G20峰会要求加强银行业的监管
G-20 Leaders Tighten Grip on Banks2008年11月17日
G-20 Leaders Tighten Grip on Banks
WASHINGTON -- After a weekend of emergency financial diplomacy, the question now is whether the world's biggest economic powers, in their haste to prevent a future crisis, may inadvertently worsen the current one.
At an unprecedented summit, the Group of 20 leaders ordered a regulatory crackdown on the kind of high-risk lending and investment that has led the world into a financial mess unseen since the Great Depression. But some economists worry that the plan may backfire at a time when the global economy needs more lending, not less.
'This is a big signal to everybody to clamp down on their banks to tighten lending standards,' said Simon Johnson, a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund. 'The last thing you want to do in a global credit crunch is go around and basically tell people to tighten, tighten, tighten.'
As part of a lengthy to-do list, G-20 leaders told financial regulators to demand that banks create bigger liquidity cushions, assess their risk-management practices and boost capital requirements for certain risky investing practices. The group set a March 31 deadline for the measures, while putting off major regulatory decisions.
Mr. Johnson, now a business professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said such moves would encourage banks to hoard capital and would make sense once the crisis has passed. But leaders, he noted, were eager to take action.
President George W. Bush, U.K. Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Chinese President Hu Jintao, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the other G-20 leaders vowed to take the necessary steps -- spending programs, tax cuts or interest-rate reductions -- to restart a global economy teetering on the edge of recession.
The leaders embraced a renewed effort to unblock global trade talks and promised they will refrain from using commercial barriers to protect their own industries for the next 12 months. 'We agreed on the importance of rejecting protectionism,' Mr. Brown said. 'It is the first time that a meeting of world leaders has instructed ministers to come to an agreement and I think we will see an agreement in the next few weeks.'
The initiative could provide a test for President-elect Barack Obama, who campaigned as a trade skeptic, but may be reluctant to reject a major round of trade talks as one of his first moves on the international stage. He didn't attend the summit, but sent former Iowa Rep. Jim Leach, a Republican, and former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright to meet with G-20 representatives.
Much of the communiqué, released Saturday, focused on steps to prevent a recurrence of the global crisis that sprang from the collapse of trillions of dollars in securities backed by high-risk U.S. subprime mortgages. Most of Europe is now in recession, while the U.S. economy shrank at an annualized 0.3% in the third quarter.
'I'm a free-market person until you're told that if you don't take decisive measures then it's conceivable that our country could go into a depression greater than the Great Depression,' Mr. Bush told reporters after the summit.
The G-20 leaders endorsed a series of principles for action, such as promoting financial-market transparency. They assigned finance ministers a number of steps before the next leaders' summit in April, such as establishing 'colleges' that bring together supervisors from different countries to swap notes on institutions they oversee.
The communiqué itself reflected the underlying tension between reducing risk and increasing lending. 'Recognizing the necessity to improve financial sector regulation, we must avoid over-regulation that would hamper economic growth and exacerbate the contraction of capital flows, including to developing countries,' the leaders said.
Some London bankers are already up in arms over a European Union proposal, similar in outline to the G-20's, that would force banks to hold on to extra cash to cover certain losses. Banks say that will make raising cash more expensive and discourage lending.
'We're yelling at banks that...they've been completely imprudent, and have blown up the financial system, and will have to be more prudent -- but not right now,' said Benn Steil, director for international economics at the Council on Foreign Relations.
U.S. officials share the concern that too much regulation might worsen the credit shortage, White House spokesman Tony Fratto said Sunday. But 'given the current psychology in the financial sector, better supervision and transparency could instead have the effect of reducing fears about counterparty risk and so increase the appetite for risk-taking.'
MICHAEL M. PHILLIPS / ALISTAIR MACDONALD / KARA SCANNELL
G20峰会要求加强银行业监管
在
二十国集团周末的紧急金融外交之后，现在的问题是，忙于阻止未来重演危机的世界主要经济体是否可能会无意中导致眼下的危机愈加严重。
在这场史无前例的峰会上，与会领导人要求监管机构采取行动打击高风险放贷和投资活动，正是这类活动导致世界陷入自大萧条以来最为严重的金融动荡。但一些经济学家担心，在全球经济急需更多贷款之际，这样的计划或许适得其反。
Reuters 参加G20峰会的巴西总统卢拉和中国主席胡锦涛
国际货币基金组织前首席经济学家约翰逊说，这向所有人发出了明显信号，要对各国银行施加压力收紧信贷标准。在全球信贷紧缩的当下，最不应该作的就是到处告诉大家要紧缩、紧缩、再紧缩。
在一份长长的任务清单上，二十国集团领导人要求监管机构要求银行留出更多的流动性缓冲资金、评估风险管理操作并提高对某些高风险投资活动的资本金要求。峰会设定3月31日为落实这些措施的最后期限，但没有制定重大的监管决策。
现为麻省理工学院商业教授的约翰逊说，这样的措施将鼓励银行囤累更多资金；这些措施在危机过后会很有意义，但领导人太急于采取行动了。
美国总统布什、英国首相布朗、中国国家主席胡锦涛、法国总统萨科齐及来自其他领导人在峰会上表示，要采取必要措施（包括支出项目、减税或降息等措施），重振正滑向衰退边缘的全球经济。
与会领导人赞成重新开启全球贸易谈判、并承诺未来12个月内将不会通过设置贸易壁垒保护本国产业。布朗说，我们一致认同抵制贸易保护主义的重要性。这是首次一个全球领导人峰会要求部长们达成协议，我相信未来几周就将看到协议出炉。
这一倡议或许给美国当选总统奥巴马带来了一个考验，他在竞选中对贸易持怀疑态度，但或许不愿拒绝以一次重大贸易回合谈判作为初登国际舞台的首次亮相。奥巴马没有参加峰会，但派了前爱荷华州众议员里奇和前国务卿奥尔布赖特会见了二十国代表。
上周六发表的二十国集团公报花了很大篇幅阐述如何采取措施，防止当前这场全球危机重演。价值数万亿美元的高风险美国次级抵押贷款支持证券产品崩溃是当前金融危机的源泉。许多欧洲国家已经陷入了衰退，美国经济第三季度折合年率收缩了0.3%。
布什在峰会后对记者表示，我是一名自由市场人士，但如果你不采取实质行动，我们国家就可能会陷入一场比大萧条更严重的衰退。
各国领导人对一系列行动原则表示了认同，比如提高金融市场透明度。他们要求各国财政部长在明年4月的下一届峰会前采取多项措施，比如通过机制推动不同国家监管部门进行协作，互相交换所监督机构的信息。
公报本身反映了降低风险和增加放贷之间的矛盾。各国领导人表示：意识到改善金融监管的必要性，我们还必须避免过度监管，因为这可能会遏制经济增长、加剧资本流动萎缩，包括对发展中国家。
伦敦的一些银行业人士已经对欧盟一项提案大为不满；该提案与二十国集团公报所阐述的大体类似，可能会迫使银行截留更多现金用于应对某些损失。银行业表示，这将造成融资成本进一步上升，不利于贷款活动。
美国外交关系协会国际经济部负责人斯戴尔说，我们对银行业敲响警钟：他们实在是太不谨慎了，导致金融体系不断膨胀，他们必须更为谨慎，但不该是现在。
白宫发言人弗拉托周六说，美国官员担心过多的监管可能会导致信贷短缺局面更加严重。但是，鉴于金融领域目前的心理状态，加强监管与提高透明度反而能够缓解市场对对手方风险的恐惧，从而提高市场承担风险的信心。
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