【英语中国】中国股市表现全球倒数第五

In the rankings of the world's worst-performing stock markets this year, nations drowning in debt feature heavily. Greece is number one, closely followed by Slovakia, Cyprus and Spain. But then, in fifth place, there is China.

Shanghai's decline – the index is down 16 per cent since January – has caught many investors by surprise, since China is widely seen as the beacon of growth in a world that is still reeling from the financial crisis.

Having fallen to a eight-month low yesterday, the Shanghai Composite is this year's worst performing index in Asia.

“A lot of people have been caught offside,” says the head of trading at a global investment bank in Hong Kong.

The irony is that China's eye-catching economic growth – gross domestic product surged 11.9 per cent in the first quarter – is part of the reason why Shanghai stocks are sliding.

Worried that the economy is overheating, the government has started taking steps to prevent inflation getting out of control and to head off a bubble in the property market.

This tightening – and the prospect of more to come – is what has given investors the jitters.

Since late last year, as the global economy has revved up, Beijing has sought to rein in the amount of money sloshing through the economy and spilling into property and equity markets.

But in recent weeks policymakers have become much more aggressive. Beijing has clamped down hard on the property market, fearing excessive price rises could fuel social unrest.

“The recent property policies reversed market sentiment,” says Jerry Lou, China equity strategist at Morgan Stanley.

Beijing has already raised the minimum deposit and interest rates for home mortgages, re-introduced a sales tax, and announced an outright ban on families buying third homes in major cities such as Beijing. A procession of senior government economists and officials have indicated that more measures, including new taxes on residential properties, are being considered and could be implemented soon.

Many investors and analysts fear the increasingly stringent measures may prompt a crash in the property market that could ripple through an economy that is heavily reliant on real estate and infrastructure investment for its overall growth.

“Property tightening policies will continue until the government genuinely believes that the property market is under control, which could be a few months ahead,” says Vincent Chan, China strategist at Credit Suisse.

“It could involve some high-profile arrests or corporate failure, same as the 2004 tightening,” he adds.

Share prices of Chinese property companies have fallen more than 27 per cent since January and more than 45 per cent since their July 2009 peak.

Meanwhile, outside of the mainland, foreign investors have been aggressively short selling the A50 China Index exchange traded fund, which comprises the 50 biggest stocks listed in Shanghai and Shenzhen. Bets against the Hong Kong-listed A50 ETF have risen to a two year high, according to Bloomberg data.

Yet, when it comes to valuations, many analysts say Chinese stocks are looking cheap. On average, Shanghai stocks are trading at a price/earnings ratio of 16 for the current year, well below the long term average. New York's S&P 500 index is trading on a p/e multiple of 14.5.

The trouble is, Chinese investors pay little attention to valuations. Instead, the market is driven by momentum and liquidity, which, given current trends, does not bode well for prices. Last year, Chinese banks went on an unprecedented government-directed lending spree that saw total new loans in the economy nearly double to Rmb9,600bn ($1,406bn) compared with 2008.

Many of those loans are believed to have ended up in the stock market, helping the Shanghai Composite surge almost 80 per cent in 2009.

Now that the economy is on a more stable footing, banks have been told to cut loan growth dramatically.

The most recent data, from March, showed that financial institutions in China granted some Rmb510.7bn of new loans that month, down from an average of Rmb1,050bn in January and February.

Even so, credit growth is still running at 21.7 per cent, well above the 17 per cent official target, meaning that more tightening measures will be needed to head off inflation.

The People's Bank of China has also been absorbing liquidity from the system by issuing sterilisation bills and, since January, by raising the reserve requirement ratio – the amount of deposits banks must hold in reserve – on three occasions. Most analysts believe that there will be much more tightening to come, with the recent moves representing little more than a shift from an “ultra-loose” policy stance to a “moderately loose” one.

“We believe more forceful measures are required to reduce the risks of an overheating in the coming months,” say Yu Song and Helen Qiao, economists at Goldman Sachs.

Treading a careful path between a buoyant economy and an overheating one will be crucial as the Shanghai market braces for a deluge of new share issuance, most notably from Chinese banks replenishing their capital following last year's lending binge. The total amount of floatable new share supply in 2010 may exceed Rmb6,000bn, according to Frank Li, China strategist at JPMorgan. That figure dwarfs the average daily trading turnover of Rmb202bn in mainland shares.

Agricultural Bank of China, the country's fourth-largest lender by assets, is preparing for an initial public offering in Shanghai and Hong Kong that is expected to be the world's largest to date, at about $30bn.

For some analysts, it is this huge supply of new shares that represents perhaps the most direct challenge facing the mainland equity market this year.

Additional reporting by Jamil Anderlini

在今年全球表现最糟糕的股市榜单上，债台高筑的国家名列前茅。希腊高居榜首，接下来是斯洛伐克、塞浦路斯和西班牙。但是，排在第五位的是中国。

上海股市的下滑（上证综指自1月份以来已下跌16%）出乎许多投资者意外，因为在当今仍未摆脱金融危机的世界上，中国被广泛视为经济增长的灯塔。

上证综指昨日跌至8个月低位，是今年亚洲表现最差的股指。

“很多人措手不及，”香港一家全球投行的交易主管表示。

具有讽刺意味的是，中国令人瞩目的经济增长（今年首季国内生产总值同比猛增11.9%），是上海股市下滑的部分原因。

担心经济过热的中国政府，开始采取步骤，防止通胀失控，并遏制房地产市场的泡沫。

正是这些收紧举措——以及更多此类措施出台的前景，使投资者紧张不安。

自去年末以来，随着全球经济出现起色，北京方面已设法减少经济中流动的大量资金，防止其流入楼市和股市。

但近几周来，中国政策制定者们加大了收紧力度。北京方面已出台遏制楼市的强有力政策，担心过分的价格上涨可能滋生社会不安定。

“近期的房地产政策逆转了市场情绪，”摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)中国市场策略师娄冈(Jerry Lou)表示。

北京方面已提高了住房抵押贷款的首付比例和利率，重新开征房产销售税，并宣布在北京这样的大城市全面禁止家庭购买第三套住房。一批资深官方经济学家和官员先后表示，政府正在考虑的更多措施（包括针对居住房产的新税），可能不久就会实施。

许多投资者和分析师担心，日趋严厉的措施可能引发楼市崩盘，给严重依赖房地产和基建投资实现总体增长的中国经济造成涟漪效应。

“房地产收紧政策将会继续，直到政府确信楼市已经可控为止，这可能是几个月之后的事，”瑞信(Credit Suisse)中国策略师陈昌华(Vincent Chan)表示。

“可能涉及一些令人瞩目的逮捕或企业倒闭，就像2004年的收紧过程那样，”他补充说。

中国房地产企业的股价自1月份以来已下跌逾27%，自2009年7月达到峰值以来已下跌逾45%。

与此同时，在中国内地以外，外国投资者在积极卖空A50中国指数交易所交易基金(ETF)，该指数的成份股是在上海和深圳上市的50只市值最大股票。根据彭博社(Bloomberg)的数据，卖空在香港上市的A50 ETF的操作已升至两年高位。

然而，不少分析师表示，从估值上看，中国股市看上去颇为便宜。按今年预期盈利计算，上海股市股票的市盈率平均为16倍，远低于长期平均水平。纽约的标普500(S&P 500)股指市盈率为14.5倍。

麻烦在于，中国投资者很少关心估值高低。相反，中国股市通常由动力和流动性推动，从目前趋势看，这对股价不是个好兆头。去年，中国各银行根据政府指令，掀起空前的放贷潮，全年新增贷款9.6万亿元人民币（合1.406万亿美元），比2008年增加近一倍。

不少贷款资金据信最终流入了股市，推动上证综指在2009年飙升近80%。

既然现在中国经济的基础更为稳固，各银行已被告知大幅削减贷款增长。

最近的数据显示，3月份中国金融机构发放了5107亿元人民币新贷款，低于1、2月份平均1.05万亿元人民币的每月新增贷款。

即便如此，信贷增长仍达到21.7%，远高于17%的官方目标，这意味着需要出台更多收紧措施，以遏制通胀。

中国央行也一直在通过发行冲销票据，从系统中吸收一部分流动性，并且自1月份以来三次提高了银行存款准备金率（银行必须押作准备金的存款量）。多数分析师相信，还有更多收紧措施有待出台，近期的动作只不过代表政策姿态从“超宽松”转向“适度宽松”。

“我们相信，需要力度更大的措施，才能减少未来几个月的过热风险，”高盛(Goldman Sachs)经济学家乔虹(Helen Qiao)和宋宇表示。

在上海股市准备迎接大量新股发行之际，在繁荣的经济与过热的经济之间审慎把握将至关重要。就新股发行而言，中国各银行尤其需要从股市筹集资金，以便在去年的放贷狂潮之后补充自己的资本金。摩根大通(JPMorgan)中国策略师李民(Frank Li)称，2010年的流通新股供应总量可能超过6万亿元人民币。这个数字使中国内地股市2020亿元人民币的日平均交易量相形见绌。

按资产计算为中国第四大银行的中国农业银行(Agricultural Bank of China)正准备在上海和香港首次公开发行(IPO)，预期将筹资300亿美元，成为世界上有史以来最大规模的IPO。

对某些分析师来说，这种巨量的新股供应，也许才是中国内地股市今年面对的最直接挑战。

吉密欧(Jamil Anderlini)补充报道

译者/和风