【英语财经】新年首个交易日中国A股领跌全球股市 China leads world stocks down amid fresh fears over economy

A renewed Chinese stock market rout rippled through international markets on the new year’s first trading day, as fresh concerns for the health of China’s economy sent global equities down by the most in more than four months.

The FTSE All-World Index slid as much as 2.7 per cent, the most since the height of the August market turmoil, with the Eurofirst 300 and S&P 500 equity gauges falling 2.5 per cent and 2.3 per cent respectively.

Last year’s stock market darlings — the so-called Fangs, Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Google — were among the biggest losers in the US equity market.

The falls came after Beijing lowered its daily exchange rate to below Rmb6.5 per US dollar for the first time in more than four years, and after a gauge of the health of Chinese manufacturing indicated that activity fell for a fifth straight month in December.

Underscoring concerns about the global economy, a US manufacturing index released yesterday fell to its lowest level since 2009, even as the Federal Reserve prepared to follow up its initial interest rate increase last month.

Maurice Obstfeld, the International Monetary Fund’s new chief economist, said China still faced “serious challenges” in restructuring its economy, identifying this as “high on the list” of things to watch carefully in 2016.

“Its economy is slowing as it transitions from investment and manufacturing to consumption and services,” he said in an interview on the IMF website. “But the global spillovers from China’s reduced rate of growth, through its diminished imports and lower demand for commodities, have been much larger than we would have anticipated.”

Investors were also nervous of the imminent expiry of a Chinese ban on stock sales by large shareholders, imposed during last year’s market meltdown. China’s blue-chip CSI 300 stock market index dropped 7 per cent, the most in nine years, triggering newly minted circuit-breakers.

While oil prices were supported by rising tension between Saudi Arabia and Iran, most other commodity prices — which are acutely sensitive to China’s economic prospects — dipped again, while safer assets such as government bonds rallied sharply as investors sought havens.

China’s market meltdown follows last year’s rout that at one stage wiped 45 per cent off the value of the Shanghai stock market, prompting Beijing to take measures to prop up prices, including state-orchestrated buying of shares and a circuit-breaking mechanism.

Now investors are worried that the unwinding of emergency rescue measures might place fresh pressure on the market, even as corporate earnings remain weak.

“With the overall economy not showing much sign of recovery, the market just rotated through various hyped-up investment themes at the end of last year. Those themes are now played out,” said Zhu Bin, an analyst at Southwest Securities in Shanghai. “The circuit- breaker mechanism is an artificial interruption of the market correction and it may actually strengthen the impact of the correction.”

The securities regulator halted large-scale share purchases in late August, though it pledged to maintain existing holdings indefinitely. Initial public off-er-ings resumed last month after a halt imposed in July, a move that could draw demand away from existing shares.

中国股市的又一轮暴跌在新年首个交易日震荡国际市场。围绕中国经济健康状况的新的担忧导致全球股市出现四个多月来最大跌幅。

富时环球指数(FTSE All-World Index)下跌2.7%之多，这是去年8月市场动荡最高峰以来的最大跌幅，欧洲基准股指Eurofirst 300和美国基准股指标普500(S&P 500)分别下跌2.5%和2.3%。

去年的股市宠儿——即所谓的Fang：Facebook、亚马逊(Amazon)、Netflix和谷歌(Google)——跻身于美国股市跌幅最大的股票之列。

此轮下跌之前，北京方面四年多来首次将人民币中间价设定在低于1美元兑6.5元人民币的水平，同时反映中国制造业健康状况的一个指标显示，12月活动水平出现连续第五个月下降。

进一步印证了各方对全球经济担忧的是，美国昨日发布的一个制造业指数降至自2009年以来的最低水平，即便美联储(Federal Reserve)准备在上月启动加息后进一步收紧政策。

国际货币基金组织(IMF)新任首席经济学家莫里斯?奥布斯特费尔德(Maurice Obstfeld)表示，中国在调整经济结构方面仍面临“严峻挑战”，他把这个问题放在2016年期间需要密切关注的问题清单的较高位置。

“在中国从投资和制造业转向消费和服务业之际，其经济正在放缓，”他在IMF官网发表的采访中表示，“但是，中国增长率降低——通过进口减少和对大宗商品需求下降——所产生的全球溢出效应，远远大于我们之前的预料。”

投资者也对中国禁止大股东售股的禁令即将失效感到紧张；该项禁令是在去年股市暴跌期间出台的。中国的蓝筹股基准——沪深300(CSI 300)指数下跌7%，这是九年来最大单日跌幅，触发了新设立的熔断机制。

尽管油价得到沙特阿拉伯和伊朗之间紧张关系升级的支撑，但其它多数大宗商品的价格（它们对中国经济前景极为敏感）昨日再度下降，同时随着投资者寻觅避风港，政府债券等安全系数较高的资产大幅上涨。

此轮下跌之前，中国股市曾在去年遭遇暴跌，一度抹去上海股市45%的价值，促使北京方面采取各种措施救市，包括国家策划的股票买入以及股市熔断机制。

投资者现在担心，在企业盈利依然疲弱的情况下，应急救市措施的逐渐解除可能给市场带来新的压力。

“鉴于整体经济没有出现太多复苏迹象，去年底市场只是围着各种炒作出来的投资主题转。那些主题正在失去后劲，”西南证券(Southwest Securities)驻上海分析师朱斌表示，“熔断机制是对市场回调的人为打断，它实际上可能加强回调的冲击力。”

中国证券监管机构在去年8月下旬叫停了大规模购股操作，尽管它承诺将无限期维持现有持股。去年7月暂停的首次公开发行(IPO)在上月恢复，此举可能从现有股票吸走一部分需求。

译者/和风