美国债务违约后会怎样？
文摘
财经
2023-05-30 12:12
美国
英国《经济学人》网站于2023年5月22日发表题为《美国债务违约后会发生什么？》的文章。以下观点不代表任何译者立场，现将全文翻译如下：Finance & economics | The nightmare scenarioWhat happens if America defaults on its debt?An unimaginable eventuality becomes all too imaginable![]()
May 22nd 2023 | WASHINGTON, DCThe american constitution vests legislative power in Congress. Over the coming days the political body may arrogate to itself a metaphysical power: transforming the utterly unthinkable into hard reality. By failing to raise America’s debt ceiling in time, Congress could drive the country into its first sovereign default in modern history. A collapse in stockmarkets, a surge in unemployment, panic throughout the global economy—all are within the realm of possibility.美国宪法赋予国会立法权。未来几天，这个政治机构可能会为自己攫取一种形而上的权力：将不可思议变成现实。如果国会不能及时提高美国的债务上限，就可能导致美国在现代历史上首次发生主权违约。股市崩盘、失业率飙升、全球经济恐慌——一切皆有可能。The path to a default is clear. America has until roughly June 1st to raise its debt limit—a politically determined ceiling on total gross federal borrowing, currently at $31.4trn—or it will run out of cash to cover all its obligations, from paying military salaries to sending cheques to pensioners and making interest payments on bonds.通往违约的路线很清晰。美国大约在6月1日之前必须提高债务上限，这是一个政治决定的总联邦借款额度，目前为31.4万亿美元，否则美国政府将没有足够的现金来支付所有的义务，从军人工资到养老金，再到偿还债券的利息。The country has faced such deadlines in the past, lulling observers into the belief that it will, once again, raise its debt limit at the last minute. But its politicians are more fractious than during past standoffs. Kevin McCarthy, the Republican speaker of the House of Representatives, is pushing for swingeing spending cuts, as he is required to do to keep his narrow, quarrelsome majority together. Joe Biden, for his part, may lose the support of progressive Democrats if he is seen as having capitulated to Republican demands.美国过去也面临过类似的最后期限，所以观察家们相信美国会在最后一刻再次提高债务上限，但是相较于以往的僵局时期，现在的美国政客更加不和。众议院共和党领袖凯文·麦卡锡正在推动削减开支，他必须这样做才能维持自己式微而不和的多数派。至于总统拜登，如果外界认为他向共和党的要求屈服，就可能会失去激进派民主党人的支持。The Treasury, working with the Federal Reserve, has a fallback plan if Congress does not raise the debt limit. Known as “payment prioritisation”, this would stave off a default by paying interest on bonds and cutting back even more from other obligations. Yet putting bondholders ahead of pensioners and soldiers would be unpalatable, and may prove unsustainable. Moreover, prioritisation would rely on the continued success of regular auctions to replace maturing Treasury bonds. There is no guarantee that investors would trust such a dysfunctional government. With each passing day, an American default would loom as an ever more serious risk.如果国会不提高债务上限，财政部和联邦储备委员会有一个后备计划，被称为“支付优先”，可以通过支付债券利息并进一步削减其他义务来避免违约。然而，政府把债权人的优先权放在退休人员和士兵会令人不悦，而且可能难以维持。此外，优先支付还依赖成功定期拍卖到期的国债。不能确定投资者是否会信任这样一个功能失调的政府，随着时间推移，美国违约风险会越来越高。Default could come in two flavours: a short crunch or a longer crisis. Although the consequences of both would be baleful, the latter would be much worse. Either way, the Fed would have a crucial role to play in containing the fallout; this crucial role would, however, be one of damage-limitation. Every market and economy around the world would feel the pain, regardless of the central bank’s actions.违约可能有两种情况：短期紧缩或长期危机。虽然两者都产生有害的后果，但后者要严重得多。无论哪种情况，美联储在控制影响方面都将发挥关键作用；然而，这个关键作用只能是减少损失。无论美联储采取什么行动，每一个国家的市场和经济都会感受到痛苦。America is home to the world’s biggest sovereign debt market: with $25trn of bonds in public hands, it accounts for about one-third of the global total. Treasuries are seen as the ultimate risk-free asset—offering a guaranteed return for corporate cash managers, governments elsewhere and investors big and small—and as a baseline for pricing other financial instruments. They are the bedrock of daily cash flows. Short-term “repo” lending in America, worth about $4trn a day and a lifeblood for global financial markets, largely runs by using Treasuries as collateral. All of this would be thrown into doubt.美国拥有世界上最大的主权债券市场：公众手中持有25万亿美元的债券，占全球总量的约三分之一。国债被视为终极无风险资产，为企业现金管理者、其他国家政府以及大大小小的投资者提供保证回报，并作为定价其他金融工具的基准，这些工具是日常现金流的基石。美国每天“回购”约4万亿美元的短期贷款，这是全球金融市场的命脉，主要是通过使用国债作为抵押来运作。而违约会导致所有这些受到质疑。By definition, a default would initially be a short-term disruption. An official at the Fed says it would resemble a liquidity crisis. Assume that the government defaults on bills and bonds coming due after the “x-date” when it runs out of cash (this is estimated by Treasury to be June 1st, if not perhaps a little after that, depending on tax receipts). Demand may still remain firm for debt with later maturities on the assumption that Congress would come to its senses before long. A preview of the divergence can already be seen. Treasury bills due in June currently have annualised yields of about 5.5%; those in August are closer to 5%. This gap may widen precipitously in the event of a default.按照定义，违约最初会是一种短期的干扰。美联储的一位官员说，这类似于一场流动性危机，假设政府在用完现金的“X日期”之后违约了到期的票据和债券（美国财政部估计这个日期是6月1日，如果不是的话，可能会稍晚一点，取决于税收收入）。假设国会不久就会恢复理智，对后期到期债务的需求可能仍然保持稳定，目前已经能够看到这种分歧的征兆。目前，6月份到期的国债年化收益率约为5.5%，8月份的则接近5%。如果发生违约，这个差距可能会急剧扩大。To start with, the Fed would treat defaulted securities much as it treats normal securities, accepting them as collateral for central-bank loans and potentially even buying them outright. In effect, the Fed would replace impaired debt with good debt, working on the assumption that the government would make payment on the defaulted securities, just with some delay. Although Jerome Powell, chairman of the Fed, described such steps as “loathsome” in 2013, he also said that he would accept them “under certain circumstances”. The Fed is wary of both inserting itself at the centre of a political dispute and taking actions that seem to break the wall between fiscal and monetary policies, but its desire to prevent financial chaos would almost certainly override these concerns.一开始，美联储会像对待正常证券一样对待违约证券，接受它们作为中央银行贷款的抵押品，甚至有可能直接购买它们。实际上，美联储会用良好债务替换不良债务，这是假设政府会在一定的延迟后偿付违约证券。尽管联储主席杰罗姆·鲍威尔在2013年称这样的举措“令人厌恶”，但他也说他会在“某些情况下”接受。美联储既不愿意卷入政治争端的中心，也不愿意采取看似打破财政政策和货币政策之间隔离墙的行动，但这些顾虑和防止金融混乱几乎算不上什么。The Fed’s response would, however, create a paradox. To the extent that the central bank’s actions succeed in stabilising markets, they would reduce the need for politicians to compromise. Moreover, running a financial system based, in part, on defaulted securities would pose challenges. Fedwire, the settlement system for Treasuries, is programmed to have bills disappear once they pass their maturity date. The Treasury has said it will intervene to extend the operational maturities of defaulted bills to ensure that they remain transferable. Yet it is easy to imagine this kind of jury-rigged system eventually breaking down. At a minimum, investors would demand higher interest to compensate for the risk, leading to a tightening of credit conditions throughout global markets.然而，美联储的对策会造成一个悖论。美联储作为央行，如果成功稳定市场，会导致政客们更不愿相互妥协。此外，部分基于违约证券的金融体系运行也会带来挑战。Fedwire是国债的结算系统，它被编程为一旦票据过了到期日就让它们消失。财政部表示，它将干预延长违约票据的运营期限，以确保它们仍然可以转让。然而，这种临时拼凑的系统最终崩溃是很容易想象的。至少，投资者会要求更高的利息来补偿风险，导致全球市场的信贷条件收紧。However this works out, America would already be in the throes of extreme fiscal austerity. The government would be unable to borrow more money, meaning it would have to cut spending by the gap between current tax revenues and expenditures—an overnight reduction of roughly 25%, according to analysts at the Brookings Institution, a think-tank. Moody’s Analytics, a research outfit, estimates that in the immediate aftermath of a default, America’s economy would shrink by nearly 1% and its unemployment rate would rise from 3.4% to 5%, putting about 1.5m people out of work.无论结果如何，美国已经陷入了极端的财政紧缩之中。政府将无法借入更多的钱，意味着它必须通过削减当前税收收入和支出之间的差距来减少开支，智库布鲁金斯学会的分析师认为大概要一口气砍掉25%的支出。研究机构穆迪分析公司估计，如果违约，直接后果是美国经济缩水近1%，失业率将从3.4%上升到5%，大约150万人失业。In the short-term scenario, Congress responds by raising the debt ceiling, allowing markets to recover. A default that lasts for a few days would be a black eye for America’s reputation and probably induce a recession. Yet with deft management, it would not be the stuff of nightmares.A longer default would be more dangerous. Mark Zandi of Moody’s calls it a potential “tarp moment”, referring to the autumn of 2008 when Congress initially failed to pass the Troubled Asset Relief Program to bail out the banks, prompting global markets to crater. Continued failure to lift the debt ceiling, even after a default occurs, could have a similar impact.短期来看，国会可以提高债务上限来恢复市场。如果选择违约，短短几天的违约也将重创美国信誉，并可能引发衰退。但是如果管理得当，就不会是噩梦般的事情。如果违约拖得更久，情况会更加危险。穆迪公司的马克·赞迪表示，如果国会不通过新的财政刺激计划，美国可能面临一个类似于2008年秋《金融稳定法案》被否决的危机时刻，银行得不到救助，导致全球市场暴跌。即使发生违约，后期如果仍然未能提高债务上限，可能还会有类似的影响。The Council of Economic Advisers, an agency in the White House, estimates that in the first few months of a breach, the stockmarket would fall by 45%. Moody’s reckons it would fall by about 20%, and that unemployment would shoot up by five percentage points, which would mean somewhere in the region of 8m Americans losing their jobs. The government, constrained by the debt ceiling, would be unable to respond to the downturn with fiscal stimulus, making for a deeper recession.白宫的经济顾问委员会估计，在违约的最初几个月内，股市将下跌45%。穆迪公司认为将下跌约20%，失业率将上升五个百分点，意味着大约有800万美国人失去工作。受债务上限的限制，政府将无法用财政刺激来应对经济衰退，导致衰退加深。An avalanche of credit downgrades would add to these troubles. In 2011, during a previous debt-ceiling standoff, Standard & Poor’s, a ratings agency, downgraded America to a notch below its top aaa rating. After a default, ratings agencies would be under immense pressure to follow suit. This could lead to a nasty chain reaction. Institutions backstopped by the American government such as Fannie Mae, a crucial source of mortgage finance, would also be downgraded, translating into higher mortgage rates and undercutting the all-important property sector. Yields on corporate bonds would spike as investors scrambled for cash. Banks would pull back their lending. Panic would spread.信用评级的大量下调将加剧这些问题。2011年，之前债务上限的僵局期间，评级机构标准普尔将美国的评级降低了一个等级，不再是最高的AAA级。如果违约，评级机构将面临巨大压力，跟随调整降级，可能导致恶性连锁反应。为美国政府背书的机构，如房利美，一个重要的抵押贷款融资来源，也会被降级，这会导致抵押贷款利率上升，并削弱至关重要的房地产部门。随着投资者争相抢购现金，企业债券的收益率将飙升，银行将收紧贷款，恐慌将蔓延。There would also be bizarre, unpredictable twists. Normally, the currencies of defaulting countries suffer badly. In the case of an American breach, investors might initially flock to the dollar, viewing it as a haven during a crisis, as is normally the case. Within America, people might turn to deposits at too-big-to-fail banks, believing that the Fed will stand behind them come what may. But any signs of resilience would carry an almighty caveat: America would have violated the trust that the world has long placed in it. Questions about alternatives to the dollar and to the American financial system would gain urgency. Faith, once destroyed, cannot easily be restored. 还会有一些莫名其妙且不可预测的动向。通常，违约国家的货币会受到严重打击。但如果美国违约，投资者一开始反而可能会涌向美元，将其视为危机避风港，这是一般情况。在美国内部，人们可能会转存到大而不能倒的银行，并相信无论发生什么，美联储都会支持他们。但是任何展现美国坚韧的迹象都是大大的警告：美国将违背世界长期以来对它的信任。关于美元和美国金融体系的替代方案将变得更加紧迫。信任一旦被破坏，就难以恢复了。■
