5Making banks safe Calling to accounts.doc

Making banks safe Calling to accounts 罪魁祸首让银行变得更安全The final article in our series on the financial crisis examines the best way to make banks safer without killing lending.本篇重点：如何在不扼杀放贷的情况下，找到一条让银行变得更安全的最佳途径。 1 BANKS are a perplexing mix. The special institutions at the heart of capitalism, they provide an easy link between savers and borrowers: granting loans to those with the ideas and ambition to use them while at the same time providing peace of mind to squirrels who want to lock their cash away safely. Yet banks have a dark side too: they exist to manage risk, but often simply stockpile it. When they go bad they scythe away wealth and strangle economies. There is little argument that it was the banks that started the crisis five years ago. There is huge disagreement about how to put things right.银行是一个矛盾的混合体。作为身处资本主义核心的一个特殊机构，银行为储蓄人和借款人搭建了一条便利的通道：她一方面可以将资金借给有想法有野心的人，另一方面又可以为想把现金安全地藏起来的小松鼠提供安全之选。然而，银行也有其黑暗的一面：它们原本是为了控制风险而存在，然而却经常成为风险累积之地。当他们露出其丑恶的一面时，它们会将你的财富席卷一空，会让经济体窒息而亡。毫无疑问，5年前的那场金融危机之所以会发生，银行是一个关键的因素。但是，怎样才能让银行的运作走上正规呢？各方议论纷纷，至今尚无统一的观点。2 To see why banks are so vital, start with the finances of a typical household or firm. Their debtsmainly mortgages on homes, offices or factorieshave fixed terms; they often have fixed interest rates too. In what is owed there is a lot of certainty. But firms and families financial assets are not bound by such rigid terms: deposits can be withdrawn with little notice, bonds and equity can be sold quickly if cash is needed or if investment tastes change. This combination of fixed-term debts and flexible assets is a comfortable set-up.为了说明银行的重要性，不妨从家庭和企业的财政说起。对于一个典型的家庭或企业来说，他们的债务主要是按揭贷款，即为购买房产、办公场所或生产厂房而从银行获得的贷款，这些贷款都是受固定条款约束的，而且贷款的利率也经常是固定的，也就是说，债务是固定的，它有很多确定性因素在内。但是，家庭和企业的金融资产就有所不同了，上述的固定条款对它们没有约束力。如果你急需现金，可以在不引起别人注意的情况下从银行中提取存款；如果你急需现金投资偏好发生了变化，可以迅速地卖出债券和股票。债务是“死”的，资产是“活”的。两相搭配，就会让你拥有一个不错的前程。3 But one partys asset is anothers liability. This means that corporate and personal finances have a mirror image in the balance-sheets of banks, where assets (the loans a bank has made) cannot be adjusted but where debts (its customers deposits) can be called in overnight. That mix is risky: a rush of depositors demanding their money back can force cut-price asset sales. If debts are called in more quickly than assets can be sold, insolvency looms. Managing that risk is what banks do: by holding a risky balance-sheet they allow households and firms to have safe ones.但是，请不要忘记这样一个道理：对于财富来说，它既是你的资产也是别人的负债。也就是说，银行资产负债表所反映的情况正好同个人和企业的财政报表相反。在这上面，资产（即银行发放的贷款）是不能调整的，债务（即银行客户的存款）却是随时在变化的。两者相结合，使得银行成为一个充满了风险的行业。如果储户急于从银行中提取存款，银行就得被迫甩卖资产；如果银行出售资产的速度满足不了债权人的还债请求，等待她的将是破产的命运。银行的工作就是控制风险：通过自己持有一份充满风险的资产负债表，就可以让家庭和企业拥有一份安全的资产负债表。4 Since the maturities of their assets and liabilities do not match up, banks tend to give themselves some margin for error. They build resilience into their finances in two ways. Liquid assetsthings like cash and government bonds that can be sold quickly and at relatively certain pricesare a safety valve. If investors suddenly shun a banks bonds or depositors withdraw large sums, it can sell them. That allows the banks balance-sheet to shrink safely, in line with creditors demands.由于资产的到期日和负债的到期日并不同步，银行往往倾向于给他们的错误预留一定的空间。他们通常用两个办法使其财政保有弹性。像现金和政府债券等可以以相对固定的价格出售的流动资产，就如同一个安全调节阀。如果投资者突然回避银行债券，或者是储户提取大量现金，银行可以出售这些资产。借此，银行可以让自己的资产负债表安全地萎缩，做到同债权人的要求保持同步。5 But balance-sheets can shrink for other reasons too. The value of a banks riskier assetsmortgages, bonds, loans to companiescan drop sharply if the prospects of the borrowers sour. The danger is that the value of the banks assets could fall below its liabilities: with more owing than is owned, the bank would be bust. To forestall such failures banks maintain equity. This represents the money a banks owners have invested in it. Equity takes the first hit when asset values drop. Since the banks owners absorb the loss, its creditorsbondholders and depositorscan rest assured that they will not have to.但是，银行的资产负债表也可以因其他原因而萎缩。若贷款人的前景不再被看好，银行持有的按揭贷款、债券、对企业发放的贷款等风险较大的资产的价格可能会迅速下跌。在这种情况下，银行所面临的风险是，其资产的价值可能会跌至负债的价值之下。换言之，银行拖欠别人的资金要多于别人拖欠银行的资金。银行可能会破产。为了预防此类灾难，银行需要保有权益资本，即银行股东的投资。当资产价格下跌时，权益资本将充当第一受害者的角色。正是因为有了权益资本，银行的损失才能被吸收，而债券持有者和储户等债权人的权益也才能得到保证。6 But a bank is not a charity, and the two shock-absorbers are costly. Some rough rules of thumb show why: the return on cash is zero, with liquid assets like government bonds yielding a measly 2-3%. In contrast, mortgages might generate 5% and unsecured lending closer to 10%. Picking safe assets lowers returns. In addition equity investors expect a return (via dividends or capital gains on their shareholding) of around 12%, compared with the 4% or so demanded by bondholders.但是，银行不是慈善机构，而且上述两种减震措施的成本也是巨大的。根据“不同资产不同回报”原理，当政府债券等流动资产可以提供2-3%的低回报时，现金的回报率是零。相比之下，按揭贷款的回报率可能会达到5%，无抵押贷款的回报率接近10%。也就是说，选择安全的资产会降低回报率。除此之外，权益投资者对通过分红或者股权收益而得到的预期回报率是12%左右，而债券持有者的预期回报率只有4%。7 This sets up a tension between stability and profitability which banks bosses must manage. Their failure to do so lies at the heart of the crisis. One simple equation explains their dire performance: Return on equity (RoE) = Return on assets (RoA) x Leverage于是，这就导致稳定性与银行大佬所要求的盈利性之间的关系出于一种紧张的状态，而危机之所以会爆发，其核心问题正是因为他们没能处理好两者之间的关系。在此，我们可以通过一个简单的公式，来解释一下他们为何会有如此失败的表现。这个公式是：权益回报（RoE）=资产回报（RoA）X 杠杆系数。8 The idea is straightforward. A banks equity-holders gain when the return on its assets rises. Maximising RoE means holding fewer safe assets, like cash or government bonds, since these provide low returns. When returns on all asset classes fall, as in the early 2000s, banks have another way to boost RoE: leverage (the ratio of their assets to their equity). Banks can increase their leverage by borrowing more from depositors or debt markets and lending or investing the proceeds. That gives them more income-generating holdings relative to the same pool of equity. In the short run, shareholders gain.这个公式直观地描述以下这种想法：银行权益资本持有人若想获利，就必须提高资产回报；若想让RoE最大化，就意味着减少现金和政府债券等安全资产的持有量，因此此类资产只能提供较低的回报；若所有类别的资产价格都在下跌，就像21世纪头几年那样，银行还可以用另外一种方法来提升RoE，即根据资产对权益的比率，引进杠杆化投资，若想提高杠杆系数，银行可以从储户或者债券市场那里借取更多资金。这样，他们就可以获得相对于同样权益而言更多的收入。从短期来看，股票持有人是受益者。Risk on 追逐风险9 Of course, skimping on safety mechanisms makes banks more risky. Yet the RoE formula is hard-wired into banking, familiar to every chief executive and shareholder. A 2011 report by the Bank of England showed that Britains biggest banks all rewarded their senior staff based on RoE targets. Bosses duly maximised short-term profits, allowing liquid assets and equity to fall to historic lows (see chart 1).忽视安全机制必然会令银行变得更加危险。但是，有关RoE的公式早已渗透到这个行业的每一位高层管理者和股东的血液中。据英格兰银行在2011年发表的一份报告显示，英国大银行对高层管理人员实施奖励的根据就是，是否实现了RoE目标。银行大佬们在追逐短期利润最大化的同时，却放任流动资产和权益资本跌至历史最低水平（见表一）。 10 By the mid-2000s leverage was out of control. Consider the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and Citi, respectively the biggest banks in Britain and America in 2007 (RBS was also the biggest in the world). Official reports show that these lenders had leverage ratios of around 50 when the crisis hit: they could absorb only $2 in losses on each $100 of assets. That helps explain why the American subprime market, although only a small fraction of global finance, could cause such trouble. Top-heavy, with brittle accounts, the banks were riding for a fall.至21世纪第一个十年的中期，杠杆化投资进入了一种失控的状态。以2007年英美最大的两家银行苏格兰皇家银行（亦是当时世界上最大的银行）和花旗银行为例。据官方的报告显示，在危机爆发时，这两家银行的杠杆系数达到50左右，而其每100美元资产可以吸收的损失只有2美元。由此，我们不难理解：为什么只占全球金融市场一小部分的美国次贷市场能引发如此的灾难。这些银行头重脚轻，账目混乱。除了走向崩溃，还能有什么样的命运呢！ 11 The main regulatory response has been a revision of international banking regulations first agreed in Basel in 1989. Basel III, as the latest version is known, is more stringent than its predecessors on four basic measures of safety: it requires banks to hold more equity and liquid assets, to leverage themselves less (the maximum ratio is now 33) and to rely less on short-term funding. In countries where bank bail-outs during the crisis caused outrage, however, or where the financial sectors liabilities are much bigger than the economy (making bail-outs ruinous), regulators are determined to go further.对于这种现象，监管方的主要应对措施是修改国际银行业监管条例。国际银行业监管条例亦称为巴塞尔协议，其首个版本于1989年在瑞士巴塞尔通过。最新版本是巴塞尔协议III。相比前一个版本，巴塞尔协议III对银行的资本金提出了更高的要求，它在安全性方面提出了以下四个基本要求：银行应持有更多的权益资本和流动资产，降低投资中的杠杆比率（目前的最高比率是33倍），减少对短期融资的依赖。然而，对于那些因在危机期间救助银行而引发民众不满，或是金融部门负债远远超出经济总量的国家，监管方决心在满足巴塞尔协议III的基础上对银行提出更高的要求。 12 The most radical option is to carve up lenders deemed “too big to fail”. Splitting them into smaller and simpler banks would make oversight easier, and prevent a bankruptcy from upending the local economy or the governments finances. But unravelling and reapportioning assets and liabilities might be impossibly tricky.其中最激进的选项是，对那些被视为“大到不能到”的银行进行拆分。将它们分拆为规模更小、业务更简单的银行既可以让监管变得更容易，同时还能防止当地的经济或者政府财政因其破产而陷入困境。但是，对银行进行拆分以及因拆分而导致的对资产和负债的重新分配并不是一件容易的事情。 13 An alternative is to ban banks from the riskiest activities. In America, a rule proposed by Paul Volcker, a former head of the Federal Reserve, will soon prevent deposit-taking banks from engaging in “proprietary trading” (in essence, investing in stocks, bonds and derivatives using its customers money). In theory, the “Volcker rule” will shield deposits from traders losses. In practice, it is difficult to distinguish between trading conducted with a view to serving customers and that done solely for the banks benefit.一种选择是，禁止银行从事风险性极大的活动。在美国，由美联储前主席保罗沃尔克提出的一项建议不久将被采纳。根据这项建议，以吸纳存款为其主要业务的银行将被禁止“自营交易”，也就是说这些银行不能使用客户的存款进行股票、债券和衍生品交易。从理论上讲，“沃尔克法则”能为储户提供保护，使他们的利益不会因银行在交易中的失败而受损。但是，在实际应用中，要想把银行为服务客户而进行的交易与单纯为自己牟利而进行的交易区分开来是困难的。 14 Regulators in Europe are taking a different tack. In both Britain and the euro zone, they have proposed “ring-fences” that will separate customer deposits from banks other liabilities. Against them, banks would only be allowed to hold assets like cash, government bonds and loans to individuals and firms. Activities deemed riskier, such as trading in shares and derivatives and underwriting companies bond issuance, would sit outside the ring-fence, backed by a separate stash of capital.欧洲监管者采取的是另外一种办法。在英国和欧元区，他们提议设立一个“环形防火墙”，将客户的存款与银行其他负债隔离开来。依托这种防火墙，银行只能持有现金、政府债券和对个人及企业发放的贷款等资产，而股票交易和承销企业债券发行等被认为是风险性较高的行为，会被挡在由单独资金支撑的防火墙的外面。 15 But even once the new ring-fences are in place, banks will still grant mortgages. That is a risky business. Take British commercial-property lending (loans on offices and shopping centres). It is a large part of the mortgage market, over 20% of GDP at its peak. It is also volatile: commercial-property prices fell by almost 45% between 2007 and 2009. In America the share of even the best “prime” mortgages in arrears topped 7% in early 2010. None of this risk would be outside the ring-fence, or blocked by the Volcker rule.但是，即便是在这种新型防火墙建好后，银行仍然可以发放按揭贷款。按揭贷款是一项风险十足的业务。以写字楼和购物中心英国商业房地产贷款为例，它占据了整个按揭贷款市场中相当大的份额，巅峰时期的贷款总额超过了英国GDP的20%。但它的波动性也是非常大的：在2007年至2009年间，商业房地产的价格差不多下跌了45%。在美国，即便是优先级抵押贷款的拖欠率在2010年初的时候也超过了7%。以上这些风险是无法被“环形防火墙”或“沃尔克法则”挡在外面的。 16 That is one reason some argue that banks should hold significantly more equity than the new rules require. In a recent book, Anat Admati of Stanford University and Martin Hellwig of the Max Planck Institute maintain that the cost of holding extra equity is overstated. For one thing, bigger buffers make banks safer, so the cost of other forms of funding (like bonds) should fall. In a related paper, David Miles, a member of the committee at the Bank of England that sets interest rates, estimates both the costs and benefits of increasing equity. The two are equal, he concludes, when equity is about 16-20% of banks risk-adjusted assetseven higher than the Basel III rules require.鉴于此，有人又提出了这样一种建议：银行应当持有比新规则所要求的还要多的权益资本。斯坦福大学的阿纳特阿德马蒂和马克斯普朗克研究所的马丁赫尔维格在一本新书中指出，持有额外权益资本的成本被夸大了。首先，资本金的增加会让银行变得更安全，因此债券等其他融资方式的成本也应当下降。据英格兰银行利率委员会的戴维米尔斯在一份相关的报告中估算，当权益资本在银行经过风险调整后的资产中的比例达到16-20%时（这一比例甚至超过了巴塞尔协议III的要求），增加权益资本的成本和收益是相等的。 17 Bank bosses (most notably Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase) regard that as far too high. Their concern is that banks are being forced to hold redundant equity. That would have two effects. First, it might reduce lending, since existing buffers would only be enough to cover a smaller stock of loans. Second, higher equity means lower leverage, which could reduce RoE below investors expectations. That would make it hard to raise the equity regulators are demanding andif sustainedprompt a gradual wind-up of the banks as investors opt to put their money elsewhere. The only alternative would be to raise RoA by charging borrowers much higher interest.但是，以摩根大通的杰米戴蒙为代表的银行大佬们却不这么看。他们认为，这个比例太高了。如果银行像现在这样被迫持有太多的权益资本，可能会给他们的经营带来两方面的影响。第一，由于现有的资本金可能只够覆盖较少的贷款，因此增加权益资本可能会让银行减少放贷；第二，提高权益资本意味着降低杠杆比率，从而会使RoE低于投资者的预期，并进而使银行难以筹集到监管者所要求的权益资本；同时，如果这种情况持续下去，可能会让银行的经营，随着投资者将其资金投向别处而逐渐枯萎。那么，银行所面临的唯一选择就是，通过对借款人收取更高的利率来提高RoA。 18 There is some truth on both sides. The academics are right to say that higher equity need not kill off lending. After all, equity is a source of funds, not a use for them. Historically much lower leverage ratios have been associated with strong growth in lending and GDP (see chart 2). Yet it is also true that without leverage to boost returns, banks might need to squeeze more from their assets: the cost of credit could rise.双方的观点各有一部分是正确的。学术界的正确之处在于，他们提出了“提高权益资本不必以扼杀放贷为条件”的看法。这是因为，权益资本毕竟是资金的一个来源，而不是对资金的使用。从历史上来看，大幅降低杠杆比率必然会带来放贷和GDP的强劲增长（见表二）。然而，银行大佬们观点也不无可取之处。因为，如果不使用杠杆来提高回报，银行可能需要从其资产中挤出更多的资金用于回报投资者。这样，他们的信用成本可能会上升。 19 There may be a third way. Some researchers think a better balance between equity and debt can be struck by using funding that has some of the attributes of both. They want banks to sell more “contingent capital” to investors. These IOUs act like bonds in normal times, paying a return and requiring full payback when they mature. But in bad times they change from debt into loss-absorbing equity.除此之外，可能还存在着第三条道路可供选择。有些研究者认为，利用兼具权益资本和债务特性的融资，可以让两者达到一种更好的平衡。换言之，他们想让银行向投资者出售更多的“应急资本”。银行的这种求救行为类似于债券：在经营正常的时候，银行会在债券到期时向投资者支付回报并全额回收。但是，一旦银行出现危机，这些应急资金可以从债券变成能够吸收损失的权益资本。 20 Such ideas are attractive not just because they provide a clever solution to the debt v equity puzzle. Regulators are also pushing them for a related reason: they should encourage a banks creditors to provide more oversight. Knowing that their bonds could be converted into risky equity, the theory runs, big investors like insurers and pension funds would go through banks books with a fine-tooth comb, spotting any leverage-pumping activities on the part of profit-hungry CEOs. How cheap contingent capital will prove is uncertain: investors will presumably demand a higher return than for debt, particularly from risky-looking banks.这是一种充满诱惑力的想法。它既能够为债务与权益资本之争提供一个明智的解决方案，也可以让监管方为了让债权人更多地监督银行而推动这种想法。从理论上讲，如果保险公司和养老金基金等大型投资者知道他们手中的债券有可能被转换成充满了风险的权益资本，他们可能会对银行的报表进行彻底的梳理，找出患有利润饥渴症的CEO们使用杠杆进行投资的蛛丝马迹。应急资本是否是一种低成本的投资还有待实践检验。理论考诉我们，当投资者投资于看上去风险更高的银行时，他们会要求获得高于债券的回报。 21 That might actually be a good thing: ideally markets as well as regulators would encourage banks to act prudently. In a 2010 paper Andrew Haldane of the Bank of England argued that banks borrowing costs are distorted. Since investors assume the biggest ones will be bailed out in times of crisis, they accept relatively low rates of interest on the bonds they issue. That, in turn, distorts the banks decisions: since such funding is cheap it is hardly surprising that profit-maximising bank bosses gorge on it.实际上，这可能会是一件好事。在理想的情况下，市场会像监管者一样，鼓励银行谨慎经营。英格兰银行的安德鲁霍尔丹在2010年的一份报告中指出，银行的借贷成本被人为地扭曲了。如果投资者假设，当危机来临时，大型银行将得到救助。那么，他们就会接受银行发行的利率相对