Credit booms are often followed by credit busts. For those who don’t read history, this lesson has been learnt from painful recent experience. But not as far as China is concerned. The world’s second largest economy has seen a tremendous surge in lending over the past few years. The inevitable bad loans are already turning up. Yet the markets are not unduly concerned. While other countries suffer the ill consequences of reckless lending, China’s fate is different. Or, so we are told.

　　信贷繁荣之后通常会发生信贷泡沫破灭。对于那些不读历史的人来说，他们已从近期的痛苦经历中吸取了这一教训。但对中国来说却没有什么教训可以吸取。过去几年里，这个世界第二大经济体发放了天量的贷款。不可避免的不良贷款正在显现出来。然而，市场对此并未给予过分关注。尽管其它经济体尝到了不计后果放贷的恶果，中国的命运却与它们有所不同。或者说，我们听到的是这样。

　　In 2009 and 2010, total credit grew respectively by 39 percent and 34 percent of GDP. At 160 percent of GDP, China’s stock of debt has climbed by 40 percentage points since early 2009. In a recent report, Credit Suisse economist Vincent Chan observes that Chinese credit growth has reached the critical level that has previously anticipated sudden downturns in other countries.* Non-bank credit instruments are also proliferating in China. A shift to this type of short-term funding is a typical indicator of rising financial fragility.

　　2009年，中国信贷总额增长占到国内生产总值(GDP)的39%；2010年，这一比率为34%。自2009年初以来，中国债务总额攀升了40个百分点，达到GDP的160%。在最近的一份报告中，瑞信(Credit Suisse)经济学家陈昌华(Vincent Chan)表示，中国信贷增长已达到临界水平，这一水平以前在其它国家预示着突然低迷的来临。中国非银行信贷工具也在激增。转向这种短期融资，是金融脆弱性加大的一个典型标志。

　　Problems are appearing with loans to local government infrastructure projects, which constitute the bulk of the recent credit surge. Last month, a heavily indebted toll road operator in the south-western province of Yunnan announced it could not meet its repayment schedule. A port operator in Shanghai was reported to have illegally diverted working capital loans into real estate investments. Beijing’s Land Reserve, a levered vehicle that is used to fund public land purchases, apparently faces liquidity problems.

　　随着银行纷纷向地方政府基建项目发放贷款（这类贷款构成了近年来借贷激增的主体），各种问题正在浮出水面。上个月，云南省一家负债沉重的收费公路运营商宣布，它无法按既定计划还款。据报，上海一家港口运营商非法使用流动资金贷款进行了房地产投资。北京的土地储备贷款（一种用来为购买公共土地筹措资金的杠杆式工具），明显面临着流动性问题。

　　Nobody knows for sure how much debt these local government funding vehicles have taken on. The highest reported figure of Rmb14,000bn ($2,165bn) exceeds one-third of China’s GDP. Nobody knows how many of these loans will default. Moody’s has warned they may drive the banks’ non-performing loan ratio to 12 percent. In any other country, this would be a cause for concern. But not in China. Stephen Roach, a former chairman of Morgan Stanley’s Asian operations, typifies the prevailing sang-froid: “it doesn’t pay,” writes Mr Roach, “to diagnose the Chinese economy by drawing inferences from the experiences of others”.

　　没有人清楚地知道，这些地方政府融资工具到底背负了多少债务？报道中出现的最大数字是14万亿元人民币（合2.165万亿美元），超过中国GDP的三分之一。也没有人知道，这些债务中有多少将会违约？穆迪(Moody's)已发出警告称，这些债务可能会将中国银行业的不良贷款率推升至12%。在几乎任何国家，这都足以引起关切；但中国不在此列。摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)亚洲前董事长史蒂芬·罗奇(Stephen Roach)，就是当前占主流的这类镇定人物的代表。他写道，“参照其它国家的经历来推断中国经济，是毫无意义的”。

　　After all, China has experience with bad debts. At the turn of the century around 40 percent of Chinese bank loans were non-performing. Yet this mountain of bad loans did not portend an economic slowdown, undermine public finances or derail economic growth. In fact, over the following decade, China’s economy expanded rapidly. Its banks were cleaned up, listed on the world’s stock exchanges, and are today ranked among the world’s most valuable companies.

　　毕竟，中国有过遭遇坏账的经历。在世纪之交，中国银行业40%左右的贷款为不良贷款。但是，如此之高的不良贷款却没有引来经济下滑、妨碍公共财政或让经济增长偏离正轨。事实上，中国经济在随后十年里增长迅猛。中国的银行进行了清理整顿，然后又在全球的证券交易所上市，目前则身处世界最具价值公司行列。

　　The story of how Beijing dealt with these bad debts is told in the book Red Capitalism by Carl Walter and Fraser Howie. Non-performing loans were taken from the banks at face value and handed over to government-controlled asset management companies, which in turn issued notes that were acquired by the same banks. The central bank indirectly used foreign exchange reserves to provide banks with new equity. Some bad loans were guaranteed by the Ministry of Finance and remained on the banks’ balance sheets as “restructuring receivables”.

　　卡尔·沃特(Carl Walter)和侯伟(Fraser Howie)合著的《红色资本主义》(Red Capitalism)一书，讲述了中国是如何处理上述坏账的。不良贷款按其面值从银行中剥离出来，转移给政府控制的资产管理公司，然后资产管理公司发行债券，仍由这些银行购买。中国央行间接地使用外汇储备向银行注入新的股本。部分不良贷款得到了财政部的担保，以“重组应收款项”的名义保留在银行的资产负债表上。

　　By such acts of, what Mr Walter and Mr Howie aptly term, “financial legerdemain” China was able over a number of years to absorb bad debts equivalent to around a quarter of GDP. Depositors also contributed to the recapitalisation of the banking system. Deposit rates were kept artificially low, thus boosting the banks’ lending margins. Robust economic expansion did the rest.

　　通过这种被卡尔·沃特和侯伟贴切地称为“财务戏法”的做法，中国得以在几年之内消化了相当于GDP四分之一左右的坏账。储户们也为银行系统的资本重组做出了贡献。存款利率被人为保持在低水平上，从而提升了银行的贷款利润。其余的部分是靠强劲的经济增长解决的。

　　Most commentators believe that the non-performing loans generated by the recent credit boom will be handled with similar aplomb. Yet circumstances have changed. China’s credit system is more transparent than a decade ago. This could make Beijing’s financial boot-strapping more problematic. Bank depositors may also try to avoid footing the bill. Despite capital controls, it is increasingly easy for rich Chinese to move money offshore. The proliferation of high-yielding financial products provides an alternative to bank deposits for savers.

　　大多数评论人士认为，近期信贷繁荣催生的不良贷款同样会以这种从容不迫的方式加以解决。但是，环境已经改变了。中国的信贷系统比十年之前更加透明。这或许会让中国的财务自救变得更加困难。银行储户可能也会尽力避免为此埋单。尽管政府实施资本管控，但中国富人将财富转移到海外的难度仍变得越来越小。高收益金融产品的大量出现，则为储户提供了银行存款以外的理财方式。

　　A decade ago, China’s economy had been restructured and enjoyed the benefits from accession to the World Trade Organisation. Exports and foreign direct investment were surging. The economy was spurred by a continuous flow of urban migrants and rising levels of fixed asset investment. These sources of growth have largely been expended. China can no longer expand its share of global trade without antagonising trading partners; migration from rural areas is slowing; and fixed asset investment at close to 50 per cent of GDP is far too high. The economy is also vulnerable to a collapse of the property bubble.

　　十年前，中国经济进行了重组，且因加入世贸组织(WTO)而受益匪浅。出口和外国直接投资(FDI)突飞猛进。持续不断的城市外来务工人员大潮和越来越高的固定资产投资水平推动经济向前发展。这些增长源动力现已基本消耗殆尽。中国若要扩大在全球贸易中所占份额，必将激怒主要贸易伙伴；农村向城市移民的趋势已经放缓；而固定资产投资已接近GDP的50%，高得离谱。中国经济还面临着房地产泡沫破裂的风险。

　　The Chinese authorities engineered a credit boom in 2009, believing they could sweep the resulting bad loans under the carpet as they had done in the past. But both China’s economy and debts are far larger today. It will be a challenge to pull off the same trick again.

　　2009年，中国当局策划了一场信贷繁荣，并且相信自己能像过去一样，将由此造成的不良贷款隐藏到地毯之下。但是，中国今日的经济规模和债务规模都远大于以往。中国当局要想施展同样的“戏法”将面临艰巨的挑战。