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【导读】美联储宣布将退出QE3，是不是太早了？详见下文。 Free exchange 自由贸易 Early retirement 提前退休
译者：forestmoon ON OCTOBER 29th the Federal Reserve said it would end “QE3”: the programme of asset purchases it first announced in September 2012 and began shrinking last December. Quantitative easing, or the buying of assets with newly created money, has been the workhorse of monetary policy since rich-world interest rates fell almost to zero in 2008-09. Despite its expansive use since then, many still see it as an exotic and possibly dangerous monetary tool. They raise three pressing questions: did it work, did it have unacceptable side effects, and was the Fed right to stop? 10月29日 美联储宣布它将结束“QE3（第三轮量化宽松）”：一项资产购置计划，它在2012年9月第一次宣布开始执行，并于去年12月开始收缩。量化宽松，或者说用新创造的货币购买资产，自从2008~2009年期间富裕国家的利率几乎掉至0时，已经成为货币政策的主力。尽管自从那时起它便被广泛使用，但仍被认为是一项独特并且可能危险的货币工具。他们提出了三项紧迫的问题：它有效吗，它是否有可接受的副作用，美联储结束它的决策是否正确？ Though QE is often described as an “unconventional” form of monetary policy (as opposed to mundane adjustments to interest rates), it has actually been in use for some time. The Federal Reserve tried it from 1932 to 1936, and the Bank of Japan in the early 2000s. Both have used it again since the financial crisis, along with the Bank of England. 虽然QE经常被描述为一个“没有争议的”货币政策形式（相比较于对利率的普通的调整），它实际上已经被用了不少次了。美联储从1932~1936年期间就曾试图用过，日本银行在21世纪初期也曾用过。这两个自金融危机伊始便又一次和英格兰银行一起采用了。 QE is thought to work in a few ways. Early in the recession asset purchases were primarily intended to ease credit by directing a firehose of liquidity into fearful markets. Other effects became more important over time, such as portfolio rebalancing. A bank that has sold bonds to the Fed will typically wish to spend the proceeds to buy some other asset. When banks buy new securities, the newly created money flows through the system, raising asset prices and reducing interest rates. That, in turn, should boost demand by making investment more attractive. If banks buy foreign assets, that may weaken the exchange rate, giving a boost to exporters. Finally, QE is also thought to work as a signal: research suggests that it reinforces central banks’ policy guidance, making promises to keep rates low more credible, for instance. QE被认为从以下几个方面其效果。在衰退的初始阶段，资产购置的初衷是为了通过在充满恐惧情绪的市场中布置一个流动性的消防带来放松信贷。其它的效果将随着时间推移变得更加重要，比如，资产组合的再平衡。一个把债券卖个美联储的银行，很典型地，希望能够花费这个债券衍生出的收益来购买其它资产。当银行买了新的有价证券时，新创造的货币将流向整个体系，提升资产价格，降低利率水平。这又进一步通过使投资更有吸引力来提升需求。如果银行买了国外的资产，这将降低汇率，刺激出口者。最后，QE也被视为一个信号：研究表明，它增强了中央银行的政策指导，例如，使维持低利率的承诺更为可信。 QE’s detractors point out that central banks around the rich world have expanded their balance-sheets by trillions of dollars in recent years (see chart), yet are still nurturing lacklustre recoveries. Nonetheless, there is a consensus among researchers that QE has indeed lowered borrowing costs, and thus increased both economic output and inflation, as its advocates intended. In both America and Britain, for instance, several studies have concluded that it helped to lower interest rates. Those declines are generally held to have boosted economic growth. Recent work by Martin Weale and Tomasz Wieladek of the Bank of England found that for every 1% of GDP the Fed spent on bonds, both real output and inflation rose by about a third of a percentage point. Given how close so many economies now are to outright deflation, even a small boost to inflation is not to be sneered at. QE的批评者们支出，富国的中央银行这些年已经数以十亿美元计地扩展了他们的资产负债表（见图），却仍然在给毫无生机的恢复过程输送养分。尽管如此，研究者中已经形成了一个共识，即QE确实降低了借贷成本，并因此增加了经济的产出和通胀，正如它的鼓吹者们宣称的那样。比如，在美国和英国，不少研究已经证实，它有益于降低利率，这一般可以促进经济增长。英格兰银行的Martin Weale 和 Tomasz Wieladek 的最新研究发现，美联储在债券上花费的每1%的GDP，不论实际产出还是通胀，都将提升大约0.3个百分点。考虑到那么多经济体如此地接近于完全通缩，哪怕一个小小的通胀提升都不可小觑。 Why haven’t central banks done more in that case? Excessive optimism is one reason; the Fed, for example, has repeatedly overestimated how quickly the American economy was likely to grow. The fear of possible side effects has also stayed central bankers’ hands. In some cases, those are subsiding: claims that the new trillions coursing through the economy would lead to hyper-inflation no longer seem credible, given how static prices remain. Central bankers are also increasingly confident that their pneumatic balance-sheets will not interfere with conventional monetary policy. The Fed, for instance, has begun paying interest on the excess reserves banks keep with it. By raising that rate it can attract extra reserves and thus curb bank lending. 为什么中央银行没有在那种情况下做得更多呢？过度乐观主义是一个原因；例如，美联储不停地高估美国经济体有可能增长多么迅速的可能性。对有可能产生的副作用的担心同样使央行投鼠忌器。在一些案例中，这些论点正在平息：宣称新的万亿注入经济体将导致恶性通货膨胀，在价格如此稳定的情况下，已经变得不那么可信。中央银行正在对他们的充气式膨胀的资产负债表将与传统的货币政策不冲突变得更加有信心。例如，美联储已经开始对银行持有的超额准备金支付利息。提升这个利率，它将吸引更多的储备金并因此控制银行信贷。 The worry that QE is generating dangerous financial instability has been more persistent. Jeremy Stein, who served on the Fed’s Board of Governors from 2012 to 2014, thinks that persistently low interest rates have caused investors to embrace frighteningly risky assets in a search for yield. If QE spurs the construction of a financial house of cards, the argument runs, its eventual collapse may hurt more than QE ever helped. 对QE是否产生危险的金融动荡的担忧则更为持久。曾于2012~2014年在美联储委员会效力的Jeremy Stein，认为持续的低利率将导致投资者更热衷于令人害怕的高风险资产以追逐利润。争论称，如果QE刺激了这种不切实际的金融体系的建造，它将最终坍塌，并造成远比QE带来的好处多得多的危害。 Risk-maker or risk-taker? These fears will be difficult to judge until more time has passed, yet there are good reasons to believe they are overstated. Most central bankers insist they have the regulatory tools to keep excessive risk-taking in check (although their recent record in that respect is inglorious). Recent research by Gabriel Chodorow-Reich of Harvard University finds that the “reach for yield” QE has prompted has been modest relative to its benefits. Asset purchases helped recapitalise ailing banks, he reckons, and higher asset values have dampened the incentive to make risky bets. Anyway, it is important to weigh QE’s risks against those of other policies. Were the European Central Bank to resort to QE, it might lead to undue risk-taking, but if the policy also reduced the odds of a catastrophic break-up of the euro it would be worthwhile. 风险制造者还是风险承担者？ 短期内对这些担心难以判断，但有充分理由相信它们被夸大了。许多中央银行坚持他们在核算中有监管工具以避免过度的风险承担（虽然他们在这方面过去的记录是不光彩的）。哈佛大学的Gabriel Chodorow-Reich最近的研究发现，QE促进的“拿来收益”相比于其好处，已经比较适度了。他还认为，资产购置帮助状态不佳的银行重新积累资本，且更高的资产价值帮助弱化做高风险赌注的动机。欧洲央行是将求助于QE，它可能导致超预期的风险承担，但如果政策也降低了欧元崩溃风险的概率，那么也是值得的。 Critics’ third complaint is that QE raises inequality. Asset purchases, naturally, raise asset prices. Since the rich own most financial assets, QE tends to increase inequality through the “portfolio” channel. Yet to the extent that QE boosts growth, it reduces inequality, for joblessness is regressive: poorer workers suffer higher unemployment rates and more significant loss of income in weak economies. Higher inflation also makes debts easier to bear, because they can be repaid with money that is worth less. Since borrowers tend to be poorer than creditors, QE diminishes inequality in that way too. Recent research suggests that tight monetary policy tends to raise inequality while expansionary policy reduces it. 批评者的第三个抱怨是，QE加剧了不平等。资产购置，一般提升了资产价格。因为富人拥有大多数的金融资产，QE倾向于通过资产组合的渠道加剧不平等。然而在某种程度上，QE促进了增长，也减少了不平等，因为失业更有危害性：脆弱经济体中贫穷的劳动者遭受了更高的失业率，以及更为显著的收入减少。更高的通胀也使得负债更容易忍受，因为这些负债可以被价值更少的钱来偿还。既然出借者变得比借入者更穷，那么QE从这个意义上也减少了不平等。最近的研究表明更紧的货币政策倾向于提升不平等，同时扩张性的政策将减弱。 If QE works and its potential costs are overstated, should the Fed not keep at it? Those cheering its demise note that growth has been strong and steady for most of 2014, and that unemployment, at 5.9%, is near its long-term average. Yet history suggests that leaving QE behind is never simple. As long as interest rates remain near zero any nasty new development will force the Fed to resume it or stand by while the economy deteriorates. And low and falling expectations of inflation suggest that markets doubt the Fed’s ability to leave Japan-style stagnation behind. A premature exit from QE3 is a good way to make sure there is a QE4. 如果QE有效果并且它的潜在成本被夸大了，那么美联储是否需要继续施行呢？那些对QE终止而欢呼的人发现，增长在2014年的大多数时间变得强有力，并且失业率，5.9%的水平，已经接近于它的长期平均水平。但历史表明把QE放在身后从来不是简单的。既然利率保持在0附近，任何令人不快的新进展将逼迫美联储继续实行，或站在一边看着经济垮掉。并且，对通胀的低且持续下降的预期也表明，市场怀疑美联储拜托日本式滞涨的能力。一个QE3的过早的退出，是一个很好的办法确认还将有一个QE4. 【译者注】 量化宽松政策：简单理解就是“印钱”。其中量化指的是扩大一定数量的货币发行，宽松就是减少银行储备必须注资的压力。当银行和金融机构的有价证券被央行收购时，新发行的钱币便被成功地投入到私有银行体系。 2014年10月29日，美国结束了维持两年之久第三轮量化宽松政策，并重申将会在相当长一段时间保持利率在当前低位。分析人士普遍认为，美国退出QE可能会促使国际资本回流美国，但对中国资本流动不会产生太大影响，中国央行稳健的货币政策基调不会有太大改变。（来自百度百科） |
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