Lex专栏：有比没有好的中国式违约

A debt default is generally not cause for celebration. Not defaulting, by contrast, should be a good thing. But in China, a lack of defaults has said more about inadequate processes for dealing with failing companies than it does about their financial health — not to mention a lack of political will to allow companies to fail. That is slowly changing.

债务违约通常不是庆祝的理由。相反，没有发生违约应该是好事。然而在中国，缺少违约更多地说明了处理失败企业的程序不完善——且不提缺乏让企业倒闭的政治意愿，而不是它们的财务状况良好。这种状况正在慢慢改变。

Lately, defaults have been rising as the government tries to restructure ailing state-owned enterprises. Wind, a data service provider, notes a “flurry” of defaults in the past three months, bringing the accumulated total of sour loans to $8bn — three times higher than at the end of last year. SOEs, once considered immune, account for nearly half of that.

近来，随着中国政府试图重组处境艰难的国有企业，违约在增加。数据服务提供商万得资讯(Wind)指出，过去三个月出现了一轮违约潮，令累计坏账总规模达到80亿美元——三倍于上一个年底的数字。其中，一度被认为不会违约的国企占了上述坏账来源的近一半。

As part of its push to open its markets to international capital, China is keen to stimulate overseas interest in its debt. Although the third-largest domestic bond market in the world, and growing rapidly, China’s fixed income market totalling nearly $10tn is still less than a third of the US market’s value. In an effort to grow, regulations regarding foreign investor access have been loosened. Last year the interbank bond market, which accounts for the majority of bond trading in China, was opened to qualified foreigners.

作为将其市场向国际资本开放的努力的一部分，中国正急于刺激海外对其债务的投资兴趣。尽管是全球第三大国内债券市场并且成长迅速，但中国近10万亿美元的固定收益市场规模仍不到美国市场的三分之一。为提振债市增长，有关外国投资者投资债市的监管条例已被放宽。去年，占中国债券交易大头的银行间债券市场已向符合资格的外国投资者开放。

Efforts to pique foreign appetite have so far been only partly successful. Overseas investor buying increased as the market rallied last year. Still, they hold just 2 per cent of the total. Disincentives abound. Credit risk and the absence of a transparent process to handle defaults is still a deterrent. Poor-quality issuer information and questionable local ratings (nearly all issuers are rated A plus or above, according to Wind) do not help. And a period of renminbi depreciation hardly makes RMB assets attractive.

到目前为止，试图激发境外投资兴趣的努力只取得了部分成功。随着去年市场的上扬，境外投资者的买入有所增加。话虽如此，他们持有的债券只占总数的2%。这其中的抑制因素很多。信贷风险和缺乏处理违约的透明程序仍是一个吓阻因素。低品质的发行人信息和有问题的国内评级(根据万得资讯的数据，几乎所有发行人都被评为A+或以上)也没有帮助。而一轮人民币贬值也无助于让人民币资产有吸引力。

Fitch Rating notes that defaults have added to recent disruption in the asset class. Tightening liquidity and the expectation of rising US yields have led to a market sell-off; onshore corporate bond issuance fell one-third versus the previous year for the month of December as 82 deals were cancelled or delayed. In the long run, however, better allocated capital in China will bring clearer rewards.

惠誉评级(Fitch Ratings)指出，违约加剧了这种资产类别近期的震荡。流动性收紧和对美国收益率攀升的预期导致了一轮市场抛售。2016年12月，随着82宗交易被取消或推迟，在岸公司债券发行规模同比下降三分之一。不过，从长远来说，在中国配置更佳的资本将带来更清晰的回报。