分类： 未分类

在2019年的国际商品市场，原油等很多商品显示出受中美贸易摩擦影响的价格波动。其中，呈现出持续上涨行情的是用于汽车尾气催化剂的贵金属钯。在汽车销售持续低迷的背景下，以全球尾气排放规定强化为东风，需求增加，供给不足正在加剧。2019年比年初上涨6成，预计在历史最高点附近跨年。

纽约市场的钯期货徘徊在每盎司1850美元左右。临近年底出现了获利抛售，但与年初相比仍上涨5成。过去长期徘徊在700美元附近的期货行情自2016年起缓慢上升。到2018年9月突破1000美元之后，在1年多时间里又上涨了近1000美元，呈现出价格在3年里涨至3倍以上的迅速上涨行情。现货价格12月17日突破了2000美元。

钯的矿山供给量每年约为220吨。这些几乎全部用于工业需求，2019年预计连续8年出现供给不足。钯属于镍和白金的副产品，因此难以根据供求情况进行增产。

贵金属钯

钯的需求正在增加是因为全球尾气排放规定的影响。在最大需求国中国，主要城市自2019年7月率先执行汽车尾气排放新规“国6”，到2020年将扩大至地方城市。俄罗斯矿业巨头Norilsk Nickel的数据显示，中国每辆汽车的钯使用量2019年增加15~20％，到2020年预计进一步增加5~7％。

中国当地很多汽车厂商在应对新规方面进展迟缓，自2018年底起加快了通过现货（即时合约）市场采购等举措弥补不足的趋势。欧洲市场也将于2020年引进新规，钯使用量预计增加3~5％。英国冶炼巨头庄信万丰（Johnson Matthey）的藤田干生表示，“在中国，新规的影响比预期更早地全面显现出来。明年以欧洲和中国为中心，（钯）需求将增加”。

包括钯在内的催化剂用贵金属的使用量2019年似乎出现激增。使用英国调查公司IHS Markit和庄信万丰的数据计算，可以得出每辆车使用的催化剂用贵金属（白金、钯、铑）2009年为3.6克。2018年增至4.2克，2019年预计达到4.5克。铑的价格也因需求增加而上涨，2019年达到2.5倍，时隔11年突破了每盎司6000美元。

尾气排放规定预计在2020~2023年以欧洲和亚洲为中心进一步强化。有市场预测认为，2018~2019年减速的新车销售到2020年将再次转为增加。

矿山企业正在推进开发钯储藏量大的矿山，但全面向市场供给预计要等到2020年中期。即使处于转向纯电动汽车（EV）的趋势，眼下汽油车的优势似乎也不会变化。2020年或将成为预测今年创纪录上涨势头能维持至何时的一年。

分析师观点：银行现金类理财监管比照货币基金 严于预期料施压中国债市

酝酿已久的中国商业银行现金类理财监管新规终于出炉。分析师指出，新规对银行现金类理财的监管口径基本与货币基金保持一致，尺度较此前的市场预期明显偏严，银行调整资产配置的因此有所加大，整体影响利空债市。

他们并认为，本次通知中对中长期利率债、中低评级信用债、二级资本债等的投资限制更为严格，上述债券料面临一定抛售压力，此外资质偏弱的同业存单的发行难度可能进一步增加。而在严监管的大背景下，未来银行现金类理财收益率下滑是大概率事件，同时有利于银行降低负债成本。

中国银保监会、央行周五就规范现金管理类理财产品管理有关事项通知发布征求意见稿，规定投资范围和投资集中度，明确产品的流动性管理和杠杆管控要求，现金管理类产品的杠杆水平不得超过120%；明确现金管理类产品应当投资于现金，不得投资于股票。

《通知》整体上与货币市场基金等同类产品监管标准保持一致。考虑对机构业务经营和金融市场的潜在影响，合理设置过渡期，明确过渡期为《通知》施行之日起至2020年底，促进相关业务平稳过渡。

“经济危机比你想象中要花更长时间才会到来，然而一旦到来，发生的速度比你想象中快得多。”美国经济学家多恩布什如此形容1994年的墨西哥经济危机。

由于之后多次经济危机都符合这种“漫长酝酿，一夜爆发”的特征，后世称其为多恩布什法则。

22年后，经济学家米歇尔·渥克出版《灰犀牛》，书中引用多恩布什法则，提出“灰犀牛”的概念，形容大概率且影响巨大的潜在危机。

特斯拉已与中资银行达成协议 可获得12.9亿美元贷款

美国电动汽车生产商特斯拉(TSLA.O)已就最多90亿元人民币(12.9亿美元)的担保有期贷款与多家中资银行达成协议。

特斯拉称，也已就最多22.5亿元人民币的无担保循环贷款签署协议，并表示两笔贷款都将用于其上海车厂。

文件显示，中国建设银行(0939.HK) (601939.SS)、中国农业银行(1288.HK) (601288.SS)、浦发银行(600000.SS)和中国工商银行(1398.HK) (601398.SS)是参贷行。

除了支持上海车厂的建设与生产，贷款还将用于支付应于明年3月4日偿还的35亿美元债务。

Bankers around the globe are facing the biggest job cuts in four years, and their troubles could continue in 2020 as lenders are trying to cope with rising competition amid a slowing economy.
Nearly 78,000 people are set to lose their jobs, as more than 50 banks have revealed plans to downsize their workforce this year, according to Bloomberg, citing filings by the companies and labor unions. It is the highest number since 2015, when 91,448 employees in the banking sector were let go.

European banks will see the biggest layoffs, as they plan to cut more than 63,500 jobs or almost 82 percent of the total. North American banks come in second, as they reportedly plan to dismiss nearly 7,700 people.

Top investment bank Morgan Stanley has recently joined other lenders in the effort to downsize staff, as it is reportedly planning to axe 1,500 (roughly two percent) of its workforce. But it is still far behind Deutsche Bank, which tops the list of planned job cuts with 18,000 employees set to be laid off through 2022 as part of an $8.3 billion overhaul.

This year’s banking staff reductions bring the total for the last six years to more than 425,000. However, the figure might be even higher as many banks could eliminate jobs without disclosing their plans.

“Although it’s been a bull market, there’s not been a lot of primary activity and that’s made it very hard to pay the bills,” an investment director at stockbroker AJ Bell, Russ Mould, told Yahoo Finance UK.

The sweeping cuts might continue in 2020, as some analysts believe that banks continue to face “a number of uncertainties.” For example, Swiss multinational private bank Julius Baer as well as Spain’s Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA are reportedly looking into reducing their workforce.

• China’s regulators are pushing to improve the debt restructuring process, currently notoriously opaque and protracted
• Senior officials from bodies including the central bank and securities regulator this week urged that defaults be handled more efficiently and transparently, saying action is needed to restore investor confidence

As bond defaults become an accepted norm in China, Beijing is shifting its focus to what happens next.
China’s regulators are pushing to improve the debt restructuring process, currently notoriously opaque and protracted. Senior officials from bodies including the central bank and securities regulator this week urged that defaults be handled more efficiently and transparently, saying action is needed to restore investor confidence.
The stakes are getting higher, with corporate bond failures in China rising to a fresh record of more than 131.1 billion yuan (US$18.7 billion) this year. While that’s encouraging better pricing of risk, the lack of a reliable system to clean up after a default has unsettled some investors and made them reluctant to provide financing to lower-rated companies.
“A large market like China’s is likely to see more defaults each year. At a time like this, regulators may have realised the need to pay more attention to the issue of handling defaults,” said Qin Han, chief fixed income analyst at Guotai Junan Securities.
Guidelines jointly drafted by China’s central bank, economic planning agency and securities regulator will soon be released, the official Xinhua News Agency reported late Tuesday, citing Liu Guoqiang, a deputy governor of the People’s Bank of China.
Watchdogs have already sought to unify the fragmented regulatory framework for corporate bonds.
Given its US$13 trillion bond market is the world’s second largest, China has a disproportionately short history of defaults. Since the first onshore bond failure in 2014, Beijing has allowed more debt to go bad to instil stronger discipline in a market long accustomed to state-led bailouts.
That’s put bondholders in China on a steep learning curve – and they’re often finding themselves with little say in a murky restructuring process.
Opaque practises include prioritising compensation for individual investors over institutional creditors, or offshore debt over onshore notes. Another strategy of concern to analysts is that some debtors are negotiating payment extensions with creditors privately instead of resolving their problems publicly through the clearing house. That makes it harder for onlookers to track what’s happening, and for other creditors to ensure they’re being treated fairly.
Due to the lack of guidelines, creditors are “totally on their own” when exploring different ways to deal with bond defaults, said Shen Chen, a partner at Shanghai Maoliang Investment Management LLP.
The new policies to be released by regulators should help, Shen said. “It’s a positive signal and the handling of defaults will be more orderly in the future.”
From China’s maiden default through the end of 2017, the recovery rate on publicly traded bond failures was 38 per cent, according to calculations by China International Capital Corp. as of September 2018. The rate dropped sharply to 17.4 per cent for bonds that had defaulted before the end of 2018, based on the brokerage’s calculations in October.
For now, the surge in messy bond failures has made life even tougher for the country’s weaker borrowers: Chinese companies with a domestic credit rating of AA or below, the equivalent of the junk grade, have raised a net 105.9 billion yuan via public bond sales so far this year, the lowest level since 2008, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Last week, officials announced plans to impose consistent disclosure requirements for issuers, regardless of where their debt is traded. The current system – where bonds are traded on two stock exchanges and in the interbank market, with different rules for each venue and different regulators – was confusing to investors, analysts said.

Former chairman of Hengfeng Bank imprisoned for siphoning off millions through corruption and embezzlement

A court in eastern China has handed down a suspended death sentence to a corrupt former chairman of a troubled regional lender, indicating Beijing’s determination to clamp down on banking risks.
The Yantai Intermediate People’s Court in Shandong province handed down a death sentence with a two-year reprieve to Jiang Xiyun, chairman of Hengfeng Bank from 2008 to 2013, for embezzling 754 million yuan (US$107 million) in the bank’s shares, taking 60 million yuan in bribes, illegally guaranteeing 3.7 billion yuan in credit, and destroying accounts and records related to 660 million yuan, according to a court ruling published on Thursday.
Suspended death sentences are usually commuted to life in prison in return for good behaviour during the reprieve period. However Jiang, 70, is unlikely to leave prison, with the court saying he would not be granted any further reduction in jail term or parole if the sentence was commuted.
The ruling shed fresh light on lender’s operations under Jiang and his successor Cai Guohua, which ended this year with one of the most spectacular bank failures in China.
The bank has not published financial statements since 2016 and last week received a state-led bailout of US$14 billion.
Cai has been the subject of a disciplinary investigation since late 2017 and is facing charges of taking bribes and misusing funds. According to financial magazine Caixin, Cai allegedly attempted to misuse billions of the bank’s funds and financed his lavish personal lifestyle with bank money, spending roughly 400,000 yuan per day.
The sentence imposed on Jiang is unusually harsh but not without precedent.
In December last year, Yang Chenglin, former chairman of Bank of Inner Mongolia, was given the same sentence for taking over 300 million yuan in bribes. And suspended death sentences were handed to both Liu Jinbao, the former chief executive of Bank of China Hong Kong, in 2005 for embezzlement, and Wang Yi, the former deputy governor of China Development Bank, in 2010, also for embezzlement.
Hengfeng Bank was founded in 1987 as a pioneering home savings bank. It became a joint-stock bank with a business licence to operate nationwide in 2003. Singaporean lender United Overseas Bank bought 15 per cent of the lender for US$115 million in 2008, and its stake is expected to be diluted to about 3 per cent after the bailout this week.
The bank now has 306 sub-branches across the country and it is the third lender to be bailed out by the state since May.
In May, serious credit risks forced the central government to take over Baoshang Bank in Inner Mongolia, the country’s first bank failure in more than 20 years. A few weeks later, Bank of Jinzhou, based in China’s rust-belt province of Liaoning, was bailed out by China’s biggest lender, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, and China’s top state-owned asset management firms.
The former chairman of Jinzhou Bank, Zhang Wei, died of cancer earlier this month. Caixin reported that Zhang tried to flee China for the United States in July 2019 but he was stopped by the police.
Many banking institutions are struggling to repay debts and facing great pressure to attract new deposits amid the slowest economic growth in nearly three decades, raising concerns about the weak links in China’s banking system, particularly city commercial and rural banks.

• Workers in the three Asian cities spend longer in the office, take fewer holidays and have some of the worst work-life balance in the world
• This workaholic culture sits in stark contrast to cities in Northern Europe, where vacations are long and the average working week is much shorter

A typical working day for Singaporean office worker Shamir Osman lasts about nine and a half hours, so packed full of meetings and calls that he sometimes does not even get a chance to eat.

The 39-year-old public relations manager’s hectic schedule is far from unusual in the city state, where the average working week lasts just shy of 45 hours – the second longest in the Asia-Pacific, according to a study of 40 cities done by office access control systems provider Kisi.

The report, released in August, looked at the length of workers’ commutes, their arrival time at work, the number of hours they worked per week and the amount of leave taken to determine the hardest-working cities in the world – with three of the top five being in Asia.Japanese megacity Tokyo took the top spot, with Singapore coming in second, followed by the US capital of Washington, Malaysia’s Kuala Lumpur – which had the longest average working week at 46 hours – and then Houston in Texas.

At the other end of the scale, the cities judged to have the best work-life balance were all in Northern Europe: Helsinki in Finland first, followed by Germany’s Munich, Norway’s Oslo – which had the shortest working week at just under 39 hours on average – then Hamburg in Germany and Sweden’s Stockholm.For Osman, who has not been on holiday since a weeklong trip to Yogyakarta in October, the almost 30 days of leave that an average worker in Munich takes each year might seem excessive, especially as the Singaporean average is just 14 days – but even this amount of time is a luxury compared to the fewer than 10 days per year that the average employee in Tokyo takes off work.

This workaholic culture is something to which merchandiser Betty Ho – a former employee of a Japanese firm in Singapore – can fully attest.
“You cannot be late, there are a lot of meetings, your desk has to be neat and organised, the boss is always right and you cannot leave the office before him,” said the 41-year-old.
Earlier this year, the excessive hours some tech companies in China expect their employees to work hit the headlines, after a post on global code-sharing and collaboration platform Github triggered a wider backlash against the so-called 996 system – which stands for working from 9am to 9pm, six days a week.
The complaints spiralled into a broader debate on productivity and work-life balance in the country, with tech tycoon Jack Ma, founder of South China Morning Post owner Alibaba, saying that he saw the 996 schedule as a “huge blessing that many companies and employees do not have the opportunity to have”.
“If you do not do 996 when you are young, when will you? Do you think never having to work 996 in your life is an honour to boast about?” he said at an internal Alibaba event in April, according to a transcript published on the company’s official WeChat account.

谈到澳大利亚经济，许多人都想忘记今年。

• 2020年展望不怎么看好
• 2020年经济增长的预期比2019年好
• 当前的减税和降息不足以刺激家庭消费
• 2020年现金利率将可能停在0.25%
• 明年澳大利亚经济衰退的可能性很微小
• 澳元波动不会太大
• 最大的潜在惊喜是事情进展得比预期的快

经济增长放缓。这是因为家庭把减税和利率下调所带来的额外收入用来增加储蓄及偿还债务，而没能花出去。

失业率居高不下，高于澳联储最新设定的4.5%的“充分就业”目标，而这一目标是刺激工资增长所必需的。目前，工资增长仍处于低迷状态，并朝着错误的方向执意前行。

尽管经济学家和澳大利亚央行（澳联储）呼吁用增加基础建设支出，或减税幅度更大的形式进一步进行财政刺激，但澳大利亚联邦政府却坚持己见，表示，虽然财政盈余的规模小于最初的预测，但还是将在本财年结束时实现首个财政盈余，

所有这一切将让澳大利亚经济在2020年何去何从呢？11位经济学家发表了他们的观点。

一句话展望2020年经济

简而言之：不怎么看好

展望下2020年，接受问卷调查的经济学家们并不很乐观。

“澳大利亚的经济将难以获得动力，”资本经济公司（Capital Economics.）的马塞尔·提里安特（Marcel Thieliant）说。

“2020年比2019年稍微好一点，但没有什么可以欢庆的，”联邦银行高级经济学家加雷斯·艾尔德（Gareth Aird）说。

当被要求对经济前景做一个简短的总结时，问卷调查的答案大多主题相同，只是略有变化。

德勤进入经济（Deloitte Access Economics）咨询公司的尼基·亨特利（Nicki Hutley）说：“澳大利亚经济带着严重的流感步入2020年，它需要澳大利亚央行和财政政策给予一些关注”

大多数人认为，这种关爱与照护应该以增加财政刺激的形式进行。到2020年中，货币政策已起到了很大的提振作用。而澳联储至少还会再下调一次官方利率。

随着房地产市场转好，其他经济学家稍微感到一丝乐观。其中，就包括澳交所上市公司，房地产服务商REA集团的首席经济学家内里达·科尼斯比（Nerida Conisbee）。

“澳大利亚经济正在缓慢复苏，但仍存在问题……与今年相比，2020年的形势会好得多，”她说。

对经济增长的预期

简而言之：比2019年要好，但低于潜力所在

对澳大利亚2020年经济增长的预测从最低点的2%到最高点的2.75%不尽相同。

投资管理公司IFM 投资者（IFM Investors）的首席经济学家亚历克斯·乔伊纳（Alex Joiner）说：“我预计经济增长率将在2.25%至2.5%左右，尤其是在政府没有实行任何进一步实质性刺激的情况下”。

摩根大通（JP Morgan）的高级经济学家本·贾曼（Ben Jarman）预测，澳大利亚经济将强劲地复苏，国内生产总值增长率将达到2.75%左右，但他也表示，这不足以抵消今年经济放缓后的闲置产能。

联邦政府也有着同样的预测：到2021年中，下一个财政年度，经济增长率会达到2.75%。

The Reserve Bank’s forecasts are even more optimistic, with 2.75 per cent growth forecast over 2020, lifting to 3 per cent in 2021.

澳联储的预测甚至更加乐观，预计2020年澳大利亚经济将增长2.75%，2021年将升至3%。

“我们对澳大利亚央行乐观的增长和通胀预测表示怀疑，并认为澳大利亚的国内生产总值增长在2020/21年期间仍会受限在2%左右，”AMP资本（AMP Capital ）高级经济学家戴安娜·穆西纳(Diana Mousina)表示。

“闲置产能仍将是一个问题，这将让通胀和工资增长保持低位。”

在12月份的董事会会议记录中，澳联储开始降低对当前前景的展望。

该会议纪要写道：“董事会成员们一致认为，在2020年2月重新评估经济前景非常重要，届时澳联储将准备更新最新预测”。

当前的减税和降息足以提振家庭现状吗？

简而言之：也许不行

“这是2020年一个关键性的问题，”BIS牛津经济（BIS Oxford Economics）咨询公司首席经济学家萨拉·亨特（Sarah Hunter）说。

对澳联储和政府来说，令人不快的消息是，零售开销和家庭消费数据显示，人们选择将降息和退税带来的额外现金用来偿还债务或增加储蓄了。

• Women of wealth often seen at haute couture shows or rubbing shoulders with royalty, they tell us about their online ventures and giving back to society
• A doctor earned her stripes doing 40-hour hospital shifts before opening a clinic, a former Miss Universe funds students, a Thai actress works with the UNHCR

From a US couture client who used to live in Hong Kong to the Thai Angelina Jolie and a “rich kid of Beverly Hills”, these fabulous women from Asia and beyond lead very fashionable lives.

1. Susan Casden, Los Angeles
   Casden fell in love with couture in Paris nearly 20 years ago and has since built a collection even New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art has interest in. She lived in Hong Kong from 1978 to 1994, and was married to Tony Fung, scion of Hong Kong financial services firm Sun Hung Kai & Co.
2. Jamie Chua, Singapore
   A Singapore Airlines stewardess when she met her future husband, Indonesian tycoon Nurdian Cuaca, the 45-year-old is done with just spending money. Paid to endorse products to her social media followers, her investments include a beauty clinic and skincare range. Everybody should have work, she says.
3. Bui Simon, Los Angeles
   Porntip Bui Simon was crowned Miss Universe in 1988 and knew she had to use the platform it provided her to do more than promote beauty products and bathing suits. Her Angels Wings Foundation provides scholarships for Thai students in both the US and her native Thailand, where it also supports children.
4. Dorothy Wang, Los Angeles
   The Rich Kids of Beverly Hills star says four seasons of the show wore her out, but does not rule out another reality show if the format is right. Meantime, she has been enjoying her stress-free life, collaborating with a beauty brand and working on a travel and food website.
5. Christine Chiu, Los Angeles
   Christine Chiu felt like a “kid in a candy store” at her first haute couture show. The experience ignited her love for custom-made clothes and the art behind their creation. Chiu is passionate about giving and recently was invited to Scotland by Prince Charles to open a new health and wellness centre in her name.
6. Praya Lundberg, Bangkok
   The Thai actress and model grew up in the spotlight as a child actor and her fame made her able to see the inequities in her homeland. In 2017, she was named Thailand’s first Goodwill Ambassador to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
7. Angela Lee, Hong Kong
   Look at Lee’s Instagram account and it’s all Hermès Birkins and Kellys, Van Cleef & Arpels jewels, and Patek Philippe watches. But she is a doctor with stints in Britain’s health service and 40-hour Hong Kong hospital shifts recently behind her, who’s lately opened a skincare clinic.