美聯儲利潤縮水不可怕
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????要是你養的奶牛長得越來越大，產的奶卻越來越少，通常你就得考慮一下它們的乳腺是不是出了問題。這就是我聽說2013年美聯儲（Feb）為美國財政部提供的資金少于2012年時的第一反應。5年前，全球金融援助行動開始后，美聯儲一直是納稅人的資金來源，它持有的證券已經增加了約1.1萬億美元。 ????這條有意思的消息來自美聯儲研究機構Stone McCarthy Research Associates。本月早些時候，這個機構告訴客戶，2013年美聯儲為財政部提供了765億美元資金，少于2012年的884億美元。假設這個數字比較準確，5年來美聯儲向財政部（也就是說，向納稅人）提供的資金一共達到了3660億美元。如果不是為了壓低利率而大規模購買證券，這個數字可能只有1500億美元左右。 ????美聯儲為財政部提供這么多資金并不是為了當好人，而是因為美聯儲得按要求把幾乎所有利潤都交給財政部，后者相當理直氣壯地把這筆資金作為自己的收入，就像對待人們繳納的所得稅一樣。 ????讓我繼續闡發這個比喻，2013年美聯儲提供給財政部的資金明顯少于2012年是什么原因呢？美聯儲的“草料”一直都不太好嗎？非也。 ????實際情況是，2012年的援助行動讓美聯儲獲得了相當可觀的一次性利潤。 ????首先，為了幫助貝爾斯登（Bear Stearns）和美國國際集團（AIG）的債權人，2008年聯邦政府采取的措施之一是收購這些公司的證券。2012年，美聯儲將這些曾經“有毒”的證券轉讓后，獲得了61億美元利潤。金融危機期間，美聯儲以低價買進了這些證券，等到它再次賣出這些證券時，市場正對收益如饑似渴。 ????此外，美聯儲出售了所持證券中期限較短的一部分，目的是籌集資金用于長期證券投資。這種做法被稱為扭曲操作，總計給它帶來了133億美元的利潤。 ????考慮到匯兌損失，2012年美聯儲的這些一次性收益達到了185億美元。因此，2012年美聯儲的利潤為901億美元，而2013年的預計利潤只有785億美元。扣除2012年的一次性利潤，并且基于Stone McCarthy Research Associates估算的2013年盈利數字，美聯儲的利潤上升了10%左右。 ????美聯儲在大約一年前公布了2012年的收益情況，因此我們可能很快就會得到2013年的官方盈利數據。 ????同時，我懷疑美聯儲披露這些信息后，人們會像往常一樣討論持有3.8萬億美元證券給美聯儲帶來的巨大風險。其中有大量長期證券。如果利率不斷上升，這些長期證券的市場價值就會持續下降。 ????批評人士會說，證券價值縮水有可能消耗掉美聯儲的資金。但你們知道嗎？不會出現這種情況，原因是2011年美聯儲調整了會計方法。幾乎沒有人注意到這一點，我也是昨天才從Stone McCarthy Research Associates創始人雷?斯通那里聽說了這件事。 ????以我的理解，有了這條規則，美聯儲就無需按照市場價格下調自己打算持有的證券的價值。這樣，美聯儲就可以穩坐釣魚臺，一邊讓這些證券生息，一邊等著它們到期，在到期后按面額收回全部資金。一般的銀行不能自行制定會計法則，但美國中央銀行可以這樣做。 ????最后一點。今后某個時刻，短期利率將升至4%以上，我希望這種情況能很快出現。它會大幅削減美聯儲的利潤，甚至造成虧損。無論怎樣，美聯儲為財政部提供的資金將遠低于此前的水平。可以斷言的是，這筆資金變少后，政客們就會在對美聯儲加強監督方面施加政治壓力。 ????我不是美聯儲的擁躉。但如果美聯儲的資金斷流1-2年，我們不應該太擔心這個充當“奶牛”角色的機構，也不用馬上就把它放到草場上。我們應該記住，等到財政部確實需要資金的時候，納稅人應該把美聯儲所持證券中最好的一部分撇出來。這一點無需多言。（財富中文網） ????譯者：Charlie?? |
????When your cow gets bigger but produces less milk, it's usually time to worry that something has gone wrong with the beast. That's the first thing that came to my mind when I heard that the Federal Reserve, a cash cow for U.S. taxpayers ever since the worldwide financial bailout began five years ago, sent less money to the Treasury last year than it did in 2012. This despite the fact that the Fed had increased its securities holdings by about $1.1 trillion. ????I got this interesting news from a Fed watching firm, Stone McCarthy Research Associates, which told its clients earlier this month that it estimated that the Fed had sent $76.5 billion to the Treasury last year, down from $88.4 billion in 2012. Assuming Stone McCarthy's number is reasonably accurate, the Fed has sent the Treasury (and thus U.S. taxpayers) a total of $366 billion for the past five years, compared with the $150 billion or so it would have probably sent had it not made massive securities purchases in an attempt to force down interest rates. ????The Fed doesn't send all this money to the Treasury to be nice. It does this because it's required to turn over essentially all its profits to the Treasury, which counts them -- quite properly -- as revenue, the same way it counts your income tax payments. ????To continue milking my metaphor, what accounts for the Fed sending substantially less money to the Treasury last year than in 2012? Has the Fed been chowing down on inferior fodder? Nope. ????What happened is that in 2012, the Fed made some nifty one-time profits as a result of its bailout activities. ????First, it sold the once-toxic securities it acquired in 2008 from Bear Stearns and AIG (AIG) as part of the federal bailout of those firms' creditors. It made a $6.1 billion profit on these securities, which it bought at distressed prices during the financial meltdown and sold into a yield-hungry market. ????In addition, the Fed realized $13.3 billion of profits by selling shorter-term securities it held in its portfolio, in order to raise money to reinvest in longer-term securities, a move called Operation Twist. ????These one-time profits, offset by currency losses, totaled $18.5 billion in 2012. That's why the Fed earned $90.1 billion in 2012, but only an estimated $78.5 billion last year. Subtract the one-time profits from 2012 and plug in Stone McCarthy's estimate for 2013, and the Fed's profits were up about 10%. ????The Fed released its 2012 numbers just about a year ago, so we'll probably get its official 2013 numbers reasonably soon. ????I also suspect that the Fed's announcement will trigger the usual discussions about the huge risks the Fed is running by holding $3.8 trillion of securities, many of them long-term, whose market value will continue falling if -- make that when -- interest rates continue rising. ????Critics will say this value decline could well wipe out the Fed's capital. But guess what? That won't happen, thanks to a little-noticed accounting change the Fed adopted in 2011 and that Ray Stone told me about yesterday. ????The rule, as best I can explain it, allows the Fed to avoid having to mark down the value of securities that it intends to hold. That way, it can sit there, collect interest on the securities, wait for them to mature, and collect their full face value when that happens. Regular banks can't make up their own accounting rules, but our central bank can. ????And one final note. At some point, which I hope comes reasonably soon, short-term interest rates will rise above 4%, which will put a big damper on the Fed's profits, possibly even generating losses. In any event, it will send far less money to the Treasury than it's been sending. And you can bet that this decline will generate political pressure by politicians to increase oversight of the Fed. ????I'm no Fed fanboy. But if Fed remittances stop for a year or two, we shouldn't get too upset with old Bossy and try to put her out to pasture. We should remember that taxpayers got to skim the cream off the Fed's securities portfolio when the Treasury really needed the money. Nuff said. |
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