12月4日，Christian Science Monitor发布上海交通大学上海高级金融学院副院长、金融学教授朱宁关于近期降息政策解读的观点报道。
China's rate cut is about financial reform not stimulus
Behind China's unexpected interest-rate cut is a carefully calculated move toward liberalizing deposit rates. The People's Bank of China (PBoC) is trying to push for financial reform while nominally acquiescing to political and market pressure for looser monetary policy. Although the PBOC will likely lower interest rates again or cut reserve requirements for major financial institutions in the next six months, it will abstain from aggressively pumping liquidity into the economy.
The PBoC surprised markets Nov.21 with an unexpected interest-rate cut. The central bank lowered the one-year benchmark lending rates to 5.6 percent from 6 percent while cutting the one-year benchmark deposit rate to 2.75 percent from 3 percent. Bundled into this announcement was a decision to allow banks to pay depositors up to 1.2 times the benchmark rate – compared with 1.1 times previously – a move that effectively maintained the mandatory cap on deposit rates at 3.3 percent.
The rate cut – the first since July 2012 – signals that the central bank has finally succumbed to political pressure from the State Council to do more for China’s faltering growth. But the PBOC, still very concerned about indiscriminately pumping liquidity into the economy amid ballooning debt levels, managed to partially neutralize the impact of the cuts while also advancing its own financial reform agenda.
On one hand, the central bank cut the benchmark lending rate, which is only a guideline for pricing loans, by more than it cut the mandatory cap on interests on deposits. A narrowing gap between how much banks charge borrowers and how much they pay depositors would squeeze bank profits. Banks could make up for smaller margins by pursuing greater volumes of cheaper loans, but most analysts agree China's banking sector is more likely to simply keep increasing lending premiums. The impact on liquidity is therefore expected to remain limited.
On the other hand, by raising the maximum deposit rate to 1.2 times the benchmark, the bank is likely attempting to encourage some of the competition that would ensue if commercial banks were free to set deposit rates as they see fit. Chinese central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan said earlier this year that China would scrap the control on the ceiling of deposit rates in about two years, a move that would effectively let banks compete for depositors instead of having a steady stream of cheap money that they can later lend out at higher rates.
With most banks likely to keep deposit rates at 3.3 percent, Chinese households are also expected to have little incentive to reduce their savings rate in favor of consumption, a further watering down of monetary stimulus.
Other signs of deposit-rate liberalization
On Nov. 30, China unveiled another step toward deposit-rate liberalization. The PBOC said in a draft rule on its website that the government was weighing a plan to guarantee deposits of up to
500,000 yuan ($81,000) per saver. The central bank is seeking feedback on the proposal through Dec. 30.
“[The interest-rate cut] is not necessarily a watershed moment for the PBOC,” says Zhu Ning, a professor of finance at Shanghai Jiaotong University. “An important reason behind the rate cut is pressure from the State Council.”
The limited nature of past stimulus measures is an indication of just how uncomfortable the PBoC has been about the idea of injecting liquidity into the entire economy. The bank worries that the money will find its way into speculative schemes rather than encouraging business to borrow in order to hire or expand. The central bank has long shied away from rate cuts, opting instead for targeted stimulus such as cutting reserve requirement ratios at selected banks on condition that they lend more to the agriculture sector and small businesses. Those sectors, however, remain soft as the overall economy loses momentum.
Rate cut buys time for more reforms
In general, there are signs that monetary stimulus – even in more conventional forms, such as interest-rate cuts – can't by itself do the trick for China's economy.
The overall borrowing appetite is weak, says Gan Jie, a professor of finance at the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business. Only 3 percent of the 2,015 industrial firms recently surveyed by the school identified credit as a key bottleneck, according to the results released in November. Almost half of the firms said they had no desire to borrow or plan for expansion in the near future as they struggle with overcapacity and falling prices.
The central bank will probably take additional steps to add some monetary stimulus in the next six months, but it will continue to avoid aggressively injecting cash into the system, Cai Hongbin, dean of the Guanghua School of Management at Peking University, tells MGO. Mr. Cai's view is shared by several other sources. The central bank may lower rates again or slash the reserve requirements at major financial institutions in the next one to two quarters, a senior loan officer at a state-run bank told MGO on condition of anonymity.
Ms. Gan says interest rate cuts could be a way of buying time for more fundamental reforms, such as slashing the ranks of the powerful state-owned enterprises to let private firms operate more freely.
“Reform is always very slow,” she says. “We take a gradual approach. Now we have used up everything else, there may be more movement to tackle this.”
发布时间：2014-12-04
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