【英语财经】世界经济的头号威胁 Chinzila represents the number one threat to the global economy

No longer a source of awe, Chinzila — the nexus between China and Brazil — has become the number one threat to the global economy.

The spillover from weakening Chinese industrial growth to commodity prices and volume demand has turned financial stress fractures into big faultlines within the emerging markets. Without careful management and co-ordination, it is possible these faultlines become systemic, with the Chinese renminbi the potential catalyst. While it has been clear since 2012 that China’s growth model was running out of road, the stock market bust and bungled currency depreciation brought the further realisation that policymakers overestimated their control over the economy. The price of these policy mistakes extends beyond several hundred billion dollars in lost foreign exchange reserves and a missed opportunity for banks burdened by bad debts to raise capital. They also come at a cost to the reform process itself. As long as growth is weak and the corporate sector beset by deflation, renminbi depreciation pressure will persist.

Attempts to discourage domestic capital outflows now risk creating a new bubble in the domestic bond market. Given that this financing channel remains the last hope of government efforts to kick the debt can down the road, a domestic bond market bubble may prompt capitulation to further renminbi depreciation in 2016.

Brazil, the pre-eminent beneficiary of China’s rise, has suffered most from its subsequent weakening. With a political stalemate forestalling any significant deficit reduction, Brazil suddenly finds its debt dynamics on an explosive trajectory.

Like China, Brazil’s problem is not the traditional one of excessive foreign debt, but rather a domestic credit boom. Thanks to vast capital inflows, real interest rates collapsed from an average of 12 per cent between 2001-07 to 5 per cent in the post-crisis period. Private credit duly surged from 50 per cent of gross domestic product in 2007 to 83 per cent at its peak in 2015. The silver lining is that Brazilian banks’ liquidity buffers are strong, and the worst of the bad debt issues are concentrated in state-owned banks.

The stresses besetting the Brazilian economy and loss of policy credibility have removed the option of a gradual adjustment. The “default” adjustment option becomes one of tighter monetary policy, an extremely weak currency and a more rapid fiscal adjustment — the sum of which entails much larger non-performing loans and contingent liabilities for the sovereign. Given Brazil’s large nominal deficit and more modest primary deficit, the result is explosive debt dynamics as borrowing costs shoot up.

Stresses in Brazil can morph into systemic risk through losses borne by common lenders. Of course, most emerging market central banks built large foreign reserve war chests over the cycle. While this has protected sovereign balance sheets, central banks are more reluctant to step in to bail corporates out of their currency exposures.

The only way to stop the bleeding is for current accounts to adjust sufficiently to cope with abnormally large capital outflows. One of the most striking aspects of the emerging market currency depreciations to date is how little current accounts have adjusted. The only solution is huge currency depreciation and monetary tightening which, in the first instance, will exacerbate deleveraging pressures and credit losses. On paper, China still has the capacity to save itself and other emerging markets. The optimal policy response would be a strong central government fiscal stimulus orientated toward consumption, not infrastructure; a vast carveout of non-performing loans from the financial system; reforms to the credit intermediation mechanism and to the social safety net. These reforms were not going to be easy in good times, but in bad, they would generally taste like a rotten egg to any politician.

The alternative of significant renminbi depreciation is frightening. Depreciation pressure is the side-effect of past policies gone wrong. To let that pressure out in the absence of a broader policy response to the debt overhang and credit misallocation problems is simply to unleash deflation on the rest of the world.

Gene Frieda is a global strategist for Moore Europe Capital Management

中国与巴西之间的联结“Chinzila”不再令人惊叹，而是已成为全球经济的头号威胁。

中国工业增长疲弱对大宗商品价格和需求的溢出效应，已使新兴市场内金融压力造成的裂缝变成了大块的薄弱地带。如果管理与协调得不好，这些薄弱环节可能会演变成系统性的——人民币就是潜在的催化剂。自2012年以来中国增长模式显然已难以为继，而股市下挫以及失算的货币贬值让人进一步意识到，中国的政策制定者高估了自己对经济的控制能力。因为这些政策错误，中国损失了几千亿美元的外汇储备，使背负坏账的银行错失了融资的机会，可代价不只这些。改革进程本身也受到波及。只要增长保持疲弱、企业部门受到通缩困扰，人民币贬值压力就将挥之不去。

眼下，如果试图阻止国内资本流出，可能会在国内债市催生新泡沫。鉴于这一融资渠道仍是政府尝试暂时延缓债务问题的最后希望，国内债市泡沫或许会促使中国在2016年不得不接受人民币进一步贬值。

曾是中国崛起的重要受益者的巴西，在中国随后的经济放缓中受到的冲击最严重。由于陷入政治僵局，不可能进行大规模的赤字削减，巴西突然发现自己的债务状况处在爆炸性增长的轨道上。

像中国一样，巴西的问题并非传统的外债过高，而是国内信贷繁荣。得益于大量资本流入，实际利率从2001年至2007年平均12%的水平下降到危机后时期的5%。私人部门信贷对国内生产总值(GDP)的比例由200年的50%，上升至2015年83%的峰值。一线希望在于，巴西银行业的流动性缓冲非常充足，最严重的坏账问题主要发生在国有银行。

巴西经济遭受的压力，以及政策可信度的丧失，使得渐进调整成为不可能的选项。“默认”调整选项变成收紧货币政策、货币极其弱势和加快财政调整——结果势必造成规模更大的不良贷款和主权或有债务。由于巴西庞大的名义赤字和相对较低的基本赤字，随着借贷成本大幅升高，结果就是债务大爆炸。

一般性贷款机构蒙受的亏损，可能使巴西经济中的压力演变为系统性风险。诚然，大多数新兴市场的央行在这个周期中积累了高额的外汇储备“战争基金”。尽管这保护了主权资产负债表，但央行却变得更不愿意介入，出手把企业从外汇敞口中拯救出来。

阻止流血的唯一方法是对经常账户进行充分调整，以应对异常庞大的资本外流。迄今新兴市场货币贬值最令人瞩目的一个地方，是经常账户基本没有调整。唯一的解决办法是货币大幅贬值和货币紧缩，而这首先将加剧去杠杆压力和信贷损失。在理论上，中国仍有能力拯救自己和其他新兴市场。最佳对策是，中央政府针对消费而非基础设施实施强力财政刺激；将大量不良贷款从金融体系中剥离出来；对信贷中介机制和社会保障网实施改革。在经济繁荣时期，这些改革措施不容易实行，而在经济不景气时期，这些改革措施在任何政客看来通常都像是臭鸡蛋。

人民币大幅贬值会是一个可怕的选项。贬值压力是以往政策错误的副产品。不对债务积压和信贷错配问题做出整体政策回应，就想把贬值压力释放出来，结果只会把通缩带给世界其他地区。

本文作者为摩尔欧洲资本管理(Moore Europe Capital Management)全球策略师

译者/邢嵬