John Kuhns was in Hong Kong at the end of January, visiting local branches of his mainland banks in search of money. That was because “my banks told me they might only be able to provide 60 per cent of what they lent last year, given restrictive new quotas”, says the head of China Hydroelectric, a Beijing-based investor in hydropower.

　　中华水电(China Hydroelectric)首席执行官约翰?库恩斯(John Kuhns) 1月底在香港，到其内地银行的本地分支机构寻找资金。库恩斯是一位美国人，从上世纪90年代开始就一直活跃在中国的发电行业，他所在的中华水电总部位于北京。他表示，他当时去香港是因为“我的银行告诉我，鉴于限制性的新额度，它们可能只能提供去年贷款的60%”。

　　But there was no need for alarm, these bankers added, according to Mr Kuhns, an American who has been active in Chinese power generation since the 1990s. “They said: ‘If you need more, we can help you arrange a bond issue in Hong Kong. Or we can help you set up a trust company to obtain more money.’?”

　　但库恩斯表示，这些银行家也告诉他无需恐慌。“他们说：‘如果你需要更多资金，我们可以帮你在香港安排债券发行。或者，我们可以帮你组建一家信托公司，以获得更多资金。’”

　　Welcome to the unofficial financial realm that has sprung up outside China’s heavily regulated banking system. At the same time as banks in China – under orders from a government anxious to rein in a lending boom – act to cut their credit to China Hydroelectric and other borrowers, their Hong Kong arms are offering alternative arrangements. Mr Kuhns says he was told he could raise as much as HK$3bn ($385m) in bonds tied to the value of the renminbi, an amount far greater than he needed.

　　欢迎来到在中国监管森严的银行体系之外已蓬勃兴起的非官方金融王国。当在急于控制贷款热潮的政府的命令下，中国内地银行采取行动，减少对中华水电及其它借款者的贷款时，它们在香港的分支机构却在提供其他的安排。库恩斯表示，有人告诉他，他可以通过与人民币挂钩的债券，筹集高达30亿港元（合3.85亿美元）的资金，远远超出他的需求。

　　The message he had received in Beijing was the same as that conveyed to countless other borrowers across China as the authorities try to control credit growth. This year, with inflation running at almost 5 per cent and expected to rise, the government has signalled that it is serious about adopting a more restrictive policy.

　　在中国政府努力控制信贷增速之际，他在北京获得的信息与传达给中国各地无数其它借款者的信息是一样的。今年，中国的通胀率几乎达到5%，预计还会继续上升。中国政府已表明，对于采取限制性更强的政策，其态度是认真的。

　　But can it? In response to the heavy hand of the regulators, a host of grey-market institutions and arrangements has sprung up precisely to get around formal restrictions in China’s heavily controlled financial markets. Analysts say annual flows could involve Rmb2,000bn ($305bn) – equivalent to about one-third of gross domestic product.

　　但它能做到吗？面对监管机构的强硬手段，中国涌现出了大量灰色市场机构和安排，就是为了绕开管控严格的中国金融市场的正式规定。分析人士表示，年度资金流动可能达到2万亿元人民币（合3050亿美元），约相当于国内生产总值(GDP)的三分之一。

　　“The People’s Bank of China has difficulty in controlling liquidity and getting the banks to meet the loan quotas,” says Francis Cheng at CLSA in Hong Kong. He reckons the banks account for only half of total financing. The rest comes from a variety of trust companies, finance companies, leasing companies and underground banks. All of them are less regulated than the banks, subject to conflicting regulators or not regulated at all.

　　里昂证券(CLSA)驻香港的郑名凯(Francis Cheng)表示：“中国人民银行(PBoC)很难控制流动性，让银行按额度放贷。”他估计，银行仅占中国融资总额的一半。其余部分来自各种信托公司、金融公司、租赁公司和地下银行。它们要么受到的监管不如银行那么严格，要么受到互相冲突的监管机构的监管，要么根本不受监管。

　　Yet Beijing operates as if the banks account for all of the financing. That is one reason credit growth has continued to exceed official targets, fuelling the inflation that worries Beijing.

　　然而，中国政府的做法就好像所有的融资全都来自银行。这就是中国的信贷增速总是超出官方目标的一个原因，引发了令中国政府担忧的通胀。

　　Some senior banking officials deny the very existence of the informal sector. “The term ‘shadow banking’ doesn’t really apply to China,” says Jiang Jianqing, chairman of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, one of the country’s biggest banks. “There are no financial institutions outside the supervisory and regulatory system here.”

　　一些银行业高级官员甚至否认非正规领域的存在。“‘影子银行’这个词不太适用于中国，”中国四大国有银行之一——中国工商银行(ICBC)的董事长姜建清表示。“这里没有游离于监督和监管体系之外的金融机构。”

　　Whether Beijing succeeds or not in reining in informal fund flows is important, since the fate of these restrictions provides clues to the future direction of China’s economy. If credit growth became too great, China would face more inflation in the short term and possible excess capacity in the longer term. That could lead to a resumption of the profitless growth that China is trying to leave behind. If inflation remained high, social unrest would become increasingly likely.

　　中国政府能否成功遏制非正规资金流很重要，因为这些限制措施的命运预示着中国经济未来的走向。如果信贷增长变得过快，中国短期内将面临更多通胀，较长期内或许会遭遇产能过剩。这可能会导致中国一直在努力摆脱的“无利润增长”重现。如果通胀持续高企，社会出现不稳定的可能性就会越来越大。

　　If, conversely, China slammed the monetary brakes on too hard, it would have a big contractionary impact both at home and abroad, given that Chinese imports have become an important source of global growth.

　　相反，鉴于中国进口已经成为全球增长的一个重要源头，如果中国的货币刹车踩得过猛，在国内外都会产生重大收缩性影响。

　　Monetary policy matters more in China than it does in most developed markets, because the ability to allocate capital remains largely the preserve of the state. It is where financial power and political power intersect.

　　货币政策对中国比对大多数发达市场都更重要，因为中国的资金配置能力仍主要掌握在政府手中。金融力量与政治权力在这里交叉。

　　One main spur to the shadow financial world has been the strict rules in place on the price of money. The shadow system has developed because interest rates in the formal financial sector are tightly controlled – and kept within a narrow band. So banks prefer to lend to large state enterprises that can be relied on to repay.

　　刺激影子金融世界形成的一个主要因素是中国对货币价格的严格规定。影子体系得以发展壮大，是因为正规金融领域的利率受到严格管制，并保持在狭窄的区间内。因此，银行更愿意贷款给可以指望其偿还资金的大型国有企业。

　　They will never be blamed for lending to these giant enterprises; indeed, that is what they are supposed to do. Dealing with the state sector buys the lenders political goodwill and puts the individual bankers making the loans in a good light. By contrast, the banks have virtually no incentive to lend to private enterprises, since they cannot charge higher rates to compensate for the greater risk of lending to entities that often have less collateral.

　　它们永远不会因为贷款给这些大企业而受到批评；实际上，这似乎就是它们该做的。与政府部门打交道让银行获得了政治名誉并让个人银行家在有利的情况下放款。相比之下，银行几乎没有贷款给私营企业的动机，因为它们无法收取更高的利息，以弥补贷款给通常抵押较少的机构的较大风险。

　　Yet China boasts an ever growing number of entrepreneurs and other wealthy individuals with excess savings. They have no desire to put their money in a bank when real interest rates on deposits are negative. They are therefore happy to put money into informal channels that lend to cash-strapped young private companies that will pay 20-30 per cent a year to obtain it.

　　然而在中国，拥有过多储蓄的企业家和其他富裕个人数量正在不断增多。在实际存款利率为负值之际，他们无意把钱存入银行。因此，他们乐于把资金投入非正规渠道，借给那些资金拮据的年轻私营企业，每年收取20%至30%的利息。

　　“Without interest rate deregulation, you will drive more money underground,” says Christina Chung at RCM Asia Pacific in Hong Kong, a fund manager. “It is difficult to reduce the importance of the black market until financial reforms take place and banks have the incentive to lend to small and medium enterprises and diversify their loan books.”

　　“如果不放开利率，就会推动更多资金转入地下，”基金管理公司RCM Asia Pacific驻香港的钟秀霞(Christina Chung)表示。“除非进行金融改革，让银行有动机贷款给中小企业并实现贷款的多样化，否则就难以降低黑市的重要性。”

　　“Credit quotas are ineffective,” adds Qiang Liao, a director of Standard & Poor’s in Beijing and a former official at the Chinese Banking Regulatory Commission. “Non-banks such as trust companies are a response to a regulated interest rate regime.”

　　 “信用额度没什么作用，”标准普尔(Standard & Poor)驻北京董事、曾在中国银监会(CBRC)任职的廖强表示。“信托公司等非银行机构是对受到监管的利率机制作出的回应。”

　　The trust companies are often at the heart of these new kinds of money flows, operating in a murky domain where the official banking system meets the shadow banking system. The trust companies cater largely to two groups of clients: private companies that need capital and cash-rich families in search of higher returns.

　　信托公司通常处在这些新类型资金流动的中新，运营在正规银行体系与影子银行体系交汇的阴暗领域。信托公司主要为两类客户服务：需要资金的私营企业以及资金充裕寻求更高回报率的家庭。

　　The trust companies and other shadow institutions are particularly active in the politically sensitive real estate market. Informal money flows are a big reason why property prices continue to rise. Across China, money continues to flow into apartment blocks, gleaming office towers and shopping malls. Since developers cannot borrow money from banks until they own the land, many need to raise funds elsewhere. As they are willing to pay upwards of 10 per cent for the privilege, that sort of return attracts lots of interest from those with a surplus to invest.

　　信托公司等影子机构在颇具政治敏感性的房地产市场上尤为活跃。非正规资金流是房地产价格持续上涨的一个重要原因。在中国各地，资金继续流向住宅楼、熠熠生辉的办公大楼和购物中心。由于开发商在拥有土地前无法从银行借款，因此有很多开发商需要从别处筹集资金。它们愿意为此多付出10%的利息，那些有盈余资金可供投资的人对此颇感兴趣。

　　So when Banyan Tree, a Singapore-based resort company, was looking to raise a Rmb1.1bn fund for China, it turned to established entrepreneurs and high net worth individuals whom it tapped through wealth management consultants. “Institutional investors in China are not mature enough to understand the concept and give us their money,” says a Banyan Tree executive. “Wealthy entrepreneurs can make decisions very quickly.”

　　因此，当新加坡度假酒店公司悦榕集团(Banyan Tree)考虑为中国市场设立一只11亿元人民币的基金时，它求助的是通过理财顾问筛选出来的著名企业家和高净值个人。“中国的机构投资者还不够成熟，它们无法理解这个概念，不会把资金交给我们，”该公司的一名高管表示。“富有的企业家能够非常迅速地做出决定。”

　　Virtually everyone has a stake in keeping the game going and turning a blind eye to edicts from Beijing. Since the trust companies are supposed to be simply intermediaries and cannot collect deposits from retail customers, Beijing is not all that bothered about them, bankers say. Banks themselves take advantage of less regulated institutions, shifting loans off their balance sheets by selling them to the trust companies, which slice them up and distribute them to their clients. That enables the banks to make more loans. “Innovative tools can make credit simply not appear,” says Helen Qiao, an economist with Goldman Sachs in Beijing.

　　 让游戏继续进行下去，对中国政府的法令视而不见，几乎与每个人都利害攸关。银行家们表示，由于信托公司应该是单纯的中介机构，无法吸纳散户的存款，因此政府对它们并不是很担心。银行本身则利用监管不那么严格的机构，把贷款出售给信托公司，再由信托公司将贷款切割发放给客户，由此将贷款从银行的资产负债表上转移出去。这让银行扩大了放贷规模。高盛(Goldman Sachs)驻北京经济学家乔虹(Helen Qiao)表示：“创新性工具能够让信贷隐身。”

　　与此同时，地方政府依靠卖地为自己的活动融资。因此，它们乐于确保开发商拥有资金在土地拍卖会上大肆抬高报价。在很多情况下，地方政府就是帮助开发商为买地融资的信托公司的所有者，并在此过程中收取费用。最后，在那些拥有资金并希望获取高额回报的人中也不乏市政高官的身影。