结构性因素推动人民币进一步升值
日前，瑞银亚洲汇率策略小组上调了对人民币汇率的预期值，如表1所示。瑞银此前的预期是2007年人民币将对美元升值4%，新的预期则是至少升值6%。而即使是新预期，也有可能过于保守。
瑞银改变人民币汇率预期的主要理由包括以下几方面：
结构性压力继续存在。第一个原因是人民币仍然承受着强大、持续的升值压力。2006年全年贸易顺差都在大幅增长，而这又意味着人民银行持续干预汇市、官方储备不断增加。
更重要的是，这种情况没有明显的结束迹象。去年的宏观紧缩政策已经对实体经济活动产生了显著影响，整个2006年下半年，生产、信贷和投资的增长都在减速。在这种情况下，实际进口增长率自然随之放慢。进入2007年，中国政府已经不可能期望进口迅速出现回升，从而解决顺差扩大的问题。
央行对冲销操作渐失耐心。目前，事态远没有发展到不可持续的地步。迄今为止，中国仍可以毫无困难地冲销流入的外资，并控制国内流动性条件。然而，人民银行已经开始改变负债式的冲销操作，转而以提高法定准备金率作为管理流动性的工具。由此可见，对于无限制地增加央行票据存量，人行已经越发感到不安。
中国更加适应人民币升值。另一个关键因素是，中国政府显然已更加适应人民币的渐进升值。自取消钉住美元的汇率制度至今，人民币对美元的升幅刚刚超过6%。而且，虽然国内产业的游说势力做出了种种悲观预期，事实上人民币的小幅升值并未对国内出口制造商造成真正的负面影响。近年来，玩具、纺织品、家具、食品、消费电子品等轻工行业的税前利润率一直保持稳定。之所以如此，部分原因就在于凭借出口价格的上升，出口商成功地将成本传递给了国外消费者。
人民币加快升值已是事实。贸易顺差的扩大，外汇储备压力的持续增大，当局对冲销操作逐渐失去耐心，同时又更加适应控制下的人民币升值。由于这种种变化，如果中国政府更加倾向于通过人民币汇率来缓解对外经济失衡问题，将不足为奇。
而这已经成为事实。从折合为年率的人民币月度升幅来看，从2005年7月到2006年年中，人民银行的行动步伐颇为迟缓。但在过去的两个季度中，以年率计算，人民币对美元的升值速度已达6%－7%。事实上，瑞银对人民币汇率的新预测只是假定今年之内中国将保持当前的人民币升值速度。
制动因素阻碍人民币升速加快
既然结构性经济因素正在推动中国更加注重汇率政策，而且既然人民币升值速度已经达到每年6%－7%的水平，那么为什么瑞银不认为其升速将进一步加快呢？
正如华尔街其他分析机构一样，瑞银的汇率预测框架非常注重中国高层领导人对人民币加快升值的接受程度，而在此问题上中国领导层通常谨慎、保守。然而，一些客观因素可能会进一步推动人民币走强，尤其是日元回升的前景。如果日元确实大幅度对美元升值，很可能会带动人民币进一步升值。因此我们的新预测可能低估了人民币升值的可能性。
然而，从其他方面看，人民币加速升值也面临着天然的制动因素，尤其重要的是中国资本项目的走势。2003－2005年间，“热钱”大规模流入中国。而在过去的18个月中，中国实际上却出现了资本外流。
事实上，在经常项目余额急剧扩大的情况下，正是资本净流出“挽救”了人民银行。若非如此，人行对汇市的干预力度和外汇储备增加的规模也将会急剧扩大。
这就存在一个问题：随着近期A股市场的大幅升值，中国金融和企业界或许正在密切关注将资金调回国内的机会。在这种情况下，如果由于汇率因素，人民币相对于美元拥有近乎两位数的回报率优势，无疑是不合时宜的。
中期内人民币升势将减缓
瑞银预计，2007年人民币对美元的升幅将超过6%，明年将为5%，而中期之内升值速度将进一步下降。那么预计人民币的升值速度将减缓的理由是什么？答案在于，除了人民币升值之外，还有两个因素有助于逐步缓解中国经济的对外失衡状况，因而有助于降低人民币的升值速度。
首先，虽然中国的贸易顺差仍在上升，而且还没有出现明显的回落迹象，但瑞银预计，中国的顺差将在2007年之中稳定下来，甚至年底就有可能开始下降。其原因在于，近期中国的贸易顺差之所以猛增，主要原因在于重工业部门的过剩产能，而这种过剩只是暂时性的。
第二，汇率或许是2007年中国对外经济政策的重点之一，但肯定不是唯一重点。瑞银认为，其实今年的主要政策目标在于另一个领域，即促使资本进一步外流。
英文原文：A Good Year For the RMB
More appreciation ahead
Yesterday Nizam Idris of our Asian FX Strategy team upgraded our 1-month and 3-month calls on the Chinese renminbi, pushing our forecasts to 7.72 and 7.65 respectively （from our earlier outlook of 7.78 and 7.72, see CNY – Full Steam Ahead, UBS Emerging Markets Strategy Highlight, 25 January 2007）. Today we are doing the same for our 6-month, 1-year, 2-year and medium-term outlook, as follows （see Chart 1）:
Chart 1: The new RMB forecasts
Source: UBS
So, for example, our original one-year outlook envisaged a 4% annual appreciation against the dollar during 2007; now we expect a 6% appreciation as our baseline scenario – and, as we discuss below, we still see risks skewed to the even stronger side.
Why the change? Here are the main factors:
1. Continued structural pressure
The first point to note is that the renminbi is still under strong, sustained appreciation pressure. The trade surplus has continued to increase sharply all through 2006 （Chart 2）, and as you can see from Chart 3, this has meant sustained FX intervention and official reserve accumulation by the PBC.
More important, there’s no clear end in sight. Macro tightening policies last year have had a visible impact on real activity, with slowing production, credit and investment growth all through the second half of 2006. In this environment, real import growth has naturally slowed as well. So as we enter 2007, the Chinese authorities can no longer hope for a quick import recovery to resolve the problem.
2. Sterilization fatigue
Now, this is far from an unsustainable state of affairs. As we showed in The Complete RMB Handbook （Asian Economic Perspectives, 18 September 2006）, China has had virtually no problems sterilizing foreign inflows and controlling domestic liquidity conditions to date. However, the fact that the PBC is already moving away from debt-based sterilization operations towards reserve requirement hikes as a liquidity management tool suggests that they are increasingly uncomfortable with increasing the stock of outstanding central bank bills ad infinitum （see Best Get Used to Reserve Hikes, Asian Focus, 6 November 2006 for further discussion）.
3. More comfort with appreciation
Another key point is that the authorities are visibly more comfortable with a gradual appreciation scenario. To date, the renminbi has strengthened by just over 6% against the dollar from the pre-2005 peg level – and despite the pessimistic predictions of the domestic industrial lobby, this small move has had no real negative impact on export manufacturers. Reported pre-tax margins in light manufacturing （toys, textiles, furniture, food processing, light electronics, etc.） have been absolutely stable over the past few years （Chart 4）, and this is due in part to the fact that exporters have been successful in passing costs on to external consumers （Chart 5）.
英文原文：This helps explain why the Ministry of Commerce, formerly a vocal opponent of any renminbi move, announced publicly two weeks ago that low- to mid-single digit appreciation rates were not a concern for the industrial sector.
4. It's already happening
In this environment - a rising trade surplus, continued strong FX reserve pressures, impatience with perpetual sterilization, greater comfort with controlled currency moves - it should come as no surprise that the authorities would increasingly turn to the renminbi as a means of helping to rebalance the external accounts.
And in fact, we're already there. Look at Chart 6 below, which shows the annualized month-on-month pace of appreciation against the dollar since the July 2005 move. As you can see, the PBC was moving rather slowly through the middle of 2006 ... but for the past two quarters, the renminbi has been appreciating at a 6% to 7% annualized pace. In essence, our new forecasts assume that the authorities will simply keep up the current pace for the rest of this year.
Why not a faster appreciation?
But if structural economic factors are clearly pushing the government towards a greater focus on the currency, and if the renminbi is already moving at 6% to 7% y/y, why wouldn't we expect a further acceleration in 2007?
In fact, we could. As with other analysts on the street, our current forecast framework is heavily influenced by our views on the political acceptability of greater currency appreciation to the Chinese senior leadership, who have normally taken a cautious, conservative stance on the issue. But we can easily see objective factors that might push the PBC into further strengthening - and in particular, we are thinking here about the potential for a turnaround in the Japanese yen; if the yen does strengthen significantly against the US dollar （in line with our global view）, this could well bring on further renminbi gains as well. So we agree that renminbi risks are skewed to the strong side of our forecasts.
On the other hand, there are also natural breaks on the process. And in our view the most important is the capital account position, as shown in Chart 7. The blue line in the chart shows our measure of net portfolio capital flows （including so-called “errors and omissions”）; from 2003 to 2005, “hot” money inflows were rushing into the economy, but for the past 18 months China has actually seen net capital outflows.
We’ll discuss the reasons for this turnaround in greater detail in our next Focus report （see below）, but the crucial point to understand here is that with a sharply rising current account balance, net capital outflows have “saved” the PBC from what would otherwise have been an equally big rise in monthly FX intervention and reserve accumulation. And the authorities are naturally hesitant to take policy actions that would pull capital back into China and force the PBC to step up intervention even further.
Therein lies the problem: with the substantial recent gains in the A share market, we suspect Chinese banks and firms may already be eyeing an opportunity to repatriate funds back into the mainland - and in this environment, offering near-double digit returns on the renminbi against the US dollar would almost certainly be seen as too aggressive.
Why the medium-term slowdown?
One final question is: why the expected slowdown in the pace of appreciation in 2008 and beyond? This year we are forecasting more than 6% against the dollar, but next year our forecast is for a 5% bilateral strengthening, and somewhat slower still in the medium term.
The answer is that there are two additional factors which should gradually help rebalance the current external surpluses without a renminbi strengthening - and thus potentially slow the pace of appreciation somewhat going forward:
A falling trade surplus. Of course China's trade balance is still rising today, and we don't yet see any clear sign that the surplus is peaking. However, over the course of 2007 we still expect the surplus to stabilize - and even begin declining by the end of the year. The reason is that much of the sharp recent rise in the trade balance is a reflection of overcapacity in heavy industrial sectors, and this is fundamentally a temporary phenomenon; we gave the full arguments in Rebalance This （Asian Focus, 12 December 2006）, and we would refer the interested reader to that publication for further details.
More capital outflows. The renminbi may be one focus for external economic policy 2007 - but certainly not the only one. In fact, we believe the major policy push this year will actually come in another area: pushing further capital outflows. We discuss the details in the forthcoming companion report to the current Focus, entitled ... And a Good Year for Capital Outflows. So please stay tuned!
免费报告搜索
