投資者對中國債市的擔心過頭了

Two-plus years of a near-unbroken rally and a market may perhaps be forgiven for a pullback — unless that market is in China, where the sharpest monthly jump in bond yields since the rally began has prompted worries another mainland boom looks to be on borrowed time.

如果一個市場兩年多來幾乎連續不斷地上漲，那麼回調一下也情有可原，除非這個市場是在中國——中國債券收益率出現了自此輪牛市啓動以來的最大月度漲幅，這令一些人擔心中國內地的又一場繁榮看起來已時日無多。

Concerns about a rise in defaults, excess leverage and doubts about the likelihood of more monetary easing has sapped investor appetite and overshadowed China’s massive bond market.

債務違約增多引發的擔憂、過高的槓桿、再加上進一步出臺貨幣寬鬆政策的可能性存疑，令投資者的興趣日減，併爲中國龐大的債券市場蒙上了陰影。

A series of defaults and near-defaults by state-owned enterprises (SOE) have dominated attention since SOE’s government backing had, until now, been considered a guarantee of prompt and full payment. Last month. two SOEs missed scheduled bond payments, while a third suspended trading of its notes and warned it would struggle to make a payment due this month.

一系列國企違約和近乎違約的事件已成爲人們關注的焦點，之所以這麼說，是因爲迄今爲止，國企獲得的政府支持一直被視爲其債券得到及時全額兌付的保證。上月，兩家國企未能按期兌付債券，另外還有一家國企暫停其債券交易並提醒市場自己將很難兌付本月到期的債券。

Rising yields, which move inversely with price, have deterred other borrowers, with corporate issuance halving to Rmb641bn last month from its rate in March, according to data from Wind Information.

收益率（與價格走勢相反）不斷上升令其他借款者畏縮不前，萬得資訊(Wind Information)的數據顯示，與3月份相比，上月企業債券發行量縮減了一半，至6410億元人民幣。

Yields on benchmark five-year government bonds rose from 2.47 per cent at the start of April to 2.8 per cent last week — a three-month high, and their sharpest one-month move since November 2013.

基準的5年期國債收益率從4月初的2.47%升至上週的2.8%，創下3個月來的高點，這一月度變動幅度也是自2013年11月以來最大的。

Crucially, the difference or risk premium between government borrowing yields and those paid by low-rated companies widened to a four-month high, illustrating growing concern of hard landing beckoning for the market.

關鍵是，國債收益率和那些低評級企業債券的收益率之間的差額（即風險溢價）擴大至4個月來的高點，表明人們越來越擔心債券市場的硬着陸風險。

Bankers, however, play down the risk that defaults could cause a wider panic.

但銀行家們並不認爲這些違約有較大可能引發更大的恐慌。

“To me this is a healthy repricing that we’ve seen,” says Beng Hong Lee, head of China markets at Deutsche Bank. “Look across China and for a long time defaults have been extremely low. That has resulted in mispricing of risk and the expectations that the government or a bank will come to the rescue.”

德意志銀行(Deutsche Bank)中國市場業務負責人李民宏(Beng Hong Lee)表示：“對我來說，我們看到的是一種健康的重新定價。縱觀整個中國，長期以來違約案例極爲少見，這造成了風險的錯誤定價，並使得人們預期政府或銀行最終會出手相救。”

The upward pressure on yields has occurred as China prepares to open its bond markets to outside investors via a new scheme that eases access. The mainland is already the third-largest debt market in the world, with some $7tn outstanding, yet foreigners hold less than 2 per cent. Bankers are sanguine that April’s storms will not deter the kind of long-term investment Beijing is keen to attract.

在債券收益率承受上行壓力之際，中國正準備通過一個放寬准入條件的新計劃向外部投資者開放其債券市場。中國內地債市已是全球第三大債券市場，債券存量達到約7萬億美元，然而外國人持有的比例不足2%。銀行家們樂觀地認爲，4月的風暴不會嚇阻中國渴望吸引的那類長期投資。

“The key to the move higher is that this is the repricing that everyone has been saying was needed and at the end of the process you will have a more attractively priced asset,” Mr Lee says. “After all, offshore investors aren’t going to come in if credit spreads go to zero.”

李民宏表示：“債券收益率走高的關鍵是，這是所有人都一直說有必要出現的重新定價，這個過程結束時，你將擁有價格上更誘人的資產。畢竟，如果信貸息差爲零的話，離岸投資者不會進場。”

Liquidity has also played a part in pushing up yields as improving economic data have prompted investors to scale back expectations for further loosening of monetary policy.

流動性因素也在推高收益率方面起到了作用，因爲逐漸改善的經濟數據促使投資者相應地降低了對貨幣政策進一步放鬆的預期。

China’s seven-day bond repurchase rate is considered a benchmark for liquidity in the country’s interbank money market, especially since the People’s Bank of China moved to conduct daily market operations, up from twice-weekly, earlier this year. Last week, however, the rate reached 2.7 per cent, a level not seen since the stock market rout in July last year.

中國的7天國債回購利率被視爲銀行間貨幣市場的流動性基準，尤其是在中國央行今年早些時候把公開市場操作的頻率從一週兩次調整爲每個工作日一次以後。然而，上週7天回購利率達到了2.7%，爲去年7月股市暴跌以來未見的水平。

Zhou Hao, senior emerging markets economist at Commerzbank in Singapore, says: “As activity data are improving and inflation expectations are picking up due to rising food prices and property overheating, the market expects less aggressive monetary policy easing.”

德國商業銀行(Commerzbank)駐新加坡高級新興市場經濟學家周浩表示：“隨着經濟活動數據不斷改善、食品價格上漲和樓市過熱導致通脹預期上升，市場預期貨幣政策寬鬆的力度將會變小。”

Previous expectations of easier policy have also encouraged a build-up of leverage in the market, which could have put some investors in precarious positions. Banks and other investors have increasingly funded new bond purchases with short-term borrowing — essentially relying on PBoC cash injections to keep borrowing costs low.

此前對更寬鬆政策的預期也助長了市場中槓桿的形成，這可能使一些投資者處於危險的境地。銀行和其他投資者越來越多地靠短期借款來籌措資金購買新債券——這實際上是依靠中國央行的資金注入來把借款成本維持在低位。

Monthly transaction volume in the repo market — short-term loans that use bonds as collateral — has surged and now exceeds total bonds outstanding, a sign of the popularity of this trade.

質押式回購（以債券爲抵押的短期貸款）市場月度交易額激增，現在的規模已經超過債券存量總額，顯示出這種交易十分風行。

The risk for the market is that further rises in money market rates makes the trade unprofitable and forces investors to unload their bond holdings en masse. Any further pickup of corporate bond defaults could similarly spark a rush to the exit.

市場面臨的風險是，貨幣市場利率的進一步上升將使這類交易無利可圖，迫使投資者集體將他們持有的債券平倉。企業債券違約若進一步增多，同樣可能導致投資者爭相平倉。

Analysts are keen to point out, however, that recent volatility appears to be mainly sentiment driven. They say actual cash conditions remain relatively loose and the central bank has in general still been injecting cash into the system in a sign that it intends to maintain ample liquidity.

然而，分析師們敏銳地指出，最近的波動看起來主要是市場情緒驅動的。他們表示，實際的貨幣環境依然相對寬鬆，中國央行總體上依然在向系統中注入資金，這表明它有意保持充足的流動性。

Should the economy not worsen significantly or the PBoC change tack on liquidity, most analysts expect a stabilisation of China’s bond markets in the coming weeks. The one caveat, they warn: tax.

大多數分析師預期，如果經濟不顯著惡化、或者中國央行不改變流動性方面的策略，中國的債券市場將在接下來的數週裏穩定下來。不過，他們對一點提出了警告：稅。

As of this week repo deals will be taxed as part of broad tax reform affecting the services sector centred on a shift from a turnover tax to one based on value-added charges.

本週起，回購交易將依據以“營改增”爲核心、影響整個服務業的廣泛稅改徵稅。

Officials say that in the aggregate, the reform will reduce the tax burden on services firms, but some individual business lines will see taxes rise. The impact on bond trading is especially large, since traders say that in practice, the turnover tax was often not assessed at all.

官員們表示，這一改革將在總體上減少服務業企業的稅負，但某些業務領域的稅負將會加重。債券交易受到的影響尤其大，交易員們表示，在實踐中，營業稅往往根本未被覈定。

A bond trader at a city-level bank in Shanghai, says: “The tax issue is quite significant. No one knows yet how big an impact it will have, but people are worried.”

上海一家城市銀行的一名債券交易員表示：“稅的問題非常大。沒人知道會帶來多大的影響，但人們很擔心。”