【英语财经】股市动荡给了美联储拖延加息的借口 Short View-Fed

Bets on when the Federal Reserve will raise US interest rates are starting to look like the playground game of pulling petals off a daisy: this year, next year, sometime, never.

Plunging share prices are widely seen as a reason for the Fed to delay again in September, with futures pricing in a higher chance of the Fed keeping rates on hold all year. From thinking a rise was almost certain, futures now suggest only a one-in-three chance of a rise next month.

Bill Dudley, head of the powerful New York Fed, told investors what they wanted to hear yesterday when he said the case for a rate rise is less compelling than it was — although he also said it was important not to be too sensitive to short-term market moves.

US stocks have suffered a proper short-term move: down more than 10 per cent in as many days, before yesterday’s early bounce. But history suggests the Fed is very sensitive to such moves, with rates cut within months every time (except 2011, when it began Operation Twist).

Sometimes, rate cuts were a direct response to the market, as in 1987. Other times, both policymakers and investors were driven by the same thing, as after the September 11 attacks in 2001. The Fed may insist it is data-dependent, but in reality seems to be very market-dependent, too.

A Goldman Sachs survey of academic studies suggests a 10 per cent drop in shares lowers future Fed rates by 15bp. Put another way, the chance of a quarter-point rate rise next month should fall 60 per cent due to the equity rout.

This does not mean the Fed should delay. After all, it did not rush to tighten monetary policy when equities rose

10 per cent (the S&P 500 was up 11 per cent last year,

30 per cent the year before). It is true that nasty price falls can be self-fulfilling if leveraged investors go bust. But drops of this size are far from unusual, with the market losing a tenth over three months 40 times in the past 50 years.

With unemployment close to long-term sustainable

levels and the US economy doing fine, interest rates could be expected to be a fair bit higher.

Yet there is ample evidence of Fed dovishness, and no pressure from inflation. The nervy market gives policymakers one more excuse to hold off. Ironically, equities may both cause a Fed delay and be the beneficiaries of it.

对于美联储(Federal Reserve)将在何时上调美国利率的赌注，开始看起来像是“点兵点将”的游戏：今年，明年，某个时候，永远不会。

暴跌的股价被广泛视为美联储将在9月再度推迟动手的一个原因，从期货价格看，美联储今年内维持利率不变的几率上升了。之前显示加息近乎板上钉钉的期货，现在暗示下月加息的几率只有三分之一。

强大的纽约联邦储备银行(New York Fed)的行长比尔?达德利(Bill Dudley)昨日说了投资者爱听的话，称加息的理由现在不如之前那么有说服力，尽管他也说，不对短期市场走势过于敏感是重要的。

美国股市已经遭遇了相当厉害的短期变动：在10天内下跌逾10%（在昨日早盘的反弹之前）。而历史似乎表明，美联储对这样的变动非常敏感，每次都会在几个月内削减利率，唯一的例外是在2011年启动扭转操作(Operation Twist)时。

有时候，降息是对市场的直接回应，比如在1987年市场崩盘时。在其他一些时候，政策制定者和投资者受到同一件事情的驱动，比如2001年9月11日发生恐怖袭击事件之后。美联储也许坚称它以数据为依据，但在现实中，它似乎对市场也很敏感。

高盛(Goldman Sachs)对多项学术研究的调查显示，股市下跌10%，将导致未来美联储利率降低15个基点。换句话说，由于股市大跌，下月加息25个基点的几率应当下降60%。

这并不意味着美联储应该推迟加息。毕竟，在股市上涨10%的时候，它并没有急于收紧货币政策（标普500(S&P 500)指数去年上涨11%，前年上涨30%）。没错，如果杠杆投资者撑不住，惨烈的价格下跌可能自我实现。但目前的这种降幅远非不寻常，过去50年里，股市曾有40次在三个月期间下跌10%。

随着失业率接近长期可持续水平，而美国经济表现不错，人们可以预计利率将显著提高。

然而，有充分的证据证明美联储的立场倾向于鸽派，而且当前不存在通胀压力。神经兮兮的市场让政策制定者多了一个拖延的借口。讽刺的是，股市可能既是导致美联储延后加息的原因，也是这种后果的受益者。

译者/和风