原文:http://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MzU1MDQwNTgzMg==&mid=2247491523&idx=1&sn=37eec22d1927fcf1e95332a262a8a32e&chksm=fba04c64ccd7c572e157c52d6486f98132abcfbc00d90ddca1bd33c7b094b91efdd7c4772671#rd
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感谢思维导图作者
May Li,男,我要去追逐心中的太阳,还要继续努力的亚古兽
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Foam party
泡沫派对
英文部分选自经济学人20200822期财经版块
Foam party
泡沫派对
Bubble-hunting has become more art than science
追逐泡沫,如今更像一门艺术而不是科学
Upon being sucked into investing during the South Sea Bubble, Sir Isaac Newton reflected that he could “calculate the motions of the heavenly bodies but not the madness of people”. From tulip mania in 17th-century Amsterdam to railway fever in Victorian Britain, history is littered with tales of investors who lost their heads shortly before they lost their shirts, in the grip of mass delusions described by Alan Greenspan, a former chairman of the Federal Reserve, as “irrational exuberance”.
在南海泡沫事件被卷入投资的艾萨克·牛顿爵士(Sir Isaac Newton)曾反思道,他能够“计算天体的运动,却无法计算民众的疯狂”。从17世纪阿姆斯特丹的郁金香狂热,到英国维多利亚时代的铁路投机狂潮,历史充满了有关投资者丧失理智后立马落得个身无分文的典故。美联储前主席艾伦·格林斯潘(Alan Greenspan)将这种强烈的集体错觉描述为“非理性繁荣”。
These delusions seem obvious with the cold clarity of hindsight. Spotting them in real time, however, is trickier—especially when the usual measures of frothiness are out of action. Wall Street types typically pore over price-to-earnings ratios, which compare a firm’s value with its profits, or free-cashflow measures, which look at the cash firms crank out after investment. Warren Buffett targets firms with a high return on capital, which compares their profits with the size of their balance-sheets. But the covid-induced economic slump has caused earnings to sink even as the Fed and other policymakers have helped buoy share prices. The obvious gauges of frothiness are not much use.
事后冷静而清晰地来看,这些错觉似乎很容易识别,但当下要发现它们却实属不易,特别是当那些发现泡沫的常用方法已失去作用。华尔街派通常仔细研究市盈率(即对比公司价值与利润)或自由现金流方法(即观察公司在满足投资需要后剩余的现金流量)。沃伦·巴菲特(Warren Buffett)把具有高资本回报率的公司作为目标对象,即对比公司的利润和其资产负债规模。但即便有美联储和其他政策制定者支撑股价,新冠疫情引起的经济衰退已经导致收益大幅下降。公认的泡沫判定方法已经无效。
This poses a problem for investors confronting the startling fact that the s&p 500, a share-price index of America’s biggest public companies, reached an all-time high on August 18th in the middle of perhaps the sharpest ever economic downturn. Without hard numbers to count on, they must interpret the market’s unusual behavioural signals in order to spot the froth.
当前的形势就给投资者带来了一大难题,令他们大吃一惊的是:在有可能是有史以来最严重的经济衰退期间,记录美国最大的500家上市公司的股票指数——标普500指数却于8月18日创下了历史新高。没有可靠的参考数据,他们必须解释市场异常的行为信号来找出泡沫。
One such sign is the mystifying moves in some stocks. On August 19th Apple became the first American company to touch a valuation of $2trn. Tesla, a carmaker that is undertaking a stock split at the end of August, has quadrupled in value so far this year. It is now worth $354bn, more than Ford, Toyota and Volkswagen combined. Nikola, an electric-truck firm (that has yet to make any lorries), has tripled in value since May. Even more perplexing was investors’ fondness for Hertz, a car-rental firm. Its share price rose tenfold after it declared bankruptcy (though this bubble has since popped).
其中一个明显的信号是一些股票价格的变动令人困惑。8月19日,苹果成为首家市值突破2万亿美元的美国公司。汽车制造商特斯拉将在8月底进行股票拆分,其股价今年迄今已翻了两番。目前市值达3540亿美元,超过了福特、丰田和大众的市值总和。电动卡车公司尼古拉(一车未造)的价格自从5月以来涨至三倍。更匪夷所思的是投资者对于租车公司赫兹的喜爱。这家公司的股价在它宣布破产后还暴涨十倍(虽然从那以后这个泡沫就破了)。
Anecdotally at least, this frothiness seems linked to a second phenomenon: a zeal for retail investing. Take, for instance, the popularity of Robinhood, a trading platform, which has opened 3m accounts since the end of 2019, taking its users to 13m. Or consider “r/wallstreetbets”, a forum on Reddit, which encourages its readers to make “yolo” (you only live once) bets on short-dated speculative options (akin to lottery tickets) in order to earn “tendies” (short-term gains). The number of subscribers to it has nearly doubled since January to over 1.4m, edging out its staid cousin, “r/investing”, which preaches the virtues of punting on diversified baskets of low-cost index funds.
至少从传闻来看,赫兹的泡沫似乎与第二个现象有关: 散户投资情绪狂热。以交易平台罗宾侠(Robinhood)的人气为例,该平台自2019年底以来已增开300万账户,用户数量达到1300万。另一个例子是“ Wallstreetbets” ,这是在Reddit(类似国内的知乎) 上的一个分论坛,它打着“你只活一次(Yolo, You only live once)”的旗号,鼓励用户进行短期期权投机(类似于彩票),以赚取“短期收益 ”(Tendies)。自今年1月以来,该网站的注册用户几乎增加了一倍,现已超过140万,超过了其死板的“表亲” “Investing”,这个板块通常鼓励投资于多元化低成本的指数基金组合。
注:
1. r/wallstreetbets:也称为WallStreetBets或WSB,是Reddit上的一个社区,参与者可以在其中讨论股票和期权交易。
2. YOLO:是you only live once的首字母缩略字。如同carpe diem和memento mori两句拉丁文俗语一样,YOLO鼓励人们即使冒着生命危险也要享受人生。
That exuberance has been matched by a third behavioural oddity: companies’ enthusiasm for issuance. Dealogic, a data provider, finds that stock issuance in America has jumped by 85% year-on-year so far in 2020. Part of that may be a result of the pandemic; many companies have raised capital to build up war-chests. But issuance is also compelling in bubblier times, because it allows firms to capitalise on lofty valuations. Hertz tried to raise up to $1bn in new equity after it had filed for bankruptcy, before regulators intervened.
与这种狂热一同出现的还有第三种行为怪象: 公司对发行股票的热情。数据提供商迪罗基(Dealogic)发现,2020年至今,美国的股票发行量同比增长了85%。其中一部分原因可能是新冠,许多公司已经筹集资金作为专款以应对紧急情况。但在泡沫时期,发行股票也很有吸引力,因为它能让公司利用高估值获利。在申请破产保护之后,赫兹曾试图筹集至多10亿美元的新股本,但遭到了监管机构的干预。
Moreover, after a hiatus in the first half of the year, tech firms are rushing to list. Special-purpose acquisition companies (spacs)—listed shell companies that then merge with private firms, offering a speedy, back-door route to going public—are all the rage. spacs were once a dirty word on Wall Street, thought fit only for firms unworthy of an initial public offering. But now they are in favour with firms and investors. They have raised $12bn so far this year, just shy of the amount raised in all of 2019.
此外,在经历了上半年的停摆后,科技企业正在争相上市。特殊目的收购公司(SPACs)盛行, 即已上市的空壳公司与未上市的公司合并,为上市提供一条走后门的捷径。特殊目的收购公司曾经是华尔街的脏字,被认为只适合那些不值得首次公开发行(IPO)的企业。但如今,它们受到了企业和投资者们的青睐。年初至今已经融资120亿美元,仅比2019的全年总融资额略少一些。
What to do, in the face of all this enthusiasm? Other assets may start to seem more alluring. On August 14th Berkshire Hathaway, Mr Buffett’s investment firm, said that it had sold chunks of its stakes in banks and bought up shares in Barrick Gold, a mining company. But gold and other assets have also shot up in value this summer.
面对热情应该做什么?其他资产可能开始变得更有吸引力。今年8月14日,巴菲特先生的投资公司伯克希尔·哈撒韦公司(Berkshire Hathaway)表示,已经卖掉手中大量的银行股,而新建仓矿业公司巴里克黄金(Barrick Gold)。黄金和其他资产的价格在这个夏天都飞涨。
As markets rise further it may become even harder to resist joining the fray. Some investors may pile in, and exit with a profit. But even the most brilliant minds can be bamboozled. Sir Isaac spotted the bubble early and liquidated his holdings—only to be sucked back in at the very peak.
随着市场进一步上行,投资者更难拒绝加入这场竞争。一些投资者可能会蜂拥而入,再获利离场。然而即使最聪明的人也可能会被骗。牛顿很早就发现了泡沫并变现了所持资产,不料却在股价顶峰时连本带利给还了回去。
翻译组:
Ellie,女,金融硕士,经济学人粉丝
Alex,女,小研究员一枚,经济学人粉丝
Chao,男,爱读书思考的DPhil Candidate,TE粉丝
Brittany,女,会计金融美本,行业分析师,爱经济学人
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Chloe,女,翻译硕士,经济学人忠实读者
Emily,女,食物链底端金融民工,经济学人粉丝
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本次感想
Alan,男,金融工程硕士,经济学人粉丝
各国央行在经历COVID-19之后都纷纷释放流动性以保护市场主体,无论之前各国之前的货币政策是适中、较宽松还是偏紧,也无论利率水平是多少,因为各国央行知道COVID-19对企业、居民的现金流、日常经营会有极大影响。
但是货币政策的松紧只决定总量,央行并不能左右资金流向哪个行业、哪家企业,这些微观企业经营决策并不是央行的货币政策能左右的。举一个例子:每每央行释放资金,资金往往会往房地产跑,这是企业、居民、银行、政府各自基于自身利益的考量而形成的局面。银行能够得到土地抵押且房地产贷款收益率高,房地产可以借着资金释放融到更便宜的资金、居民蜂拥而上排队摇号,只要之后房价起飞自己可以少奋斗30年,中央政府不敢让房地产崩盘因为那意味着银行体系坏账集中爆发会形成银行危机进而演变成货币危机,而地方政府受困于分税制改革后财权事权不对等,不得不依靠土地财政。而最近两年,随着经济下行,政府下决心要扭转这个恶性循环,以设置最高限价、点名批评等方式管制一手房房价。如果缺少管制,看上去市场自身没有别的力量能让房价冷却。
同样的,央行也并不能决定有多少资金流入股票市场。各国央行在释放流动性后,各国股指也基本在两周内回升到疫情爆发之前的高度。股票价格是企业未来现金流的折现,从这个角度出发,这意味着市场参与者认为虽然目前企业短期内利润表非常不好看,但是因为目前有着充裕资金的帮助,企业可以挺过目前阶段,在未来企业可以创造出符合当前股价的现金流。这个前提假设是,市场参与者的判断是正确的。
另一种情况是,市场错了。现在的情况是,更多的资金在追逐在疫情之前相同数量的资产,显然股票权证会相对货币升值,货币相对贬值。但这只体现了目前的供需状况,如果考虑到日后央行逐渐退出目前的宽松货币政策的话,目前的估值相对于以后来说是偏高的,因为届时市场上的货币会变得更少。
从目前来看,鉴于COVID-19在美国依旧严重,美联储在短期内并没有退出当前货币政策的打算,以及大选在即总统需要争取华尔街、大企业家、财阀们的选票,也许目前的估值是合理的。
文章有讲到retail-investor,即散户,在reddit上的注册账户大幅增多的现象。但是reddit上的散户注册账户变多和大量散户真正入市是有区别的,需要更多数据验证。
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