中国的银行: 问题正在积聚 | 经济学人

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中国的银行: 问题正在积聚 | 经济学人

BANKS in China appear to be in rude health. The seven biggest mainland banks have just posted a 16% year-on-year increase in pre-tax profits between them for the first quarter. The level of non-performing loans (NPLs) remains low, at just about 1%. But trouble is being stored up for the future.

中国的银行看起来很健康。中国大陆最大的七家银行今年第一季度税前利润比上一年同期增长了16%。 不良贷款率保持在低位，只有大约1%。但是正在积聚的问题将来会显现出来。

There are two big worries: bad local-government debt and souring property loans. The infrastructure binge of the past few years saw a boom in local-government financing vehicles (LGFVs), off-balance-sheet entities used to get around prohibitions on borrowing. Regulators say these entities’ bank debts were worth $1.4 trillion at the end of September. Private estimates range much higher, and suggest that 20-30% may be non-performing.

有两个最大的问题让人担忧：地方政府债的坏债和不动产贷款。 过去几年的基本建设热潮使地方政府融资工具大量兴起，这些资产负债表外的实体被用来规避被禁止的融资方式。监管机构说，这些实体的银行债务到去年九月底价值1.4万亿美元。根据私人机构的估计，这个数额更高，并且认为有20%至30%可能成为不良贷款。

The government is trying to defuse the bomb. One experiment is the issuance of local bonds to replace these loans. Officials also published guidance in March pushing banks to roll loans over, in the hope that growth will solve the problem. Another wheeze is shoving these loans onto the books of “policy banks” like China Development Bank (CDB), whose balance-sheets are now suffering (see chart). Half a trillion yuan, around $80 billion, in LGFV debt was rolled over last year from commercial banks to the CDB alone.

政府正在试图拆除这颗炸弹。一项试验就是发行地方政府债以替代这些贷款。官方在3月份还发布了指导意见，推动银行将贷款延期，希望经济增长将能使这一问题得到解决。 另一个获得喘息的办法是将这些贷款转到国家发展银行这样的“政策性银行”帐上，国家发展银行的资产负债表现在正受到这些问题的影响（见图）。地方政府融资工具的贷款延期，从商业银行转移到国家发展银行的债务金额去年就达到了5000亿元人民币，大约合800亿美元。

                               
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(译者注：该图表显示中国的银行中对地方政府融资工具的贷款占其国内贷款的比例，其中政策性银行中占比最高，40%。银行业平均不到20%。自上至下依次是：政策性银行、银行平均、股份制银行、国有银行和其他银行。)

The other headache is property, which is undergoing a government-forced cooling. Because real estate touches many parts of the economy, some worry that NPLs in this sector may be harder to isolate than local-government debt. Michael Werner of Sanford C. Bernstein, an investment bank, is relaxed, pointing to official figures claiming that 75% of property loans are collateralised, compared with only 38% of loans to manufacturers and 24% of those to utilities. Fine, but that reassures only if the collateral is good. It may not be.

另一个令人头痛的问题是房地产业，这个行业正在经历着政府强制性降温。由于房地产涉及到经济的许多方面，有些人担心，这个领域的不良贷款比地方政府债更加难以被隔离。一家投资银行-桑福德伯恩斯坦（Sanford C. Bernstein）的迈克尔.沃纳很放松，他指出，官方数据称75%的不动产贷款是有抵押的，相比较对制造业者的贷款只有38%有抵押，公用事业的贷款只有24%有抵押。是的，但是只有在抵押物状况良好的情况下担保才能起作用。但也许并不是。

Charlene Chu of Fitch, a ratings agency, thinks official statistics have to be treated with care in any case. Several factors are masking the true level of NPLs, she reckons. One is the practice of rolling over bad debt; another is the ability of distressed borrowers to turn to a vibrant shadow-banking sector for loans when in trouble. Banks are also shifting lots of activities off their balance-sheets. By moving deposits from normal accounts to “wealth-management accounts”, for example, banks can reduce the ostensible deposit base against which they must hold reserves, but must also pay much higher interest rates.

惠誉评级公司（Fitch）的朱夏莲（Charlene Chu）认为， 官方统计数字在任何情况下都须小心对待。她估计有几个因素在掩盖不良贷款的真实水平。一个是坏债延期的做法；另一个是，有问题的借款人在贷款出现问题时，可以转向具有活力的影子银行体系。银行也在将许多活动转移出他们的资产负债表。例如，银行将存款从正常的帐户转移到“财富管理账户”，从而可以将必须提取储备的表面存款基数降低，但是还必须支付更高的利息。

The Chinese banking system is already among the most thinly capitalised in emerging markets (the ratio of equity to assets is 6%). Ms Chu calculates that if a tenth of the banking system’s outstanding credit turns sour over the next two years, all profits and 39% of the system’s equity will be wiped out. If NPLs are unreliable indicators, liquidity measures may be a better signal of brewing trouble. Pointing to a rise in market-based interest rates and slowing loan growth, she argues that a crunch has already started. The banks’ figures do not immediately show it but the hangover from China’s post-crisis credit boom may be under way.

中国的银行体系在新兴市场中已经是资本金最薄的了（资产权益比例是6%）。 朱女士计算，如果在未来两年中十分之一的银行系统的未偿信贷状况恶化，所有的利润和银行系统资本金的39%将变为泡影。如果说不良贷款是不可靠的指标，那么流动性标准可以是一个将要发生问题的更好信号。她说，市场利率的提高和贷款增长缓慢说明紧缩已经开始。银行的数据不会立即体现出来，但是中国金融危机后信贷繁荣的后遗症可能正在显现。