亚洲金融危机的启示

亚洲金融危机的启示

作者：英国《金融时报》首席经济评论员马丁•沃尔夫(Martin Wolf) 2007年5月30日 星期三

十

年前的亚洲金融危机留下了两个对比鲜明的教训：一个是大多数西方经济学家认为亚洲人应学到的教训；另一个是亚洲人实际学到的教训。

西方经济学家得出的结论是，新兴经济体应采取灵活的汇率制度，并建立现代的、监管良好的、有竞争力的金融市场。而亚洲人则决定选择有竞争力的汇率、出口导向型增长模式和大规模积累外汇储备。问题是亚洲人是否需要改变自己的选择。我认为，答案是肯定的。 10年前，当泰铢出现的下行压力时，没人预料到接下来发生的事——7月初它开始贬值。这件看似很小的事件导致了一场金融“海啸”，“吞没”了东亚的大部分地区，席卷了印度尼西亚、马来西亚、菲律宾、韩国和泰国。其结果是汇率制度瓦解，金融体系崩溃，政府在信用违约的边缘摇摇欲坠，经济纷纷陷入深度衰退。国际货币基金组织(IMF)的官员们奔走于各个遭遇危机重击的国家之间。最终，这场危机波及到全球各地，1998年8月席卷了俄罗斯，1999年初又殃及巴西。

与它的爆发一样，此次亚洲金融危机的结果也非常出人意料。从它的严重程度和地理局限性上讲，1997至1998年的危机成为上世纪80、90年代折磨新兴经济体的一连串金融危机中的最后一次（除了2001年的阿根廷和土耳其危机）。如今，外部投资者将资金投入这些经济体的欲望十分强烈，证据包括走势强劲的金融市场、较低的外部借款息差和规模庞大的私人资本流入——例如，2006年，新兴经济体的私人资本净流入达到2560亿美元。现在，国际货币基金组织几乎无事可做了。

如何解释这种新的稳定性？正如纽约大学斯特恩商学院(New York University's Stern School of Business)的鲁里埃尔•鲁比尼(Nouriel Roubini)所言，亚洲人没有学到多数西方经济学家认为他们应该学到的教训。这并不是否认亚洲经济体已经出现实质性的结构改善，尤其在金融体系的资本化和监管方面。但这不是问题的核心。重要问题是在其它方面：亚洲决策者经过总结认为，重大错误不是盯住汇率制，而是汇率高估。正是这个错误，才使听命于美国财政部的国际货币基金组织官员到亚洲来指手划脚。

“下不为例”成了口号。结果便是再也没有下一次。现在，东亚的新兴经济体大多成为债权国。此外，它们积累的大部分外部资产都集中在官方手里（见表）。截至今年2月，东南亚国家的外汇储备总量已经达到3.28万亿美元，较1999年初增加了2.49万亿美元。单就中国而言，其同期储备额就增加了1.01万亿美元，达到1.16万亿美元。虽然在危机之后大量积累外汇储备似乎是个合理的保障方式（尽管有些代价高昂），但如今的水平看来过高了。在大多数东亚经济体中，外汇储备与短期外债的比例为4比1或5比1。

外汇储备的规模表明了一个显而易见的事实：这些国家拒绝实行许多外部经济学家建议的自由浮动汇率制度。它们反而选择压低本国汇

率。这继而导致了经常账户盈余。保持这种盈余需要本国储蓄持续高于国内投资。这些国家采用的手段就是“冲销”外汇储备累积对本国货币供应的影响，以防货币和信贷的正常扩张、经济过热、通胀以及外部竞争力丧失。

如果全球经济的一个重要区域正在产生巨额经常账户盈余，那么其它地区一定出现等额的赤字。在油价飙升之际，这一结论变得更有说服力。因为油价飙升导致收入转移到了那些有过痛苦经历的国家——这些国家已吸取教训，不再迅速消耗其额外收入。然而，在一个汇率不断波动的世界里，那些能够用本币自由借贷的国家最容易累积大量净外债。原因很简单：只有这些国家可以大量借贷，且不会造成金融体系内部出现严重的汇率失调。因此，美国成为全球第一赤字大国，就毫不奇怪了。它是作为最后手段的借款人。只有美国能够成为一个巨大的净债务国，而不会危及其本国金融体系的健康。

那么，一些经济学家所谓的“新布雷顿森体体系”（Bretton Woods Two，一种盯住美元的固定汇率制度）能否化解新兴市场经济体的金融不稳定，并成为可持续的出口主导型增长的基石呢？

鲁比尼的回答是否定的。这种政策将导致外汇储备增加，最终达到难以冲销的水平。这将导致货币供应增长过快、国内资产价格泡沫、经济过热、通胀和竞争力丧失——而这些国家的政府本来压制名义汇率的上升，就是为了防范这些问题。通过将利率维持在均衡水准以下，这种政策将会扭曲国内金融体系。低收益率外汇资产的累积可能会导致巨额资本损失，造成资源的浪费。这种政策会令亚洲经济体过度依赖于外部需求。这将导致美国的保护主义加剧。它最终会迫使美国货币当局保持宽松的货币政策，以抵消巨额经常账户赤字所导致的国内需求减少。

事实证明，亚洲金融危机之后的政策体系比许多人（包括我自己）预期的要稳固。但问题的关键是中国。尽管中国没有直接受到亚洲金融危机的影响，但它也是用这种亚洲方式吸取教训的国家之一。如今站在世人面前的是一个充满活力的庞然大物。今年第一季度，中国的外汇储备平均每月增长500亿美元，而IMF预测，中国经常账户盈余占国内生产总值(GDP)的比例今年将达到10%。我认为，这些惊人的趋势既不理想也不可持续。我将在下周讨论其原因和应对措施。 *亚洲正从1997至1998年的金融危机中吸取错误的教训（Asia is Learning the Wrong Lessons from its 1997-98 Financial Crisis），www.rgemonitor.com/

THE LESSONS ASIANS LEARNT FROM THEIR FINANCIAL CRISIS

By Martin Wolf

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

The

Asian financial crisis of 10 years ago taught two contrasting lessons: the one the majority of western economists thought the Asians should learn; and the

one Asians did learn.

The western economists concluded that emerging economies should adopt flexible exchange rates and modern, well-regulated and competitive financial markets. The Asians decided to choose competitive exchange rates, export-led growth and huge accumulations of foreign currency reserves. The question is whether the Asians need to change their choice. The answer, I believe, is \"yes\".

When downward pressure on the Thai baht started 10 years ago, nobody expected what followed - its devaluation in early July. That seemingly small event generated a financial tsunami that engulfed most of east Asia and overwhelmed Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, South Korea and Thailand. Exchange rates collapsed, financial systems went bankrupt, governments teetered on the edge of default and economies succumbed to deep recessions. Officials from the International Monetary Fund raced from one crisis-hit country to the next. In its last movements, the crisis went global, overwhelming Russia in August 1998 and Brazil in early 1999.

As surprising as the onset of the Asian crisis has been its aftermath. With the important, but geographically limited, exceptions of Argentina and Turkey in 2001, the crises of 1997-98 have so far been the last in the long series of financial crises that afflicted emerging economies in the 1980s and 1990s. Today, the desire of outside investors to put their money in these economies is overwhelming, as is shown in the strength of their financial markets, the low spreads on external borrowing and the size of the private capital inflow: in 2006, for example, net private capital flow to emerging economies was $256bn. The IMF is now almost entirely out of business.

What explains this new stability? As Nouriel Roubini of New York University's Stern School of Business argues, the Asians did not learn the lessons most western economists thought they should.* This is not to deny that there have been substantial structural improvements in Asian economies, notably in the capitalisation and regulation of financial systems. But this is not the heart of the matter. The big event has been elsewhere: the great mistake, Asian policymakers concluded, was not pegged, but overvalued, exchange rates. That error was what had brought the humiliating dictation by IMF officials operating under the thumb of the US Treasury.

\"Never again\" became the watchword. Never again has been the result. Now the east Asian emerging economies are mostly creditor nations. Moreover, much of their accumulation of external assets is in official hands (see chart). By February of this year, the foreign currency reserves of east and south Asian countries had reached

$3,280bn, up by $2,490bn since the beginning of 1999. China's reserves alone reached $1,160bn, up by $1,010bn over the same period. While a substantial accumulation of reserves seemed a justified (if expensive) form of insurance in the aftermath of the crisis, today's levels look excessive. In most east Asian economies the ratio of reserves to short-term foreign currency debt is four or five to one.

The scale of the reserve accumulation demonstrates the obvious: these countries have refused to adopt the freely floating exchange rates many outside economists recommended. They have, instead, chosen to keep their exchange rates down. This, in turn, has generated current account surpluses. Sustaining such surpluses requires a stable excess of savings over domestic investment. One instrument they have used has been sterilisation of the monetary consequences of reserve accumulations, to prevent the normal expansion of money and credit, overheating, inflation and so loss of external competitiveness.

If a substantial part of the world economy is generating huge current account surpluses, somebody else has to run offsetting deficits. That conclusion became still more potent when oil prices soared, since this shifted income to countries that painful experience has taught not to spend their additional revenue quickly. In a world of fluctuating currencies, however, accumulating large quantities of net foreign liabilities is easiest for countries able to borrow freely in their own currencies. The reason is simple: only such countries can borrow without risking significant currency mismatches inside their financial systems. It is no accident then that the US has emerged as the world's chief deficit country - its \"borrower of last resort\". It alone is able to be a vast net borrower without risking the health of its financial system.

So is what some economists have called \"Bretton Woods Two\" - a fixed exchange rate system anchored on the US dollar - both the answer to financial instability in emerging market economies and a basis for sustainable export-led growth?

Mr Roubini argues that it is not. The policy generates ultimately unsterilisable increases in foreign currency reserves. This causes excess monetary growth, domestic asset price bubbles, overheating, inflation and the loss in competitiveness that governments had tried to prevent by suppressing the rises in nominal exchange rates. It distorts domestic financial systems, by pushing interest rates below equilibrium levels. It generates a waste of resources in accumulation of low-yielding foreign currency assets exposed to the likelihood of huge capital losses. It makes Asian

economies excessively dependent on demand from outside the region. It exacerbates US protectionism. Finally, it compelsUS monetary authorities to sustain easy monetary policy, in order to offset the leakage from domestic demand caused by the huge current account deficits.

The post-crisis policy system has proved more durable than many (including myself) expected. At its heart, however, is China. Though not affected directly by the crisis, it was one of the countries that learnt its lessons in the Asian way. Today's result is a dynamic behemoth accumulating foreign currency reserves at a rate of $50bn a month in the first quarter of the year and expected by the IMF to generate a current account surplus of 10 per cent of gross domestic product this year.I do not believe these astonishing trends are desirable or sustainable. Why that is so and what to do about it I intend to discuss next week.

* Asia is Learning the Wrong Lessons from its 1997-98 Financial Crisis, www.rgemonitor.com/