新兴市场的债务

Emerging-market debt

新兴市场的债务

A run for your money

借款期限

Developing countries in Latin America and Asia can borrow for longer

拉美与亚洲发展中国家借款期限加长

PERU is not an obvious investment darling. For much of its existence, the country has been in a state of default. As recently as 1990 the inflation rate was 7,500%. Yet in the past few years Peru has persuaded creditors to lend it money for ever-longer periods in its own currency. It issued its first 20-year local-currency bond in 2006; its debut 30-year bonds followed a year later. Earlier this year Peru was able to issue 300m soles ($105.2m) of 32-year local-currency bonds. Investors in these bonds are compensated for the risk of inflation by yields of just 6.9%, a once unthinkable prospect.

Peru is not alone. Anxious to wean themselves off flighty foreign funding after the crises of the 1990s, many emerging-market governments sought to build up local-currency bond issuance. Extending the maturity of bonds is the next step. In 2007 around 40% of Peru’s local-currency debt was short-term (ie, maturing in less than a year). That had fallen to 30% by 2009, according to the Bank for International Settlements. In Mexico average maturities have gone from 1.5 years in 2000 to seven years a decade later, says Gerardo Rodríguez, who heads the country’s debt office.

秘鲁并不是唯一处于这种境地的国家。90年代金融危机之后，许多新兴市场政府为了脱离反复无常的外国基金，纷纷设法建立起地方货币债券发行体系。延长债券有效期是紧随其后的下一步。2007年约40%的秘鲁地方货币债券为短期债券，(即在一年以内到期)。据国际结算银行的统计，这个数字在2009年已跌至30%。而墨西哥国家债务办公室的负责人Gerardo Rodriguez表示，墨西哥的平均债券期限已从2000年的1.5年在十年后的今天上升至7年。

Explore our interactive guide to world debt    探查世界债务的合作向导

Asian countries are also trying to lock in yield-seeking investors. The Philippines is pursuing a number of debt swaps, offering to buy back shorter-dated debt in return for longer-dated issues. It hopes to stretch the country’s average debt maturity from ten years to 25 years. In Indonesia, bonds maturing in 2011-13 were exchanged in July for bonds maturing in 2031.

亚洲国家也正致力于锁牢看重收益的投资人。菲律宾正实施一系列债务交换政策，政府愿以长期国债为交换买回短期债务，希望把菲律宾的平均债务期限从10年延长至25年。而印度尼西亚在7月把2011至2013年期间即将到期的债券换成了2031年才到期的债券。

Improving growth prospects and lower public debt than many rich-world issuers have allowed Asian and Latin American countries to lengthen maturities. (Europe’s emerging markets have proved unable to do the same.) So too has a more professional approach to debt management. For instance, Uruguay created a debt agency in 2005. In the years that followed, it skewed its borrowing to the long end of the yield curve because it expected slower GDP growth, says Carlos Steneri, who heads the country’s public-debt agency.

高于许多发达国家债券发行者的经济增长势头和低于他们的公共债务让亚洲和拉美国家得以延长债务期限(欧洲的新兴市场被公认为延长不了债务期限。) ，也使得他们对债务管理采取更加专业的办法。例如，乌拉圭在2005年建立一个债务机构。接下来几年里，它的借款就偏向了收益曲线的末端位置。乌拉圭公共债务机构的负责人Carlos Steneri表示，这是因为该国的GDP增幅预期放缓而造成的。

Domestic savings pools have deepened over the past decade to absorb the supply of local debt issues. The number of retail investors is rising as people become richer. Pension reform has led to the creation of funds that are flush with cash and need assets to match their long-term, local-currency liabilities. Most of Peru’s 32-year bonds were reportedly picked up by local pension funds. Demand from such institutions explains why Latin America, with its more developed social-security net, is ahead of emerging Asia in extending its debt.

在过去十年中，为了吸收地方债务供给，国内储蓄量已有所增加。随着人们收入水平的提高，小额投资者的数量正在增加。社保改革导致了现金充斥的基金的形成，而这些基金需要与其长期地方货币债务相对应的资产。据报导，多数秘鲁32年期国债由地方社保基金购买。这类机构的需求解释了为什么拥有更加成熟社保体制的拉美在延长债务方面领先于新兴的亚洲市场。

But a well-developed local market seems also to attract foreign investors. In Mexico a quarter of the long-dated local debt is held by foreigners. In the year to July, inflows to emerging-market debt funds have more than doubled to $21.6 billion from the previous year, according to EPFR Global, a financial-data firm. Whether investors are getting enough compensation for the risk of holding long-term emerging-market debt is questionable. But for issuers in a crowded sovereign-debt market, it means fewer trips to the well.

但成熟的地方市场似乎同样能吸引外国投资者。墨西哥四分之一长期地方债务的债权人为外国人。根据金融数据公司EPFR Global的统计，截止到今年7月，新兴市场的债务基金流入量同比增幅超过两倍，已达到216亿美元。冒着握有新兴市场长期债务风险的投资者是否能够得到足够的赔偿不得而知，但对于身处主权债务市场林立的发行者来说，这意味着少了很多风险。

Finance and Economics

注解：
收益曲线反应的是债券到期时间与收益的关系，债务的大小并不能从曲线中看出来。所以文中skewed borrowing to the long end of the yield curve是说借款的到期时间被延长了，而不是说借款的规模增加了。（借款的时间一延长，债券的位置就越靠近收益曲线的右上方，表示收益也越大。）

很明显，秘鲁并不是投资客的宠儿。建国以来多数时候，它是一个债务违约国。近在1990年，它的通胀率还是7,500%。但在过去几年，秘鲁成功说服了债权方以秘鲁本国货币的形式借给它债期更长的借款。2006年，秘鲁发行了第一批20年期本国货币国债；一年后又发布了首批30年期国债。今年早些时候，秘鲁发布了价值3亿（1.052亿美元）新索尔的32年期地方货币债券。这些债权的投资人将以6.9%的收益率获得通胀风险的赔偿，这是一个开创历史先河的想法。