【英语财经】人民币与美元分手是好事 China edges towards a new exchange rate policy

It would be tempting to ascribe the large drop in global risk assets last week to the onset of Federal Reserve tightening and a further meltdown in commodity prices. No doubt these factors played a part, but the dominant force was probably the same one that shook the markets in August – the fear of a sudden devaluation of the Chinese renminbi. This would export deflationary forces from China’s industrial sector to the rest of the world, and would interact very badly with the start of a monetary tightening cycle in the US.

Throughout last week, the renminbi weakened against the dollar, especially in the offshore currency market that is most affected by flights of capital from China. The PBOC’s foreign exchange reserves were reported to have fallen by $87 billion in November, much more than expected, suggesting that an exodus of capital was occurring ahead of the likely Fed tightening on 16 December.

Many investors were asking whether China’s resolve to maintain a stable exchange rate was weakening, now that the renminbi has achieved its long term goal of membership of the SDR. Fears of devaluation were mounting fast.

The PBOC responded to these concerns after Asian markets closed on Friday by significantly clarifying its thinking. It hinted that it is still committed to a stable exchange rate in line with “equilibrium”, but suggested that this would now be better viewed against a basket of currencies, and not just against the dollar.

This does not yet amount formally to a new currency regime. Old habits of obsessive secrecy die hard. But this indication is probably the death knell for the semi-fixed $/RMB exchange rate that has been largely intact since 2012. The initial response of western markets on Friday was one of scepticism, with some analysts describing the change as another covert devaluation versus the dollar. US equities fell further late on Friday.

But when the implications of this new approach sink in, it will come to be seen seen as sensible step which reduces risks in the global economy in 2016.

In retrospect, it seems that China has been following a new currency regime throughout most of 2015. The PBOC has now published the weights of its new currency basket, so we can track the performance of the central bank’s preferred definition of its new effective exchange rate very accurately. The graph shows how this rate has behaved this year.

Basically we see a broadly stable effective rate fluctuating around a rate of about 102.5 (using the authorities’ suggested base of 30 December 2014=100). The margins around this rate seem to be about 2.5 per cent either way. When the effective rate threatened to break above this range in August, China devalued the renminbi against the dollar in order to keep the effective rate stable.

This is a good example of the new regime in action: China’s exchange rate will no longer be dragged upwards against all other currencies by a rising dollar. But it is still likely to broadly stable against the world as a whole.

This shift away from a bilateral relationship with the US is a logical step now that the renminbi is inside the SDR basket, especially since the dollar is widely expected to rise against that basket as the Fed tightens. It cannot by any stretch of the imagination be seen as a competitive devaluation by China. There is no good reason why monetary conditions in China should be forced to follow the Fed’s tightening, and any attempt to do this would have been condemned to catastrophic failure.

What matters now is whether the PBOC can make its new strategy stick. In the short term, the willingness to allow greater strengthening in the dollar might encourage more capital outflows from China to the US, in which case the recent tendency for the renminbi’s effective rate to fall might continue.

But the PBOC has now hinted that a large drop in the effective rate is not intended. The exact bands (if any) remain unknown, which is an intelligent move by the PBOC to avoid giving the markets a specific target to aim at. However, a sustained move below 100 would not be consistent with what they said on Friday.

This seems unlikely. China almost certainly has the liquid foreign exchange reserves available to maintain a stable effective rate for an indefinite period if it chooses to do so. Now that it has somewhat clarified what it is trying to do, the markets should gain confidence that a “devaluation” of the renminbi against a rising dollar is not all that worrying after all.

In the absence of a much harder landing for the Chinese economy – something that is not suggested by the latest activity data – the PBOC should probably be expected to stick with its new guidance until further notice.

If that proves right, what are the consequences for the other major central banks? For the US, it means that the dollar can now float upwards against the renminbi (and therefore against many other emerging market currencies as well), whereas in the past it tended to drag these currencies up along with it. This is likely to mean that US financial conditions will tighten more significantly for any given rise in US interest rates than would have occurred under the previous dollar-based approach.

Absent a currency convulsion in the next couple of days, it seems improbable that this will deter the Fed from announcing lift off next Wednesday, but it could induce them to make an even more dovish announcement about the “gradual” pace of rate rises planned for 2016. They may now be able to deliver the monetary tightening they desire with a smaller rise in domestic interest rates.

What about the ECB? Under the old Chinese regime, a rise in the dollar would have lifted the renminbi and other emerging currencies along with it, increasing the size of the decline in the euro’s effective rate. Now, the dollar will be more free to move on its own, so the euro will tend to be stronger than it would have been under the old regime.

In the wake of the ECB’s hawkish surprise last week, the euro has already given up all of the decline it attained against the renminbi when Mario Draghi issued his aggressively dovish monetary policy guidance in October and November.

Unlike the Fed, the ECB is still trying to ease monetary conditions, and it clearly believes that a lower euro is needed to attain their inflation target. After China’s latest pronouncements, that looks harder to achieve.

The ECB shot itself in the foot last week. Maybe the Governing Council will now realise that there are real economic costs when markets are needlessly surprised.

有人会忍不住将不久前全球风险资产大幅下跌归咎于美联储(Fed)开始收紧和大宗商品价格进一步下跌。这些因素无疑有一定影响，但主要原因可能还是今年8月导致市场动荡的因素——对人民币突然贬值的担忧。这将让中国工业部门的通缩力量出口至全球其他地区，并与美国开始收紧货币政策产生极其糟糕的相互作用。

前些日子，人民币兑美元一直贬值，尤其是在受中国资本外流影响最为严重的离岸汇率市场。有报道称，中国人民银行(PBoC)的外汇储备在11月份下降870亿美元，远远超出预期，这似乎表明资本外流早在美联储12月16日收紧之前就已发生。



许多投资者质问，既然中国已经实现了人民币纳入SDR的长期目标，那么它保持稳定汇率的决心是否有所削弱？对人民币贬值的担忧迅速增长。

12月11日亚洲市场收盘之后，中国人民银行澄清了自己的思路，以回应这些担忧。它暗示称，仍致力于保持人民币汇率在合理“均衡”水平上的基本稳定，但它同时提出，最好将这种稳定视为相对于一篮子货币（而非仅仅是对美元）的稳定。

这尚未正式构成新的汇率制度。陈旧的过度保密习惯很难消亡。但它可能为自2012年以来基本保持完好的半固定的人民币兑美元汇率制度敲响了丧钟。当日西方市场最初的反应是怀疑，一些分析师将这种改变称为人民币兑美元的又一次悄悄贬值。美国股市在那个周五的尾盘进一步下跌。

但是当人们想明白这种新政策的含义的时候，他们就会认识到，这是降低2016年全球经济风险的明智举措。

回过头看，中国在2015年的大部分时间里似乎遵循着一种新的汇率制度。中国人民银行现在公布了其新的货币篮子的权重，因此我们可以非常准确地追踪央行青睐的新有效汇率的表现。附图显示出这种汇率今年的表现。

基本上，我们看到大体稳定的有效汇率在102.5点附近波动（用官方建议的2014年12月30日的汇率水平作为100点）。围绕该汇率水平的波动幅度似乎是上下大约2.5%。当今年8月有效汇率可能向上突破这一区间的时候，中国让人民币兑美元贬值，以保持有效汇率稳定。

这是新的汇率制度奏效的一个很好的例子：人民币汇率将不再因为美元升值而相对于其他所有货币升值。但它对世界整体而言仍可能保持基本稳定。

既然人民币已被纳入特别提款权(SDR)货币篮子，让人民币不再仅仅追随美元是合乎逻辑的举措，尤其是在市场普遍预期随着美联储收紧政策，美元兑SDR将会升值的时候。不能将此想象为中国的竞争性贬值。没有理由认为，中国的货币条件应该被迫跟随美联储的收紧周期，任何这么做的努力都将注定遭受灾难性的失败。

现在的重要问题是，中国人民银行能不能坚持其新战略？短期而言，中国允许美元更加强势可能鼓励更多资本从中国流向美国，在这种情况下，最近人民币有效汇率下降的趋势可能持续。



但现在中国人民银行暗示称，人民币有效汇率的大幅下降并非其有意为之。准确的区间（如果有的话）依然未知，这是中国人民银行避免让市场有具体目标的睿智之举。然而，持续低于100点将会与他们在12月11日所说的不一致。

这似乎不太可能。中国几乎肯定拥有充足的流动性外汇储备，只要它有意愿，就可以无限期保持稳定的有效汇率。既然中国已经在某种程度上澄清了它在试图做什么，市场应该有信心认为：不必担心人民币兑不断升值的美元会“贬值”。

只要中国经济不会更加沉重地硬着陆——最新经济活动数据似乎表明不会如此——中国人民银行就很可能坚守其新指引，直至它发布更新的指引。

若果真如此，那对其他主要央行会有什么后果？对美国来说，这意味着美元现在可以兑人民币（从而兑其他多种新兴市场货币）升值，而在过去它往往拖着这些货币一起升值。这很可能意味着，相比之前基于美元的方法，美国利率上调将给美国金融状况带来更加显著的收紧效果。

除非今后两天发生汇率大幅动荡，这一点似乎不太可能阻止美联储在周三（即12月16日——译者注）宣布加息，但它可能促使他们对2016年计划的“渐进”加息步伐做出更为温和的声明。毕竟，他们现在能够用更小幅度的加息来达到想要的货币紧缩。

欧洲央行(ECB)呢？在过去的中国汇率制度下，美元升值将让人民币和其他新兴市场货币跟着一起升值，扩大了欧元有效汇率的跌幅。现在，美元将更为自由地独自上涨，欧元也将比在中国旧汇率制度下更为强劲。

前一周欧洲央行发布令人意外的鹰派声明后，欧元兑人民币汇率收复了之前的失地——马里奥?德拉吉(Mario Draghi)曾在10月和11月发布强烈的鸽派货币政策指引，导致欧元兑人民币下跌。

与美联储不同，欧洲央行仍在试图放松货币政策，同时它显然相信，有必要通过让欧元贬值来实现自己的通胀目标。在中国最新声明之后，该目标看起来更难实现了。

欧洲央行前一周搬起石头砸了自己的脚。或许欧洲央行管理委员会现在意识到，不必要地出乎市场意外是会造成实际经济代价的。

译者/邹策