[E342]Ponzis to punters|经济学人
本文音频及原文摘自杂志The Economist《经济学人》2016年第6期，China版块。
Financial fraud
Poor China: so vast and so sensitive
Feb 6th 2016 | BEIJING
IN 1997 the collapse of several large Ponzi schemes in Albania[阿尔巴尼亚] precipitated mass disorder[大规模混乱;极度混乱], the overthrow of the government[政府被推翻;国家政权更迭] and the deaths of 2,000 people. The failure, in another country lacking robust financial regulation[缺乏健全的金融管理体系], of a huge Ponzi scheme is not going to lead to the overthrow of its president, Xi Jinping. But it could cause the government political problems[造成政治问题困扰]. And it shows that China is as vulnerable as anywhere else to the chaos that can result from financial shenanigans.
······
▷ Ponzi schemes
庞氏骗局(指骗人向虚设的企业投资，以后来投资者的钱作为快速盈利付给最初投资者以诱使更多人上当亦作Ponzi)
▷ precipitate [prɪˈsɪpɪteɪt]
【注释】
a) to make something happen suddenly or sooner than expected
b) Precipitate usually means "bringing something on" or "making it happen" — and not always in a good way. An unpopular verdict might "precipitate violence" or one false step at the Grand Canyon could precipitate you down into the gorge.
v.促成;使突如其来地发生;加速…的发生
An invasion would certainly precipitate a political crisis.
入侵肯定会加剧政治危机。
Fear of losing her job precipitated (= suddenly forced) her into action.
对丢掉工作的恐惧促使她立即行动起来。
▷ shenanigans [ʃɪˈnænɪgənz]
【注释】
a) secret or dishonest activities, usually of a complicated and humorous or interesting type
b) Ever been ripped off at three card monte or some other con? Well, you're the victim of a shenanigan, a clever form of deception, usually designed to part the unwary from their money.
n. 诈骗,欺骗;耍手腕;恶作剧;把戏,诡计
More business/political shenanigans were exposed in the newspapers today.
今天的报纸又揭露了一些商业诈骗／政治把戏。
······
The company that failed was Ezubao, China’s largest peer-to-peer (P2P) lender. P2P websites connect borrowers and lenders without a bank’s intermediation[调停,仲裁,调解;中介]. Founded in 2014 by Ding Ning, who, according to state media, had done well for himself manufacturing can-openers, Ezubao quickly became one of China’s best-known new financial firms. Mr Ding spent millions on an advertising blitz[广告宣传;广告闪电战,广告突击活动], ordered employees to sport[得意地穿戴;夸示;故意显示;嬉戏] luxury brands[奢侈品牌] or glitzy[闪光的,耀眼的;眩目的] jewellery and was interviewed on the government’s web portal[门户网站] about his company’s contribution to Chinese growth.
······
But it was dodgy from the start. One executive said that “95% of investment projects on Ezubao were fake”. Another called it, accurately, a Ponzi scheme: instead of paying investors out of revenues from business projects, it was paying long-standing investors with the money deposited by new ones[公司将从新用户处借来的资金代替商业项目盈利所得用于作为支付长期投资者的投资回报], meaning liabilities exceeded assets[负债超过资产] and the firm was permanently insolvent. When the police arrested its bosses on January 31st Ezubao had over 900,000 investors who had lost about 50 billion yuan ($7.6 billion) between them. No known Ponzi scheme has had so many victims[迄今为止受骗人数最多庞氏骗局]. To evade scrutiny[逃避审查], managers had buried their account books deep underground. Police took 20 hours to dig them out with excavators['ekskəveɪtəz][挖掘机;开凿者,发掘者].
······
▷ dodgy [ˈdɒdʒi]
【注释】
a) dishonest
b) A dodgy situation is risky and suspicious. A dodgy person is skilled in lying and deceiving. Neither should be trusted.
有不良企图的,不怀好意的
a dodgy deal
不诚实的交易
They got involved with a dodgy businessman and lost all their savings.
他们遇到了一个奸商，结果把所有积蓄都搭进去了。
▷ insolvent [ɪnˈsɒlvənt]
【注释】
a) (especially of a company) not having enough money to pay debts, buy goods, etc.
b) Piggy bank empty? Nothing but lint in your pockets? Then you're probably unable to meet any financial obligations. In other words, you are insolvent.
(尤指公司)无清偿能力的
The company has been declared insolvent.
这家公司被宣布破产了。
······
Ponzi schemes abound in China. Between 2007 and 2008 the founder of the great ant-farm scam[蚂蚁农场骗局] stole $400m from investors in the supposed health benefits of the insects before he was arrested and sentenced to death[判处死刑]. Last year in Kunming, a city in the south-west, Fanya Metals Exchange[泛亚有色金属交易所], which mostly traded rare earths[稀土], froze $6.4 billion of funds. The chairman disappeared in December (he is thought to have been arrested). Meanwhile police in Guangzhou, according to a newspaper in the southern city, are looking into what has happened to 40 billion yuan deposited with GSM, a firm that no longer exists at its registered place of business[广州警方开始调查投资到GSM公司的400亿元的去向，而这家公司在其所注册的商业领域已经不存在了].
······
▷ abound [əˈbaʊnd]
【注释】
a) to exist in large numbers
b) When things abound, there are a lot of them. In spring, birds, flowers, rain, and frisbees abound.
大量存在;有很多
Theories abound about how the Earth began.
关于地球的起源有各种各样的说法。
······
China is probably no more prone to financial fraud[金融诈骗] than other emerging markets[相比其他的新兴经济体，中国更容易发生金融诈骗] (in 2012 the Reserve Bank of South Africa[南非储备银行] said it had investigated 222 suspicious schemes). But its scams are larger in absolute terms[按绝对价值计算][数额规模更大]—and reflect its financial system’s distortions[扭曲]. Chinese banking is dominated by state-owned firms that offer depositors artificially low interest rates[低利率] and make most of their loans to other big state-owned enterprises. P2P lending (of the sort Ezubao pretended to offer) has rushed into the gaps, matching depositors who want higher rates of return with small firms that cannot get credit from big banks[将希望获得更高回报率的储户和不能从大银行贷款的小型企业匹配/联系起来]. Total P2P loans quadrupled in 2015, to 980 billion yuan, more than in America.
······
▷ prone [prəʊn]
【注释】
a) likely to suffer from an illness or show a particular negative characteristic
b) If you're prone to doing something, it means you're likely to do it, have a habit of doing it, or are susceptible to it. People who are prone to getting the flu every winter should probably get a flu shot in the fall.
易于遭受(疾病)的;有(消极)倾向的
I've always been prone to headaches.
我总是容易头疼。
He was prone to depressions even as a teenager.
甚至在青少年时期他就容易情绪抑郁。
▷ quadruple [kwɒˈdru:pl]
【注释】
a) to become four times as big, or to multiply a number or amount by four
b) When something is made up of four parts, you can describe it using the adjective quadruple, like a young gymnast's quadruple somersault.
(使)成四倍;(使)以四乘
The number of students at the college has quadrupled in the last ten years.
在过去10年内，该大学的学生人数增加了3倍。
We expect to quadruple our profits this year.
今年我们打算把利润翻两番。
······
But the business is very poorly regulated. Realising this, the authorities in December proposed a strict set of rules, including banning P2P companies from financing their own projects or guaranteeing a rate of return[(向投资者)保证回报率]. But this comes very late. About a third of the 3,600 P2P sites were classed as “problematic” by the China Banking Regulatory Commission[中国银行业监督管理委员会] at the end of 2015. Many are doubtless proper businesses but financial information in China is not reliable enough to help investors tell pyramid schemes[层压式推销;传销;(金字塔)] from ventures that are honest[金融行业信息并不够可靠，不足以帮助投资者区分哪个是传销，哪个是真正的投资].
······
Foiling the phoney pharaohs
One of the big questions is whether financial fraud will have a political impact[政治影响]. China’s stockmarket meltdown[股市崩盘] caused ructions worldwide, but relatively few demonstrations in China itself. The opposite has been true for pyramid schemes. Investors in Fanya staged a “citizen’s arrest” of the chairman[策划了一场对其主席的“人肉抓捕”行动] at a hotel in Shanghai and drove him to the police station. Protests about Ezubao have broken out in 34 cities and the police were told to prepare for the occupation of official buildings in Beijing. Investors think financial firms are regulated by the government, even when they are not, and blame the state accordingly. “My question is simple,” wrote “Mexican man” on Weibo, a microblogging site. “What on earth were the regulators doing[监管部门到底在干什么]?” Mr Xi might ponder[思索;考虑] that, too.
······
▷ ructions [ˈrʌkʃnz]
【注释】
a) a noisy argument or angry complaint
b) the act of making a noisy disturbance
吵闹;争吵;愤怒的抗议
There'll be ructions if I'm not home by midnight.
我要是午夜之前到不了家，到时肯定会吵翻天。
······
经济学人系列阅读
以上言论不代表本人立场，摘自《经济学人》杂志，仅外语学习之用。查看来源请点击下方的“阅读原文”。