海外之声 | 公私合作关系的前车之鉴：约翰劳与密西西比公司（中英双语）

观点速递

本文作者是IMI国际委员、约翰霍普金斯大学教授史蒂夫· 汉克。本文原文发表于2018年3月6日福布斯网站（Forbes.com），《福布斯杂志》是一个可靠的商业新闻和金融信息的主要来源。

2008年金融危机之后，人们一直对泡沫的存在众说纷纭，其中不乏令人匪夷所思的评论。作者以18世纪的经济学家约翰劳和他的密西西比公司为例，讲述了其起家至灭亡的过程，认为约翰·劳和密西西比系统的命运值得人们反思。公私合作并不是想象中的简单，今天这些备受关注的公私合作关系充满危险，必须小心处理。

中文译文如下：

公私合作关系的前车之鉴：约翰劳与密西西比公司

作者：史蒂夫·汉克

翻译：袁梦婷

审校：陆可凡

 2018年3月6日

随着如今股票市场的高涨和近期加密货币狂潮，涌现了很多描写泡沫或潜在泡沫的文章。几年前，雷曼兄弟破产之后，人们都在传言所谓的后房地产泡沫，紧缩的弊端以及干预性经济政策的必要性。不过到头来依旧是关于泡沫的传言。

为了让新闻报告显得更有趣，财经新闻记者和专栏作家往往倾向于用匪夷所思的泡沫来为投机事件背锅。事实上，泡沫通常是人们第一个考虑的原因，而非最后一个。正如泡沫领域的著名专家Peter Garber在其著作《第一次泡沫潮：早期疯狂的根本》（麻省理工学院出版社，2000年）中所说： 

人们最后要关注的才是“泡沫”现象，因为这些现象不是对事件的解释，而仅仅是对一种我们并没有充分了解的金融现象的命名。如果我们有从众心理的话——这种心理常常不恰当且盲目——那么就会把我们的解释变成自欺欺人的赘述，把很多东西解释地不明不白。

事实上，对于郁金香狂热的通俗解释已经使人们转移了对涉及市场基础分析的注意力。所谓的密西西泡沫事件和南海泡沫事件再次引起Garber的惋惜： 

对泡沫的解释已经将以上这两件更加重要的事件归结为一种从众心理的现象。

这使我想起约翰劳和他的密西西比公司，这家公司成立于1717年，并于1720年倒闭，多数有关泡沫和庞氏骗局的讨论都会提到这家公司。事实上，密西西比公司与泡沫和庞氏骗局之间唯一明显的联系是，它们的价值先上升然后下降。这个事实本来不值一提。

不过值得注意的是，劳是一位重要的经济学家，也是约翰·梅纳德·凯恩斯和凯恩斯主义经济学的先驱。事实上，劳关于《土地银行》（1704）和《货币与贸易》（1705）的论文引起了约瑟夫熊彼特等人的高评价，熊彼特在《经济分析史》（1954）中写道：

约翰·劳（John Law）（1671-1729）我一直觉得自己从他那里受益匪浅。他的辉煌深刻的经济学研究项目，使他一直处于货币理论家的前列。

约翰劳与当今经济和金融动荡以及政策辩论的联系正如劳与凯恩斯之间的联系。和凯恩斯一样，劳认为经济可能受大型公共工程和公私合作伙伴关系的刺激。事实上，两位经济学家都支持政府积极干预。也就是说，凯恩斯在《就业，利息和货币通论》（1936年）中总结前人观点时避免提及劳，这难免古怪。也许凯恩斯并不想和劳的密西西比公司联系在一起——这是一个以失败告终的宏伟计划。

劳得知他的好朋友奥尔良公爵成为法国的摄政王之后，觉得实施自己的想法的机会到了。1710年，苏格兰人从伦敦移居巴黎。法国陷入财务困境。另外，法国出现部分债券违约。因此，摄政王常常采纳劳的建议。

1716年6月，劳启动了他的第一个大项目。那时通用银行成立。它发行的纸币不能完全得到铸币（黄金或白银）的背书。相反，政府债券被用来为通用银行发行纸币的50%背书。这一部分储备金由皇家批准，并且通用银行的纸币被授予了法定货币地位。

这是劳的一个突破，因为他的想法之一是用基于信用的系统取代基于铸币的银行系统。与银行负债（纸币和存款）与黄金或白银资产相抵消的做法不同，信贷系统中的负债将与贷款抵消。下面的丁字帐户强调了这两个系统之间的差异。

有趣的是，今天的国际货币体系类似于劳所设想的基于信用的系统。事实上，在1971年，在约翰劳的诞生后的300年，国际货币体系彻底摆脱了金本位制度。

劳的第二个动作是成立密西西比公司。这家公司在法国的路易斯安那州和加拿大地区被授予了贸易和发展的垄断权。通过一系列收购和兼并，它成为了一个巨大的控股公司，控制着法国贸易公司们组成的庞大帝国。简而言之，法国根据劳的计划对其国库进行了私有化。密西西比公司接管了皇室的大部分财务职能。包括唯一的铸币权，收取所有直接和间接税的权利以及管理官方债务的权利。

涉及债务管理时，劳展现了他的创新天赋。密西西比公司的成立部分是为促成债转股交易，从而通过发行公司股票来换取皇室债务。因此，皇室能够卸下其全部高收益债务。英国人没被法国人超越，因为他们遵循劳的先导，并允许南海公司承担英国政府的大部分债务。

由于回报前景乐观，巴黎处处是欧洲各地的投资者。如下图所示，密西西比公司股票价格飙升。劳也赚得盆满钵满。此外，1719年12月，他被任命为财务总监——这一职位让他几乎变成法国的虚拟总理。

理查德·坎蒂隆（1680/90？-1734）是一位伟大的经济理论家（或许也能说是现代经济学之父），金融家和铸币为纸币背书的拥趸者。坎蒂隆成功地从劳的密西西比系统中获得了两笔财富。第一笔财富来自密西西比公司股票上涨。第二笔财富是汇率投机。他发现了劳战略中的一个致命缺陷：由于铸币被固定在发行钞票的问题上，这使得密西西比股票下限为每股9,000里弗。因此，Cantillon得出结论认为，密西西比股票的货币化将导致货币供应量的激增以及里弗对英镑的价值急剧下降。结果，他对法国货币采取了大量投机性行动——这一举动使他获得大量财富，而劳也将坎蒂隆驱逐出法国。

这又将我思绪带回到现在，也让我想到劳和凯恩斯的联系。考虑到更加庞大的公共工程和公私合作伙伴关系，约翰·劳和密西西比系统的命运值得人们反思。今天这些备受关注的公私合作关系充满危险，必须小心处理。

英文原文如下：

A Cautionary Tale of Public-Private Partnerships: John Law and the Mississippi Company

By Steve H. Hanke

March 6, 2018.

With today’s high stock market multiples and the current crypto currency craze, a great deal of ink is being spilled about bubbles or potential bubbles. Just a few years ago, in the wake of the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, the wags were all in a flutter about the alleged post-housing bubble, the ills of austerity and the need for interventionist economic policies. Yet another bubble story.

In an attempt to make their reportage more interesting, financial journalists and op-ed writers often tend to put a speculative episode or event in the fundamentally inexplicable bubble pigeon hole. Indeed, bubble explanations are often clutched as a first, not a last, resort. As Peter Garber, the leading expert on bubbles, laments in his classic Famous First Bubbles: The Fundamental of Early Manias(The MIT Press, 2000):

“Bubble” characterizations should be a last resort because they are non-explanations of events, merely a name that we attach to a financial phenomenon that we have not invested sufficiently in understanding. Invoking crowd psychology — which is always ill defined and unmeasured — turns our explanation to tautology in a self-deluding attempt to say something more than a confession of confusion.

Indeed, the banal explanations of Tulipmania have diverted all attention from the analysis of the market fundamentals that were involved. And again, another edifying Garber lament on the so-called Mississippi and South Sea Bubbles:

The bubble interpretation has relegated the far more important Mississippi and South Sea episodes to a description of pathologies of group psychology.

This brings me to John Law and his Mississippi Company, which was established in 1717 and collapsed in 1720 and is a standard reference that accompanies most discussions of bubbles and Ponzi schemes. In fact, the only obvious connection between Law’s Mississippi Company and bubbles and Ponzi schemes is that their values have gone up and then down. This fact should fail to merit mention.

What merits attention is that Law was an economist of note and a precursor to John Maynard Keynes and Keynesian economics. Indeed, Law’s Essay on a Land Bank (1704) and Money and Trade (1705) brought high praise from no less than Joseph Schumpeter, who wrote in A History of Economic Analysis (1954):

John Law (1671-1729) I have always felt in a class by himself. He worked out the economics of his projects with a brilliance and, yes, profundity, which places him in the front ranks of monetary theorists of all time. 

John Law’s link to today’s economic and financial turmoil and policy debates is a Law-Keynes linkage. Like Keynes, Law thought the economy could be stimulated by grand public works and public-private partnerships. Indeed, both economists supported the idea of an active, interventionist government. That said, Keynes curiously avoided mentioning Law when noting the antecedents to the ideas contained in The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money(1936). Perhaps Keynes didn’t want to be associated with Law’s Mississippi System — a grand project that ended in failure.

The opportunity for Law to implement his ideas arose after Law learned that the Duke of Orléans, his good friend, had become the regent of France. In 1710, the Scotsman emigrated from London to Paris. France was in financial trouble. Among other things, it was in partial default on its bonds. In consequence, the regent was susceptible to Law’s proposals.

In June 1716, Law launched his first big project. It was then that the BanqueGénérale was established. It issued paper money that was not fully backed by specie (gold or silver). Instead, government bonds were used to back 50% of the paper money issued by the BanqueGénérale. This fractional reserve setup was approved by the Crown, and the Banque’s paper money was granted legal tender status.

This represented a breakthrough for Law because one of his ideas was to replace specie-based banking systems with credit-based systems. Instead of counterbalancing banks’ liabilities (paper money and deposits) with gold or silver assets, the liabilities in a credit-based system would be counterbalanced with loans. The T-accounts below highlight the differences between these two systems.

Interestingly, the international monetary system today looks a great deal like the credit-based system envisioned by Law. Indeed, in 1971 — 300 years after John Law’s birth — the international monetary system abandoned the last vestiges of the gold standard.

Law’s next venture was the establishment of the Mississippi Company. It was granted monopoly rights for trade and development in France’s Louisiana and Canadian territories. And through a series of takeovers and mergers, it became a giant holding company that controlled a vast empire of French trading companies. In short, France privatized its treasury under Law’s plan. The Mississippi Company took over most of the financial functions of the Crown. These included the sole right to coin money, to collect all direct and indirect taxes, and to manage the Crown’s debt.

When it came to debt management, Law displayed his flair for innovation. The Mississippi Company was created, in part, to facilitate a debt-for-equity swap in which the company’s shares were issued in exchange for the Crown’s debt. In consequence, the Crown was able to unload its entire stock of high-yielding debt. The British, not to be outdone by the French, followed Law’s lead and allowed the South Sea Company to assume the bulk of the British government’s debt.

With the prospect of spectacular returns, Paris became swollen with investors from all parts of Europe. And as the chart below indicates, the price of the Mississippi Company’s shares soared. So did Law’s fortunes. Among other things, in December 1719, he was appointed controller-general of finances — a position that made him the virtual prime minister of France.

Richard Cantillon (1680/90?-1734), a great economic theorist (arguably the father of modern economics), financier and advocate of specie-backed money, succeeded in making two fortunes from Law’s Mississippi System. The first was made on the rising market for Mississippi Company shares. Cantillon’s second fortune was made on exchange-rate speculation. He spotted a fatal flaw in Law’s strategy: the increase in the issue of banknotes unbacked by specie that were required to put a floor under the Mississippi shares at 9,000 livres per share. Accordingly, Cantillon concluded that the monetization of Mississippi shares would result in a surge in the money supply and a sharp fall in the value of the livre against the pound sterling. In consequence, he took a large speculative position against the French currency — an action that made him a fortune and caused Law to expel Cantillon from France.

This brings me back to the present and the Law-Keynes linkage. As ever-larger public works and public-private partnerships are contemplated, it might be worth reflecting on the fate of John Law’s Mississippi System. Today’s these much-touted partnership are fraught with danger and must be handled with care.

内容整理 叶祎然

图文编辑 叶祎然

审校  田雯

监制  魏唯

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