美中开打贸易战将一损俱损

Is it wise to pick a fight with your biggest creditor and trading partner? That is one of the more intriguing questions posed by the prospect of US President Donald Trump . During the campaign, the man who will shortly hold sway over the world’s main reserve currency threatened to brand China a currency manipulator and to impose punitive tariffs to curb the country’s bilateral trade surplus with the US, which is running at close to $400bn a year.

向自己最大的债权国及贸易伙伴国挑起战斗是明智的吗?这是唐纳德•特朗普(Donald Trump)就任美国总统前景所带来的耐人寻味的问题之一。这个不久就能支配世界主要储备货币的男人在竞选中威胁要把中国列为“汇率操纵国”，并对中国征收惩罚性关税，以遏制目前接近每年4000亿美元的中美贸易顺差。

Since China’s official foreign exchange reserves amounts to $3.1tn, much of which is invested in the US Treasury market, there is scope for devastating retaliatory action that might destabilise global bond markets and inflict serious damage on the world economy.

由于中国官方外汇储备高达3.1万亿美元——其中很大一部分投资于美国国债——中国是有能力发起毁灭性的报复行动的，其结果或许会破坏全球债券市场的稳定、给世界经济造成严重损害。

The nature of this mutual dependency is that Americans have, in effect, been borrowing from the much poorer Chinese at exceptionally low rates of interest in order to buy the cheap goods that they turn out. Yet the benefits of this subsidy to the American consumer have been won at the cost of lost jobs in mature industries across the US.

这种相互依赖的本质是，美国人实际上一直在以极低利率向比自己穷得多的中国人借钱，以购买中国人生产的廉价商品。不过，美国消费者能够享受这种补贴是有代价的，那就是美国各地的成熟行业流失了大量工作岗位。

This malign consequence of globalisation was so much at the heart of Mr Trump’s electoral appeal that it is hard to see how he can retreat from taking action of some kind against the Chinese. So the risk that Beijing might seek to sabotage the US Treasury market in retaliation by dumping its Treasury holdings merits exploration.

鉴于全球化的这种负面影响正是特朗普在竞选中大声疾呼的核心话题，要看到他转变立场不对中国人采取某种行动是很难的。所以我们有必要探讨北京方面采取报复手段、通过抛售美债来破坏美国国债市场的风险。

There have in the past been suggestions in the state-controlled Chinese media that this financial weapon should be used to influence US policy, most notably in response to arms sales to Taiwan. Such a policy would cause the dollar to fall and interest rates to rise, thereby threatening the US with recession. Yet this would also inflict heavy losses on China’s dollar-denominated investments.

受政府控制的中国媒体过去有过一种声音，中方应当利用这件“金融武器”影响美国政策，尤其是在应对美国对台军售这件事上。这样的政策将导致美元下跌、利率上升，从而可能使美国陷入衰退。不过，这也将使中国所做的以美元计价的投资遭受巨大损失。

And finding somewhere else to put the money would be problematic. Newly issued government bonds in Europe and Japan are substantially absorbed by the asset purchase programmes of the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan. More important, with global economic growth anaemic and the Chinese economy struggling to address the problems of excessive investment and spiralling private and public debt, invoking an economic cold war would be monumentally dangerous for China as well as the rest of the world.

而且要找到其他投资目标并不容易。欧洲和日本新发行的政府债券基本上被欧洲央行(ECB)和日本央行(BoJ)的资产购买项目吸收掉。更重要的是，由于全球经济增长乏力、中国经济面临投资过度和公私债务不断上升的难题，在这种形势下爆发一场“经济冷战”对中国和世界其他地区来说都极其危险。

The US defence department has weighed these risks and found them untroubling. In a 2012 report , it concluded that using US Treasuries as a coercive tool would have limited impact and would do more harm to China than the US. Given the size of this market of nearly $14tn, and the pool of global savings available to provide alternative sources of finance for the US budget deficit, this has some plausibility. Yet in an astonishingly low-interest rate world, where central banks have been systematically rigging bond markets, there is a bond bubble. Current bond prices are thus unusually vulnerable. And, after Mr Trump’s victory, the US and global bond markets have become an even more dangerous place.

美国国防部曾权衡过这些风险，认为不值得担忧。其在2012年的一份报告中得出结论：利用美国国债作为胁迫工具只会产生有限的作用，并且中国会比美国受到更大的损害。鉴于美国国债市场的规模接近14万亿美元，加上全球储蓄池可以为美国预算赤字提供替代的资金来源，这个结论似乎有些道理。不过，在当前这个利率极低、各国央行一直在系统性地操纵债券市场的时期，债券泡沫已经形成。因此目前债券价格极易波动。在特朗普赢得大选之后，美国和全球债券市场变得更加危险了。

The president-elect is promising fiscal expansion — a combination of tax cuts, infrastructure spending and defence spending, pointing to larger budget deficits and higher interest rates. Given Mr Trump’s attacks on the Federal Reserve, the future of central bank independence in the US is in question. So markets will inevitably demand compensation for the increased inflation risk, as well as for the higher geopolitical risks inherent in Mr Trump’s undermining rhetoric on Nato and the US security guarantees for Japan and South Korea. That means much higher bond yields. The great bond bull market that has endured since the early 1980s is now surely over.

这位当选总统正承诺要实施财政扩张——将减税与增加基建和防务支出相结合，结果将导致预算赤字扩大和利息升高。鉴于特朗普对美联储(Fed)的抨击，美国央行未来能否保持独立性被划上了问号。因此，面对通胀风险上升以及地缘政治风险升高——特朗普发表过削弱北约(Nato)以及美国为日韩提供的安全保障的言论——市场将不可避免地要求得到补偿。这意味着债券收益率会显著上升。自上世纪80年代初延续至今的债券大牛市现在无疑走到了尾声。

Of course, campaign rhetoric is one thing, presidential office another.

当然，竞选言论是一回事，入主白宫之后的作为是另一回事。

It is in the US interest that this master of the deal should orchestrate a suitably fudged trade deal with China. The snag is that the hard-headed Chinese know a thing or two about dealmaking. As so often, the most likely outcome is muddle-through. Yet the risks remain. And a trade war would probably strengthen the arms of hardliners in Beijing who oppose the capital market liberalisation that many in the west would like to see.

这位“交易大师”应该促成一项适当含混的美中贸易协议，这是符合美国利益的做法。问题是精明的中国人通晓交易之道。就像多数时候一样，可能性最大的结果是勉强应付过去(muddle-through)。但风险犹在。而一场贸易战很可能助长中国政府中强硬派的声势，对于西方许多人乐于看到的资本市场自由化，这些强硬派是反对的。

The irony is that China’s currency manipulations have latterly been addressed at holding up the renminbi in the face of heavy capital outflows rather than weakening it. And the devaluation of the euro against the dollar has been far greater than that of the renminbi. But if the need is for a scapegoat, the Chinese undoubtedly fit the bill.

说来讽刺，面对严重资本外流，中国近来的汇率操纵是为了支撑人民币，而不是让人民币贬值。而欧元对美元的贬值幅度更甚于人民币。但是，如果需要替罪羊的话，中国人无疑是符合要求的。