人民幣外流可能改變全球併購業
When John Henry bought Liverpool Football Club in 2010, China’s currency was trading at Rmb6.7 to the dollar and heading higher. It would eventually peak in early 2014 at Rmb6 to the greenback.
約翰•亨利(John Henry) 2010年買下利物浦足球俱樂部(Liverpool Football Club)的時候，人民幣的匯率是1美元兌6.7元人民幣，並且還在升值。人民幣匯率最終在2014年初升至1美元兌6元人民幣的峯值。
It is doubtful that Mr Henry, who made his fortune as a commodities trader and is best known for purchasing the Boston Red Sox baseball team in 2002, gave much thought to how many redbacks it took to buy a greenback.
以大宗商品交易發家，因2002年買下波士頓紅襪棒球隊(Boston Red Sox)而聞名的亨利，可能沒有認真想過人民幣和美元的換算。
But if he does end up selling Liverpool FC for a pretty penny to a consortium led by a Chinese investment group, it will be in part because of what has happened to the renminbi over the past two years.
但如果他最終以大價錢將利物浦足球俱樂部賣給由一家中國投資集團牽頭的財團，其中的部分原因將是人民幣在過去兩年中所經歷的事情。
On Monday, China’s central bank set the renminbi’s dollar “reference rate”, around which it is allowed to move plus or minus 2 per cent in daily trading, at 6.6652 — almost 11 per cent below its 2014 peak and back where it was when Mr Henry diversified from baseball into English football.
週一，中國央行將人民幣兌美元中間價（在每日外匯交易中，人民幣匯率可在中間價上下2%之間浮動）定爲6.6652，比2014年人民幣匯率峯值跌近11%，大概回落到亨利採取多樣化策略，從棒球擴展到英格蘭足球時人民幣的匯率水平。
Expectations of renminbi appreciation have been replaced by depreciation, especially after the People’s Bank of China surprised global markets with a “one-off” devaluation last summer and the US Federal Reserve resumed raising interest rates after a decade-long hiatus.
人民幣的升值預期已被貶值預期代替，尤其是在中國央行去年夏天的“一次性”貶值讓全球市場震驚、美聯儲(Fed)間隔十年再度加息以後。
While Liverpool’s prospective new owner, China Everbright Group, and other Chinese investors could once reap profits by borrowing US dollars to purchase renminbi assets,
利物浦的潛在新東家，中國光大集團(China Everbright Group)和其他中國投資者曾經可以通過借入美元購買人民幣資產來獲利，
the “carry trade” now works better the other way, giving further impetus to the torrent of money pouring out of the world’s second-largest economy.
這種“套利交易”現在顛倒過來效果更佳，進一步推動資金從世界第二大經濟體涌出。
Chinese investors spent a record $100bn on overseas acquisitions in 2015 — and then exceeded that in the first quarter of this year alone, helped along by ChemChina’s $44bn purchase of Syngenta.
中國投資者在2015年投入創紀錄的1000億美元進行海外收購，然後在今年第一季度就超過了這一數字，其中得到中國化工(ChemChina)斥資440億美元收購先正達(Syngenta)的助推。
According to PwC, China Inc’s outbound mergers and acquisitions reached $134bn over the first six months of 2016, compared with just $30bn in the same period last year. And there is a lot more money where that $134bn came from.
據普華永道(PwC)的數據，中國企業2016年上半年的海外併購交易額達到1340億美元，而2015年同期僅爲300億美元。而且這些企業還手握比這多得多的資金。
David Brown, a PwC partner who advises Chinese buyers on overseas purchases, recalls a recent meeting with executives from one of the country’s top 10 insurers. They said that regulatory changes would allow them to allocate more money to private equity investments.
爲中國買家提供海外收購諮詢服務的普華永道合夥人戴維•布朗(David Brown)，回憶了他最近一次與中國十大保險公司之一的高管們開會時的情景。這些高管表示，監管政策的變化讓他們能夠爲私人股本投資投入更多資金。
“How much more?” Mr Brown asked.
“多了多少？”布朗問。
“About Rmb90bn more,” he was told. The insurance company had assembled a small team of young executives to spend the largesse but were struggling to do so.
“大概多了900億元人民幣，”他們告訴布朗。這家保險公司此前組建了一個由年輕高管組成的小團隊來大方出手，但卻遭遇了困難。
“It’s really a great wall of money looking for somewhere to go,” says Mr Brown, who describes the surge as a “quantum jump” that will fundamentally alter the global mergers & acquisitions industry.
“這真的是一座正在尋找去處的‘金錢長城’，”布朗說，他把這種資金的劇增描述成將會給全球併購業帶來根本性改變的“量子躍遷”。
The tens of billions of M&A dollars flowing out of China every month has raised regulatory concerns at home and overseas.
中國每個月流出的數百億美元併購資金，在中國國內外都引起了監管機構的擔憂。
Michael Buckley, an M&A banker at Citic Securities in Beijing, says that transaction approvals from China’s foreign exchange regulator used to be routine. Now it can take one or two months for the necessary paperwork to clear — an eternity in the investment banking world.
北京中信證券(Citic Securities)的併購銀行家邁克爾•巴克利(Michael Buckley)表示，中國外匯監管機構過去批准交易的時間很正常。但現在完成必要的文件手續可能需要一兩個月——在投行世界裏，這極爲漫長。
As a result, sellers like to have Chinese buyers in the mix to force other bidders higher, but can be reluctant to close deals with them. “Many Chinese companies are used as stalking horses in bid processes,” Mr Buckley says. “I have been a victim of this and it’s quite painful.”
結果是，賣家希望競價者中有中國買家，以迫使其他買家報出更高的價格，但可能不太情願和中國買家完成交易。“很多中國企業在競價過程中被當成掩護，”巴克利表示，“我就是這種做法的受害者，這真的非常難受。”
Overseas, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (Cfius) and the new UK government have on occasion vetoed or delayed Chinese investments, although the vast majority of Chinese deals encounter no such opposition. On Monday, Cfius approved the ChemChina-Syngenta transaction.
在海外，美國外國投資委員會(CFIUS)和新一屆英國政府偶爾會否決或者推遲中國的投資交易，不過絕大多數中國的收購交易並未遭遇這樣的反對。週一，美國外國投資委員會批准了中國化工收購先正達的交易。
Investment bankers joke that if Cfius could stomach the sale of a leading US pork producer to a Chinese buyer — referring to Shuanghui’s $7.1bn purchase of Virginia’s Smithfield Foods in 2013 — it will approve just about anything. Americans do prize their bacon and pork chops.
投資銀行家們開玩笑說，如果美國外國投資委員會能夠接受中國買家收購一家領先美國豬肉生產商——也就是雙匯(Shuanghui) 2013年以71億美元收購弗吉尼亞州史密斯菲爾德食品公司(Smithfield Foods)——那麼該委員會應該什麼都會批准了。美國人真的很以他們的培根和豬排爲豪。
If China Inc really wants to put American tolerance for its investment dollars to the test, there is the possibility of an intriguing follow-on deal. Should Mr Henry agree to sell Liverpool, China Everbright could then make a double-play offer for the Boston Red Sox.
如果中國企業真的想要測試一下美國對其投資的忍耐度，倒是有一個可能，就是來一次精彩的連環擊——如果亨利同意出售利物浦，中國光大可以來一個雙殺，提出收購波士頓紅襪棒球隊。
