這里有些可信的基本解釋。這些新興股市開(kāi)始時(shí)可能就是估值過(guò)高了。就是當(dāng)他們暴跌后，其本益比才與發(fā)達(dá)國(guó)家的本益比接近，而不是歷史上常見(jiàn)的削價(jià)出售。多數(shù)這些市場(chǎng)的指數(shù)組成也使得這些市場(chǎng)更加不堪一擊。在FTSE新興市場(chǎng)指數(shù)中，幾乎五分之二的收益是高度緊跟經(jīng)濟(jì)循環(huán)的能源或基本原材料公司，這是發(fā)達(dá)市場(chǎng)指數(shù)中的兩倍。所以收益預(yù)測(cè)下降比發(fā)達(dá)市場(chǎng)的要快。中國(guó)大陸在多數(shù)這些指數(shù)中的表現(xiàn)不足(而中國(guó)大陸在近幾周來(lái)相對(duì)強(qiáng)勁)，這是基于外國(guó)人很難在那里進(jìn)行投資的觀點(diǎn)。在FTSE新興市場(chǎng)指數(shù)中，前20家公司占了超過(guò)四分之一的地位。雖然這比發(fā)達(dá)經(jīng)濟(jì)多了許多，但仍剩下很多運(yùn)營(yíng)不如他們的很多較小公司。

　　As well as quirks of composition and valuation, the harsh reality isthat, as in previous crises, investors are not discriminating much.Most “mega-cap” companies have been penalised more heavily thanrich-world peers in the same industry. Credit-default swaps, a type ofinsurance against bankruptcy, suggest that the borrowing costs of bigemerging-markets firms have spiked along with those of their homecountries’ governments. This is despite the fact that emerging-marketindustrial companies in aggregate, like their governments, have lowerdebt levels than their Western equivalents. Shares of emerging-marketbanks, which with the exception of a few places such as Russia are inreasonable shape, have plunged in sympathy with their Western peers.

　　與指數(shù)組成及價(jià)值受到扭曲一樣，與以前的危機(jī)相同，殘酷的現(xiàn)實(shí)是投資人并沒(méi)有細(xì)細(xì)選擇。多數(shù)“超大型”公司已經(jīng)受到的懲罰要比其富裕國(guó)家同類(lèi)行業(yè)公司要重得多。信貸違約掉期合同，即防止破產(chǎn)的保險(xiǎn)合同，表明大型新興市場(chǎng)公司的貸款費(fèi)用以及其所在國(guó)政府的貸款費(fèi)用已經(jīng)大幅上升。盡管在事實(shí)上，這些新興市場(chǎng)制造業(yè)公司總體來(lái)講，與其政府一樣，債務(wù)水平都比其西方同類(lèi)的要低。新興市場(chǎng)的銀行股價(jià)，除了幾個(gè)例外情況外，例如俄國(guó)，均處于合理狀態(tài)，但是也與其西方同行一起暴跌。

　　There may well have been structural improvements in emergingeconomies, but just now markets are having none of it. That couldpresent a buying opportunity. But if capital remains scarce for toolong, and big companies struggle to refinance their foreign debt,investors’ gut reaction could become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

　　雖然新興經(jīng)濟(jì)已經(jīng)有了結(jié)構(gòu)性改善，但是目前市場(chǎng)中并沒(méi)有反映這些。這就給出了買(mǎi)入機(jī)會(huì)。但是如果資本長(zhǎng)期處于短缺狀態(tài)，大型公司掙扎著轉(zhuǎn)貸其外債，投資人的大膽舉動(dòng)可能會(huì)變成自圓其說(shuō)了。