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看准亚洲投资时机对投资者至关重要

级别: 管理员
For Investors in Asian Markets,Timing the Recovery Is Crucial

Five years have passed since the market trough following the Asian crisis, but much of the region remains in restructuring mode.

For medium- and long-term investors, now may be the time to buy into countries where restructuring is well under way but where company profits still have plenty of room for growth.

In a new report, "Five Years From Crisis Lows," strategists at UBS have sifted through the region's markets to determine which are at that turning point, where companies have the best profit-cycle prospects during the next few years. At the top of their list: Hong Kong, the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand.

True restructuring demands work from every facet of society. Companies reduce debt, cut costs, and get rid of extra capacity. Banks recapitalize. Governments make economic and fiscal overhauls. Consumers end up cutting back, too, as a result of the layoffs, falling property values and declining stock prices that inevitably come with the overhauls.

Much of this restructuring already has taken place in Hong Kong, but the city hasn't been rewarded with the next phase of the cycle: sales recovery, increased profitability, and, on the macroeconomic level, rising employment and a growing economy.

Instead, Hong Kong seems stuck in the painful stage of the cycle, with falling prices and a dwindling economy. But progress has been made: private-sector debt, at 155% of gross domestic product, is at about half 1996 levels. Trimming that debt has hurt, even if it is good for long-term growth.

"This is real restructuring, and this does not come without a country having a period of moribund equity markets," writes Ian McLennan , UBS's chief Asian strategist, and his team. "Once the restructuring is completed, we think profit growth will be far ahead of expectations."

Of course, to a large extent, that depends on revenue growth at the property-and-finance companies, which make up the bulk of the Hong Kong stock market, says Elizabeth Soon, director of Pacific basin investments for Standard Life Investments. Property is in a six-year slump, and more supply keeps coming onto the market. But assuming prices are reaching levels that will stimulate demand and rising revenue, "we are at the stage where we could see profits improving," Ms. Soon says.

In both Indonesia and the Philippines, private-sector debt is down significantly since the Asian crisis. In the Philippines, the UBS team believes, the gradual profits recovery that started two years ago could continue for several years. In Indonesia, it has barely begun, they say.

The potential drawback to these countries is their governments. Manila needs to get its deficit under control, while Jakarta needs to avoid risky fiscal policies.

In Thailand, a profits-based recovery is well under way, as any investor in Bangkok knows. The risks lie in the banking system, where restructurings have lagged behind the rest of the region.

That drawback highlights an interesting paradox of restructuring: It's possible for a country to make huge strides in one area while taking baby steps in another.

Sometimes, though not in the case of Thai banks, that's because the problems were fairly mild in a certain sector, say corporate indebtedness. But in the meantime, other countries with once-serious weaknesses have restructured and leapfrogged over the seemingly stronger ones.

Take Singapore, where low foreign-currency debt at the time of the crisis meant companies avoided many of the problems that affected their counterparts in other countries, like Thailand. So while many Thai companies busied themselves cutting costs and selling assets, Singapore companies tended to twiddle.

Today, Singapore's private debt, at 128% of GDP, is at about the same level as during the crisis. Thailand's private debt stands at 97% of GDP, down from about 155% five years ago. That indicates Thai companies are losing the habit of borrowing money to invest in costly and unnecessary assets, and in turn they are generating higher returns on the assets they have.

Private debt -- the sum of corporate and individual, but not government, debt -- is an important measure of how companies and people are preparing for the future. Falling debt indicates restructuring and the potential for bigger profits; rapidly rising debt can indicate a bubble.

Some countries have recovered so well from the Asian crisis that, from an investor perspective, the big gains already have been made. Take South Korea, where companies have worked hard during the past few years to cut fat. The stock market is up 15% this year, but private-sector debt is back up at 154% of GDP, nearly on par with 1998. Compared with five years ago, more of it is consumer than corporate debt, fueled by a national credit-card-financed shopping spree.

"We have had the bounce-back from crisis," writes Mr. McLennan in his report. "Perhaps Korea should be viewed, in aggregate, as a low-growth, cash-generative stock."

At Standard Life, Ms. Soon cautions that investors in South Korea should prepare for plenty of bumps and starts along the way. Investors react strongly to both good and bad news, and there tends to be a lot of both. "Korea is like a stop-go kind of place," she says.

The UBS report retains its harshest comments for China, focusing on the country's high levels of investment relative to income, high debt levels, pricey stock markets and undervalued currency. "There are few things less appealing for those in search of long-run profit growth," Mr. McLennan concludes.
看准亚洲投资时机对投资者至关重要

距离亚洲金融危机形成的股市低谷已经有5年时间了,但亚洲大部分地区的重组仍在进行当中。

对中长期投资者来说,要想投资那些重组进展顺利、而企业利润增长空间又很大的国家,现在可能正当其时。

据瑞士银行(UBS)最新发布的一份名为"金融危机5年之后"(Five Years From Crisis Lows)的研究报告,策略师对亚洲各个地区市场进行精挑细选,以确定哪个地区正处于转折点,也就是未来几年哪些国家和地区企业的利润前景良好。香港、菲律宾、印尼及泰国在他们最终确定的名单中名列前茅。

真正的重组需要全社会各方面协同进行。企业要削减债务、压缩成本并解决好产能过剩的问题;银行需要调整资本结构;政府应力行经济及财政改革。但与此同时,改革不可避免地会引发裁员、物业价值缩水以及股价下挫,这些都会导致消费者支出的减少。

香港已进行了很多重组,但目前尚未出现复苏:即销售回升、盈利能力增强,以及宏观层面上的就业率和经济增长率的提高。

恰恰相反,香港经济彷佛陷入了一个痛苦的恶性循环,物价下降、经济萎靡。但重组也是有一定效果的:私人领域债务占国内生产总值(GDP)的比例已经下降至155%,仅为1996年的二分之一。削减债务对香港经济造成一些伤害,但对长期的经济增长具有积极意义。 瑞士银行首席亚洲策略师伊恩?麦克兰纳(Ian McLennan)称,这才是真正的重组,股市此时经历一段时期的低迷是很正常的。等到重组完成,企业利润的增长就会远远超过预期。

当然,这在很大程度上要取决于占香港股市绝大比重的房地产及金融公司的收入增长。Standard Life Investments太平洋地区投资主管Elizabeth Soon称,香港房地产行业已经连续6年出现下滑,新开发的物业还在不断涌入市场。但如果假设房地产价格已跌至足以刺激需求的水平,房地产企业的收入就将上升,香港房地产企业利润改善也就指日可待了。 至于印尼和菲律宾,这两国的私人领域债务比亚洲金融危机时已有了大幅下降。两年前,菲律宾企业的盈利状况已经开始改善,这种趋势可能有望持续数年。但在印尼,好转的迹象还不明显。

这两国的政府可能构成经济复苏的潜在障碍。菲律宾政府现在应当控制财政赤字,而印尼政府则需要避免高风险的财政政策。

泰国的情况正如当地投资者所看到的,企业的利润已开始改善。不过,该国银行系统的改革落后于亚洲地区其他国家,这成为泰国经济复苏的主要风险。

这种状况显示了各国在重组过程中出现的一种不平衡现象:即一个国家可能在某个领域的改革取得重大进展,但在其他领域就可能相对滞后。 有时候,出现这种情况是因为某些领域的问题相对很小,政府对这一领域的改革的重视程度相对薄弱,这就可能使那些原本在同一领域实力较弱的国家,在经过大力改革后反而后来居上。

举例来说,由于金融危机时新加坡外币债务较少,所以该国企业受到的冲击就小于那些向泰国这样外币债务较高的国家。所以后来,许多泰国企业都忙于削减成本、变卖资产,而新加坡的同行就显得无所作为了。

结果,新加坡目前私人领域债务为GDP的128%,与金融危机时期水平相当。而泰国私人领域债务占GDP的比例却已经从5年前的155%下降至97%。这就表明,泰国企业已经不再借钱投资于成本巨大或没有必要的资产,这样其资产的回报率也就相应更高。

私人领域债务,即企业和个人所欠债务(非政府债务)是衡量企业和个人对未来计划的一项重要指标。债务水平降低意味著重组及未来企业利润的增长;债务激增则意味著可能有经济泡沫出现。

从投资者的角度看,有些亚洲国家已经从金融危机的创伤中恢复的很好,这就意味著向这些国家投资想大赚一笔的好时候已经过去。比如说,韩国企业最近几年一直努力提高效率。韩国股市今年迄今为止已经上涨了15%,但私人领域债务却又回升到GDP的154%,与1998年基本持平。但与5年前相比,近几年的信用卡购物狂潮已经使私人债务领域中的消费者债务超过了企业债务。

麦克兰纳在报告中称,韩国已经从金融危机中复苏,现在可以把韩国看作是一只低增长但仍有钱可赚的市场。

但Standard Life的Soon警告称,投资韩国的投资者应该准备好接受股市的大幅动荡,这里的投资者对好消息和坏消息反应都非常激烈,而未来的好、坏消息都少不了。

在瑞士银行的研究报告中,针对中国大陆的措辞最为严厉,主要内容集中在以下方面:与收入相比过高的投资比例、巨额债务、股价过高以及货币价值低估。麦克兰纳称,中国大陆市场几乎没有什么地方可以吸引那些寻求长期利润增长的投资者。
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