大摩“缘尽”中金

Offloading a 34 per cent stake in the number one securities firm of one of the world’s fastest-growing securities markets hardly looks like one of the great decisions in the history of investment banking. Yet Morgan Stanley’s exit from China International Capital Corp, which may be confirmed soon, is the sensible thing to do.

出售全球增长最快证券市场中的头号证券公司34%的股权，看上去不像是投行业历史上最伟大的一个决定。但摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)退出中金公司(CICC)——这一交易很快将得到确认——乃是明智之举。

This 15 year-old relationship – China’s first foreign securities joint venture – ran its course a long time ago. By the time of China Mobile’s $4.2bn debut in Hong Kong in October 1997, in which CICC acted as global co-ordinator, joint bookrunner and joint lead underwriter, the Beijing-based firm – majority-owned by the investment arm of CIC, the sovereign wealth fund – had sucked out know-how on staging big offerings. In 2000, Morgan Stanley ceded management control; two years later, as Levin Zhu – son of the former prime minister, Zhu Rongji – was anointed chief executive, it was clear that differences over compensation, management and strategy had become irreconcilable.

这段为期15年的“恋情”——中国首家中外合资证券公司——很久以前就走到了尽头。1997年10月，中国移动(China Mobile)在香港进行了42亿美元的首次公开发行(IPO)，中金在其中扮演了全球协调人、联席簿记行、联席主承销商的角色。那时，这家总部设在北京的公司——主要控股人是主权财富基金中投公司(CIC)旗下的汇金——已经掌握了安排大宗上市交易所需的全部诀窍。2000年，摩根士丹利让出了管理层的控制权；两年之后，当前国务院总理朱镕基之子朱云来(Levin Zhu)被任命为首席执行官时，很明显，双方在薪酬、管理与策略上存在的分歧已变得不可调和。

Morgan Stanley’s new partner – the small, Shenzhen-based outfit, China Fortune Securities – looks a more promising match. On the understanding that the premium underwriting mandates for state-owned enterprises will accrue to the likes of CICC and Citic – combined, the pair has about a fifth of equities and a quarter of bonds – it makes sense to aim a few notches lower. ChiNext, the start-up board, and Shenzhen’s six-year-old board for small and medium-sized companies, have dominated first-time sales this year. A toehold in China is still utterly essential: fees for debt and equity issuance account for 36 per cent of Asia’s total so far this year, according to Thomson Reuters, up from 12 per cent five years ago. But having been first movers, the recent years have left Morgan Stanley behind their biggest international rivals in China; they will need to hurry to make up for lost time.

摩根士丹利与新合伙人——位于深圳的小机构华鑫证券(China Fortune Securities)——的联姻看上去更“门当户对”些。考虑到国企的优质承销委托会落到中金与中信(Citic)这类公司中，摩根士丹利应该把自己的目标调低几个等级。中金与中信合计占据了中国股票承销约五分之一的业务，和债券承销约四分之一的业务。深圳创业板(ChiNext)与已有6年历史的中小板，今年在IPO活动中占据了主导地位。在中国获得立足点仍至关重要：汤森路透(Thomson Reuters)称，今年以来，中国债券与股票发行费用额占到了亚洲总费用额的36%，较5年前的12%有了大幅提升。尽管摩根士丹利是先驱之一，但近年来，它已被在华的最大国际竞争对手们赶超。它需要赶紧行动，以弥补失去的时光。

Lex专栏是由FT评论家联合撰写的短评，对全球经济与商业进行精辟分析