2023年经济展望：冬天来了，但是春天还很远 | 经济学人财经

Finance & economics | Buttonwood

财经 | 梧桐树专栏

英文部分选自经济学人20230107财经版块

Finance & economics | Buttonwood

财经 | 梧桐树专栏

Will investors have another awful year in 2023?

2023年的资本市场还会继续哀鸿遍野吗？

There is a lot of unfounded optimism about

盲目乐观不可取

After a nightmarish 2022, shell-shocked investors have losses to recoup and plenty to ponder. There are asset-class allocations to be made, industries to favour or shun and every economic variable under the sun to forecast. Professional money managers have the extra headache of working out how to stop nervous clients racing for the exits. But one question dominates the rest, and it is the impossible one that looms over every crash. Is the worst over?

噩梦般的2022年结束了，备受摧残的投资们要挽回许多损失，琢磨很多事情：资产配置要大动筋骨；有些行业要加大投资，有些行业要溜之大吉；每一个经济变量也要心中有数。专业资金经理们还得想破脑袋阻止慌乱的投资者争相撤资。但所有这些问题中，最重要的还是那个每逢危机便在市场游荡的幽灵：“最严酷的寒冬过去了吗”。

注释：

1.shell-shocked：(因困境而)吓昏了头的，糊涂得不知所措的，焦虑得无法应对的。

2. under the sun：全世界的 ; 在世界上。

3.impossible: very difficult to deal with 难处理的；很难对付的

Economically, there is a clear answer: this year will be grim. Kristalina Georgieva, head of the imf, warned on January 1st that a third of the global economy is likely to fall into recession in 2023. Downturns have probably already begun in the euro zone and Britain. In a recent poll of economists carried out by the University of Chicago and the Financial Times, 85% thought America would follow before the year is out.

从经济方面看，答案是确切的：今年的情况不容乐观。元旦当天，IMF总裁克里斯塔利娜·格奥尔基耶娃（Kristalina Georgieva）警告称，体量占全球三分之一的经济体极有可能在2023年陷入衰退。在欧元区和英国，衰退或许已经是进行时。芝加哥大学和《金融时报》近日对经济学家进行了一项调查，结果显示，85%的受访者认为美国也会在年底前陷入衰退。

注释：

Kristalina Georgieva：克里斯塔利娜·格奥尔基耶娃，IMF总裁。

This does not guarantee another bloodbath—it could even mean the opposite. In theory, markets are forward-looking, and fears of recession stalked the world for much of 2022. Such a widely held consensus should be baked into today’s prices, meaning even a marginally better outlook would buoy prices. Indeed, analysts at JPMorgan Asset Management use the strength of agreement that there will be a recession to argue that stock prices will in fact end 2023 higher than they started. They are not alone in their optimism. Goldman Sachs’s researchers think share prices will fall in the near term, but recover by the end of the year. Deutsche Bank’s bullish lot reckon the s&p 500 index of large American firms will end the year 17% higher than it now stands.

但这不代表2023年也会血流成河——这甚至可能是好兆头。理论上，市场具有前瞻性；2022年的大部分时间里，全球都笼罩在经济衰退的担忧中。如今的价格水平应是这一普遍共识的产物，因此任何一点向好的苗头都会使其大大提振。的确，摩根大通资产管理公司的分析师基于共识强度分析，认为到今年年底，股票价格会高于现下水平。乐观派绝非仅此一家。高盛的研究员认为，股价近期将会下跌，但会在年底前回升。德意志银行（Deutsche Bank’）的看涨派认为，到年底，标普500指数将比现在高17%。

If this year offers a repeat of 2022, with heavy losses for both stocks and bonds, it will be an unusual one. Stock prices mostly go up. They rarely decline two years in a row. The s&p 500 last did so two decades ago during the bursting of the dotcom bubble. Last year’s bond rout was on account of the Federal Reserve raising rates at its fastest pace since the 1980s, which is unlikely to be repeated.

如果2022的惨剧在今年重演，股票债券继续遭受重创，那就太不寻常了。股价通常都会上涨，连续两年下跌的情况很是罕见。标普500指数上次出现这种情况还是在20年前互联网泡沫破裂期间。去年债券价格暴跌，很大程度上是由于美联储以40年来最快的步伐连续加息，而这一情况不大可能再次发生。

Even so, there are reasons to believe more pain lies ahead. The first is that shares, relative to their underlying earnings, remain expensive by historical standards. Despite last year’s plunge, the price-to-earnings ratio for “growth” stocks, those of companies promising big future profits, has fallen back only to where it was in 2019. This was its highest since the global financial crisis of 2007-09, a level which was reached after a decade-long bull market. True, “value” stocks, those with a low price compared with the firm’s book assets, look more attractive. But as recession sets in, both types are vulnerable to earnings downgrades that are, for the most part, yet to materialise.

即便如此，我们仍有理由认为前路坎坷。首先，从历史数据来看，股价相较于企业直接收益仍处于高位。尽管去年出现暴跌，成长股（即未来有望获得巨额利润的公司）的市盈率也只是回到了2019年的水平，那是2007-09年全球金融危机之后历经十年牛市才达到的峰值。价值股（相较于账面资产股价处于低位的股票）的确更具吸引力，但随着经济衰退的到来，两种类型的股票都将会被盈利下滑拖累。不过现下盈利下滑尚未出现。

注释

underlying earnings: It is a figure reached by eliminating exceptional and non-recurring costs. This is different from the reported accounting profit that is a statutory requirement, allowing more interpretation in its calculation by individual companies.

直接收益，指扣除非经常项目后的收益，非经常项目包括资产销售的收益或损失、预提损失等。

Moreover, today’s valuations were reached during an unusual period: one in which central banks pumped endless liquidity into the market via quantitative easing (qe). By buying government bonds with newly created money, the Fed and others depressed yields and nudged investors to seek returns in riskier assets, like stocks. Now these qe programmes are being kicked into reverse. One consequence is that governments will rely much more on private investors to hold their debt. In the fiscal year of 2022-23, America’s Treasury may need to borrow almost twice as much from investors as it did during each of the two years preceding the covid-19 pandemic, and four times the average in the five years before that. Even without central banks raising short-term interest rates, this glut could drive bond prices down and yields up. Just as in 2022, stocks would therefore be left looking less attractive by comparison.

此外，当前估值是在一个非常时期形成的，期间各国央行通过量化宽松政策向市场无限注入流动性。美联储及其他央行通过新发货币购买政府债券，压低了债券收益率并促使投资者转向股票等更高风险资产以寻求收益。如今量化宽松政策正在逆转。一个结果是，私人投资者将越发成为政府债券的主要持有者。2022-23财年，美国财政部从投资者处借贷的规模，可能会是新冠疫情开始前两年平均水平的两倍，是再往前推五年平均水平的四倍。即使央行不提高短期利率，这种过剩的发行量也会导致债券价格下跌、收益率上升。相比之下，股票的吸引力就会因此下降，就像2022年里发生的那样。

The final reason for gloom is a divergence between economists and investors. Although wonks are betting on a recession, many punters still hope one can be avoided. Markets expect the Fed’s benchmark rate to hit a peak of below 5% in the first half of this year, before declining. The central bank’s governors disagree. They project that the interest rate will end the year above 5%.

悲观情绪的最后一个原因则是经济学家们和投资者之间的意见分歧。学究们再怎么认定经济会陷入衰退，也拦不住赌徒们押宝警报能够解除。市场预期美联储的基准利率会在上半年达到峰值，即不到5%，并在随后开始下降。但美联储各区的行长们则不这么认为：他们预计利率会在年底达到5% 以上。

注释：

1.wonk n.书呆子，刻苦用功的学生

eg.Thesemay seem like dry Numbers, mostly of concern to budget wonks. 

这些干巴巴的数字似乎是那些预算核算的呆子才会关注的

2.punter n.a person who places a bet 下赌注者

Thus investors are betting either that inflation will fall to target more quickly than the Fed expects, or that the monetary guardians do not have the heart to inflict the pain it would take to get it down. There is, of course, a chance they will be proved right. But markets spent much of 2022 underestimating the Fed’s hawkishness, only to be put in their place by Jerome Powell, the central bank’s governor, at meeting after meeting. If the pattern repeats, 2023 will be another miserable year for investors.

因此，投资者们要么下注通胀下降到目标水平的速度比美联储预期的更快，要么押宝压低通胀的代价高到货币政策制定者们无法承受。当然，他们也不是完全没有赢面。但2022年的大部分时间里，市场都低估了美联储的鹰派作风，最终毫无悬念地被美联储主席杰罗姆·鲍威尔（Jerome Powell）教做人。如果这样的戏码再次上演，对投资者们来说，2023年又将满是凄风苦雨。

注释：

put someone in his or her place:

Rebukesomeone, remind someone of his or her position, as in Alice is entirely too rude; it's time you put her in her place. 

翻译组：

jessie ，女，爱阳光，爱细雨，爱经济学人
Helen ，女，金融资管，努力成为六边形战士ing

Summer， 女，QE在职，梦想能仗走天涯 翻译/音乐/健康

Ashely ，女，金融硕士，爱宠物，爱英语，哎旅游，经济学人粉丝

校对组：

Cecilia，今年过得贵妇一点

Hannah，女, 爱读财经的金融小白，经济学人唯粉

Ithil，男，胡辣汤爱好者，世界杯冠军、三星阿根廷球迷