【英语生活】个人担保的陷阱

Last week, I played tennis at my club in London. In the court next to me was a man whose business collapsed not long ago, after it had borrowed billions of pounds. He was laughing and seemed relaxed. Somehow I doubt he had given any personal guarantees to the banks.

Following his example, whenever I give advice to would- be entrepreneurs I tell them the single most important thing to remember is never, ever to give any lender a personal guarantee. Do not put your house on the line: there is always another way to find the money. But it seems quite a few borrowers forgot the vital rule.

A friend who works in property tells me the Irish banks were unable to extract such undertakings from British developers; it seems their property clients were scarred so badly after the bust in the early 1990s that they learnt not to risk all their assets by signing a bit of paper. But in Ireland many of the super-bullish, newly rich housebuilders and wheeler- dealers were happy to provide

a personal guarantee. Now, a bit like Satan coming to claim Faust's soul, the banks are reminding dozens of former high-flyers of their legal obligations. And for someone who is on the hook, that single commitment changes everything.

Will many be bankrupted? In my experience, institutions bother to do this only if they believe they have been deliberately misled or defrauded. A little like executing deserters in war, such brutal treatment can serve as a visceral lesson to others. But apart from that purpose, the true proceeds from declaring someone insolvent are usually negligible, and pursuing someone for the sake of it costs money and creates huge ill-will.

The gruesome mathematics of leverage in reverse, combined with personally guaranteed debt, mean there are now plenty of minus millionaires around. In rising markets, it makes sense

to use as much debt as possible. And with banks providing 80 per cent plus loan-to-value facilities, you could buy buildings putting as little as a fifth down.

But if the property has fallen by a third or more, you haven't just lost your equity; you have lost another 15 per cent of the total price – which you now owe the bank. So some players have gone from being worth £500m to very little in two years.

These situations are characteristic of the property market, where gearing is so integral and where the participants can't resist rolling the dice every time. Clearly, those markets are shattered and full of distress of various types. In most cases, as a senior restructuring expert told me, the banks are simply putting sticking plasters over the problems. Often, syndicates cannot agree on the solution, so a proper fix is simply deferred.

But in other fields, such as digital media, the behaviour and mood are different. Online entrepreneurs fund deals with venture capital, where there is never recourse to their home. At the Founders Forum, an annual conference for entrepreneurs held last week, the room was full of European technology pioneers who have sold their companies for tens or even hundreds of millions. Almost all are under

45 and are working on their second, third or even fourth internet start-up. Each time they risk some cash, but obviously keep most of their gains socked away in a bank somewhere. Debt is never an issue because senior lenders refuse to get involved where there is no tangible security or even revenues to service the interest.

For them, the golden age may be over because many old media buyers have discovered they overpaid massively for their dotcom diversification. So the mega-exits to big corporates are no longer an option. But no one from this industry is being threatened by the bailiffs. And, meanwhile, the online world is still stealing customers, advertising and market share from traditional retailers, publishers and others. So there remains plenty of confidence and a fair amount of capital ready to seize the opportunities.

Spending much of my time dealing with hard choices in stagnant sectors, it is refreshing to hear the optimism still apparent in the web world. Long may it continue.

上周，我在伦敦的俱乐部里打网球。隔壁球场有一位男士在打球，前不久他的企业由于数十亿英镑的贷款刚刚倒闭。他正开怀大笑，看上去很放松。说不出什么理由，但我猜他可能没有给银行提供任何个人担保。

以他为榜样，每次我向准企业家提供建议时，都会告诉他们，要牢记在心的最重要的一件事就是，永远、永远不要向任何银行提供个人担保。不要把你的房子拿去抵押：总会有其它方法可以筹到钱的。但事实似乎表明，有相当多的借款人都忘记了这条至关重要的定律。

一个在房地产业工作的朋友告诉我，爱尔兰的银行无法从英国房地产开发商那里获得类似担保；貌似这些房地产客户被上世纪90年代初房地产泡沫的破灭吓得够呛，以至于学会了不再拿自己的全部资产冒险，知道那几张纸的抵押协议签不得。但在爱尔兰，许多超级乐观的新富开发商或是独断独行者则乐于提供个人担保。如今，就像撒旦来索取浮士德的灵魂一样，各银行开始提醒许多曾经的富豪履行他们的法律义务。而对于被套牢的人来说，区区一个担保承诺便能改变一切。

银行会因此迫使许多人申请破产吗？以我的经验，只有当它们认为自己被蓄意误导或受到欺诈的时候，才会费心去做这件事。这有点像在战争中处决逃兵，残忍的处置方式可以对其他人形成心理威慑。但除了这个目的，宣布某人破产的实际收益通常可以忽略不计，而且为此提请起诉不仅费钱，还会使当事人对银行产生巨大的敌意。

杠杆效应反过来一算能吓死人，再加上个人担保债务，意味着我们周围现在有许多百万负翁。当市场不断上升时，尽可能地利用负债合情合理。而且如果银行提供逾8成的按揭辅助，你仅需支付不到20%的首付就能买到房屋。

但如果你购买的房屋价格下跌了三分之一或更多，那么你失去的就不仅仅是资产；你还会另外损失总价的15%——即你欠银行的钱。因此，在短短两年内，一些市场参与者的身价从5亿英镑一路下跌直至几乎一文不值。

上述情况是房地产市场所特有的，在这里可谓是牵一发而动全身，而且每次市场参与者都抵挡不住诱惑想赌一把。很明显，这些市场已经伤痕累累，并且充斥着各种不幸的故事。一位资深重组专家告诉我，在大部分情况下，银行都只是在伤口上贴一块胶布了事。银团常常在解决方案上无法达成共识，因此，彻底整改就这么被延迟了。

但其它领域的运转方式和氛围是不一样的，比如，电子媒体。网络领域的企业家用风投资金来为交易募资，这样永远不会产生对其房屋的追索权。在上周举行的企业家年会“创业家论坛”(Founders Forum)上，房间里坐满了欧洲技术先驱，他们的公司都卖了数千万、甚至数亿。这些人几乎全都不到45岁，并且正全力打造他们的第二家、第三家、甚至第四家互联网企业。每次，他们会冒险投入一笔现金，但显然，他们的大部分收益都小心存放于某家银行内。他们从来不会有债务问题，因为高级银行拒绝涉足没有有形担保物，甚至没有收入来支付利息的企业。

对他们来说，黄金时代或许已经结束，因为许多老牌媒体买家已经发现，他们为自身的网络多样化支付了过多的资金。因此，寄希望于大公司斥巨资购买，从而成功脱手，不再是可选项。但这个行业没有一个人正受到司法执行官的恐吓。此外，网络界正在悄悄抢走传统零售商、出版商以及其它行业的顾客、广告和市场份额。因此，业内人士仍然信心充足、资金充沛，随时准备抓住机遇。

在花费了诸多时间来应对停滞行业的艰难选择后，网络界乐观依旧的消息，令我精神振奋。希望这种乐观能长时间地持续下去。

译者/董琴