经济学人中英对照14

《The Economist》《经济学人》中文版
Translated From 《The Economist》,By ecocn team https://www.sodocs.net/doc/fa13723212.html,
房贷困境2009-03-07HSBC's rights issue
汇丰增股
Household chores
房贷困境
Mar 5th 2009
From The Economist print edition

Is HSBC’s $17.7 billion rights issue a sign of weakness or of strength?
汇丰177亿美元的增股是好还是坏呢？

THERE are two radically different tales doing the rounds about HSBC, Europe’s biggest lender by market value. The first says that HSBC, deep down, is still an emerging-markets operation run by rugged types who disdain the sorcery of modern finance. Under the temporary grip of an evil spell in 2003 they bought Household, an American consumer-credit firm that then haemorrhaged losses. On March 2nd they snapped out of it. HSBC’s chairman acknowledged that it was “an acquisition we wish we had not undertaken”, wrote off its cost and promised to run down its book of dodgy loans. Having opened its heart, HSBC felt able to lower its dividend and raise its core tier-one capital ratio to 8.5%, above those of JPMorgan Chase (***%) and Santander (7.2%), two more of the Western world’s biggest banks also vying for the title of the safest one.

对于欧洲市值最大的借贷商，汇丰银行来说，一直以来有两个风马牛不相及的故事围绕着它，第一个故事是说：实际上汇丰仍然在新兴市场里运营一个不论是谁都会放弃的现代金融的类似巫术般的困难类型的项目。在2003年那段黑暗的时期，他们购买了房产，是一个连美国消费者信贷公司都蒙受巨大损失的项目。在3月2日，他们东山再起，汇丰主席意识到“这是我们希望，却不可能得到的东西”，注销了其成本，并且答应减少不良贷款。事实上，汇丰能够降低他的红利和提升其核心一级资本充足率至8.5%，高于摩根大通的***%和桑坦德银行的7.2%。更多西方国家的最大的银行们都在竞争最安全银行的名号。

Against this there is a horror story. It says that HSBC’s definition of capital excludes mark-to-market losses on asset-backed securities (ABS). Furthermore, particularly demanding critics say that it also excludes mark-to-market losses on its loan book. Like almost all banks, HSBC carries these at book value and impairs as customers default. However, include both these items and the core tier-one ratio would drop to just 2%. Treating loan books on the same basis, JPMorgan would be at 5% and many other banks would be insolvent.

（除了上面提到的故事），这里有一个恐怖故事，据说汇丰的资本定义是不包含资产证券化过程中的市值损失。此外苛刻的评论家们还说资产定义也不包括贷款项目的市值损失。和几乎大多数的银行一样，汇丰银行将这些损失和贷款人的违约损失一并入账。然而包括这些项目和核心一级比率会降至2%，影响到贷

款项目的相同基准，摩根大通大约5%，许多其他银行则相继破产

This would suggest that HSBC is in fact poorly capitalised, and needs to raise even more equity. The alternative, advocated by, among others, Knight Vinke, an activist investor, would be to cut loose Household, which HSBC does not legally guarantee and which accounts for just over half of the additional mark-to-market losses. Household’s credit spreads are much higher than HSBC’s, suggesting that investors think this is possible, despite HSBC’s verbal assurances to the contrary.

这暗示汇丰事实上是资本不充裕的，需要提升股本。在很多的投资者中有一位叫Knight Vinke的提出一种方法，就是割断汇丰不能合法的提供担保并且也是占据额外市值损失高达一半的房产项目。尽管汇丰不能提供书面担保，投资者认为房产的信贷差额高于汇丰估计的可能性很大。

Which story is right? Given the risk of litigation, the reputational hit and the fact that HSBC has itself loaned Household some $13.5 billion, its mark-to-market loss would have to get a lot worse before HSBC was prepared to let it default. And like many banks, HSBC argues that there is at least some chance mark-to-market losses overstate the ultimate impairments it will face. The ABS loss has been very volatile, doubling in six months and stands at ten times HSBC’s “stress test” estimate of the probable hit. The mark-to-market loss on Household’s loan book is double what optimistic analysts think the likely ultimate impairment will be.

那么那个是对的呢？在给定的法律风险下，名声的打击和汇丰借出房贷，即市值损失高达135亿美元之巨这一事实所造成的恶劣影响，以致其不如让这些借贷者违约所产生的影响要来的小。和很多的银行一样，汇丰认为至少有一些可能使市值损失夸大了他所面临的损失。6个月内翻倍，或在汇丰压力测试中的可能损失的估计值的10倍，都表明资产证券化的损失是不稳定的。房贷项目的市值损失是乐观分析师他们估计的可能最大损失值的2倍。

Pleading that fair-value accounting is cruel is hardly unique, but what makes HSBC’s position more credible than most is that it has the capacity to wait and see. Its funding position is excellent with deposits exceeding loans, reducing its dependence on wholesale markets. And the core business continues to generate lots of pre-provision earnings. If spread out over several years, the bank could absorb the hit from Household implied by the mark to-market valuation without damaging its capital.

拜公允价值会计严格之所赐，这几乎不是唯一的。，汇丰银行的地位比大多数银行更可靠的原因是他有能力观望。他的资金条件的优势是储蓄大于借贷，这就减少了对批发市场的依赖，而且他的核心业务不断的产生大量的预先规定的

收益。如果储蓄和借贷之间的差额已经持续好几年的话银行就能吸收来自房贷市值损失的冲击，从而避免他的资本受损。

Indeed the real moral of the tale is different. Compared with other banks HSBC is protected by its big deposit base and its profitability. It looks therefore as if investors will back the rights issue. Others do not have even that comfort.

的确，故事的真实道德是不同的。与其他银行不同，汇丰受其庞大的储蓄和高盈利业务的保护，避免损失。因此这看起来似乎投资者要支持增股。其他银行就没有这么好的待遇了。

发表于15:14 | 阅读全文 | 评论 0 | 编辑 | 分享 0物理和哲学2009-03-07
[2009.3.5] physics and philosophy: I'm not looking, honest!“真的”，我没看！
前言：如果你不是学物理或者哲学的，建议不要看。
如果你不对物理或哲学感兴趣，建议不要看。
如果你只是对题目好奇，建议不要看。

Physics and philosophy
物理和哲学

I'm not looking, honest!
“真的”，我没看！

Mar 5th 2009
From The Economist print edition

The good news is reality exists. The bad is it’s even stranger than people thought
好消息是存在有真实。坏消息是它比人们之前认为的更奇怪。

“HOW wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progress.” So said Niels Bohr, one of the founders of quantum mechanics. Since its birth in the 1920s, physicists and philosophers have grappled with the bizarre consequences that his theory has for reality, including the fundamental truth that it is impossible to know everything about the world and, in fact, whether it really exists at all when it is not being observed. Now two groups of physicists, working independently, have demonstrated that nature is indeed real when unobserved. When no one is peeking, however, it acts in a really odd way.

“多么神奇，我们遇到了矛盾！现在我们有机会前进了。”量子力学[1]的奠基人尼尔斯?玻尔如是说。自从该理论19世纪20年代诞生之日起，物理学家和哲学家一直在探索这一理论对真实造成的奇怪结果，包括对一个基本真理的探索，即不可能知道世界上的一切事物，以及事实上，我们看不到的东西是否确实存在。现在独立工作的两组物理学家已经证实了看不见的自然确实存在。然而，当没人看得见时，自然的行为方式却十分奇怪。

In the 1990s a physicist called Lucien Hardy proposed a thought experiment that makes nonsense of the famous interaction between matter and antimatter—that when a particle meets its antiparticle, the pair always annihilate one another in a burst of energy. Dr Hardy’s scheme left open the possibility that in some cases when their interaction is not observed a particle and an antiparticle could interact with one another and survive

. Of course, since the interaction has to remain unseen, no one should ever notice this happening, which is why the result is known as Hardy’s paradox.

二十世纪九十年代，一位名叫吕希安?哈代的物理学家提出了一个假想的试验：粒子和反粒子相遇时，这组物质将相互抵消，并爆发出能量。这一实验对于著名的物质与反物质的相互作用而言毫无意义。哈代博士的方案也留下了另一种可能，即在某些情况下，粒子和反粒子的相互作用无法观察，那么二者将相互影响并共存。当然，由于这种相互作用我们仍无法观察，没有人会注意到这一情况，这也就是为什么这一结果以“哈代悖论”而闻名于世。

This week Kazuhiro Yokota of Osaka University in Japan and his colleagues demonstrated that Hardy’s paradox is, in fact, correct. They report their work in the New Journal of Physics. The experiment represents independent confirmation of a similar demonstration by Jeff Lundeen and Aephraim Steinberg of the University of Toronto, which was published seven weeks ago in Physical Review Letters.

本周日本广岛大学的Kazuhiro Yokota和他的同事证明了，“哈代悖论”事实上是正确的。他们将他们的研究报告发表在了《新物理学杂志》上。几周前，在《物理评论快报》上也刊发了多伦多大学的Jeff Lundeen和Aephraim Steinberg对同类问题进行独立实验后得出的证明属实的结论。

The two teams used the same technique in their experiments. They managed to do what had previously been thought impossible: they probed reality without disturbing it. Not disturbing it is the quantum-mechanical equivalent of not really looking. So they were able to show that the universe does indeed exist when it is not being observed.

两个小组都在他们的实验中用到了同样的技术。他们设法完成了之前认为不可能的任务：他们在不扰动真实的情况下探查了真实。不扰动真实，在量子力学上相当于不去看。所以，他们能够证明，当我们不去观察时，世界确实存在。

The reality in question—admittedly rather a small part of the universe—was the polarisation of pairs of photons, the particles of which light is made. The state of one of these photons was inextricably linked with that of the other through a process known as quantum entanglement.

争议中的真实——必须承认，这是世界的一小部分——是许多组光子[2]（制造光的粒子）的极化。其中一个光子的状态和另一个光子通过一种叫“量子纠缠”的过程存在内在联系。

The polarised photons were able to take the place of the particle and the antiparticle in Dr Hardy’s thought experiment because they obey the same quantum-mechanical rules. Dr Yokota (and also Drs Lundeen and Steinberg) managed to observe them without looking, as it were, by not gathering enough inform

ation from any one interaction to draw a conclusion, and then pooling these partial results so that the total became meaningful.

极化的光子可以代替哈代的假想试验中的粒子和反粒子，因为他们遵守同样的量子力学规则。Yokota博士（以及Lundeen和Steinberg博士）“没看”也成功观察到他们，也即没有在任何一种相互作用中采集足够信息，从而得出结论，然后将这些局部的结论汇集起来，这样，整个命题才得以证明。

What the several researchers found was that there were more photons in some places than there should have been and fewer in others. The stunning result, though, was that in some places the number of photons was actually less than zero. Fewer than zero particles being present usually means that you have antiparticles instead. But there is no such thing as an antiphoton (photons are their own antiparticles, and are pure energy in any case), so that cannot apply here.

这些研究者发现，在一些地方，出现的光子比应该出现的多了，而其它地方则少了。尽管，最让人吃惊的结论是在某些地方，光子的数量事实上少于零。粒子少于零通常意味着这里存在着反粒子。但是，没有反光子这种物质（光子是他们自己的反粒子，在任何情况下，都是纯粹的能量），所以这里并不适用这一原理。

The only mathematically consistent explanation known for this result is therefore Hardy’s. The weird things he predicted are real and they can, indeed, only be seen by people who are not looking. Dr Yokota and his colleagues went so far as to call their results “preposterous”. Niels Bohr, no doubt, would have been delighted.

因此，对这一结果在数学上唯一相符的解释是哈代悖论。他预言的奇怪的物质真实存在，而且事实上，他们也只有在人们“不看”时才能观察到。Yokota博士和他的同事甚至称他们的结论“荒谬至极”。而这无疑会让尼尔斯?玻尔非常高兴。

[1] 量子力学的基本原理包括量子态的概念，运动方程、理论概念和观测物理量之间的对应规则和物理原理。
在量子力学中，一个物理体系的状态由态函数表示，态函数的任意线性叠加仍然代表体系的一种可能状态。状态随时间的变化遵循一个线性微分方程，该方程预言体系的行为，物理量由满足一定条件的、代表某种运算的算符表示；测量处于某一状态的物理体系的某一物理量的操作，对应于代表该量的算符对其态函数的作用；测量的可能取值由该算符的本征方程决定，测量的期待值由一个包含该算符的积分方程计算。
关于量子力学的解释涉及许多哲学问题，其核心是因果性和物理实在问题。按动力学意义上的因果律说，量子力学的运动方程也是因果律方程，当体系的某一时刻的状态被知道时

，可以根据运动方程预言它的未来和过去任意时刻的状态。
但量子力学的预言和经典物理学运动方程(质点运动方程和波动方程)的预言在性质上是不同的。在经典物理学理论中，对一个体系的测量不会改变它的状态，它只有一种变化，并按运动方程演进。因此，运动方程对决定体系状态的力学量可以作出确定的预言。
但在量子力学中，体系的状态有两种变化，一种是体系的状态按运动方程演进，这是可逆的变化；另一种是测量改变体系状态的不可逆变化。因此，量子力学对决定状态的物理量不能给出确定的预言，只能给出物理量取值的几率。在这个意义上，经典物理学因果律在微观领域失效了。
据此，一些物理学家和哲学家断言量子力学摈弃因果性，而另一些物理学家和哲学家则认为量子力学因果律反映的是一种新型的因果性——几率因果性。量子力学中代表量子态的波函数是在整个空间定义的，态的任何变化是同时在整个空间实现的。
https://www.sodocs.net/doc/fa13723212.html,/view/2785.htm
[2] 光子是传递电磁相互作用的基本粒子，是一种规范玻色子。光子是电磁辐射的载体，而在量子场论中光子被认为是电磁相互作用的媒介子。与大多数基本粒子相比，光子的静止质量为零，这意味着其在真空中的传播速度是光速。与其他量子一样，光子具有波粒二象性：光子能够表现出经典波的折射、干涉、衍射等性质；而光子的粒子性则表现为和物质相互作用时不像经典的粒子那样可以传递任意值的能量，光子只能传递量子化的能量。对可见光而言，单个光子携带的能量约为4×10-19焦耳，这样大小的能量足以激发起眼睛上感光细胞的一个分子，从而引起视觉。除能量以外，光子还具有动量和偏振态，但单个光子没有确定的动量或偏振态。
https://www.sodocs.net/doc/fa13723212.html,/view/9448.htm
[3] 量子纠缠（quantum entanglement），又译量子缠结，是一种量子力学现象，其定义上描述复合系统（具有两个以上的成员系统）之一类特殊的量子态，此量子态无法分解为成员系统各自量子态之张量积（tensor product）。
具有量子纠缠现象的成员系统们，在此拿两颗以相反方向、同样速率等速运动之电子为例，即使一颗行至太阳边，一颗行至冥王星，如此遥远的距离下，它们仍保有特别的关联性（correlation）；亦即当其中一颗被操作（例如量子测量）而状态发生变化，另一颗也会即刻发生相应的状态变化。如此现象导致了“鬼魅似的远距作用”（spooky action-at-a-distance）之猜疑，仿佛两颗电子拥有超光速的秘密通信一般，似与狭义相对论中所谓的局域性（locality）相违背。这也是当初阿尔

伯特?爱因斯坦与同僚玻理斯?波多斯基、纳森?罗森于1935年提出以其姓氏字首为名的爱波罗悖论（EPR paradox）来质疑量子力学完备性之缘由。
量子力学是非定域的理论，这一点已被违背贝尔不等式的实验结果所证实，因此，量子力学展现出许多反直观的效应。量子力学中不能表示成直积形式的态称为纠缠态。纠缠态之间的关联不能被经典地解释。所谓量子纠缠指的是两个或多个量子系统之间存在非定域、非经典的强关联。量子纠缠涉及实在性、定域性、隐变量以及测量理论等量子力学的基本问题，并在量子计算和量子通信的研究中起着重要的作用。


发表于15:12 | 阅读全文 | 评论 1 | 编辑 | 分享 0连接朝鲜与伊朗的核扩散锁链2009-03-07
[2009.02.26] United in defiance 合力挑战
The proliferation chain that links North Korea and Iran
连接朝鲜与伊朗的核扩散锁链

United in defiance
合力挑战

Feb 26th 2009
From The Economist print edition





THE final frontier is being assaulted by a couple of troubling pioneers. North Korean officials are boasting that they will soon launch a rocket that will lift a communications satellite into space. With this defiant spectacular, they seem to be cocking a snook at America, South Korea, Japan, China and Russia, who have been trying through six-party talks to curb North Korea’s equally vaunted nuclear-weapons efforts. Meanwhile, earlier in February, Iran—suspected of harbouring similar nuclear ambitions to North Korea’s, though it denies this—lifted its own small, supposedly home-made satellite into orbit too.

一伙招人厌烦的拓荒者正在侵犯（宇宙空间这一人类）最后的新疆域。朝鲜官员们正在炫耀着将一枚携带有一颗通讯卫星的火箭射入太空的计划，通过这一挑衅壮举，他们似乎正在对美国、韩国、日本、中国和俄罗斯表达藐视之情，后五国近年来正试图通过六方会谈束缚住朝鲜同样自负的核武器成就。与此同时，在二月的早些时候，尽管自己否认但却仍被怀疑抱有与朝鲜一样核野心的伊朗，已经将一颗具信为自制的小型卫星送入轨道。

Both regimes trumpet their space prowess, and indeed such technological feats are not easy to achieve. But how do these “civilian” space efforts complement their terrestrial nuclear work? That is the question that deeply worries outsiders.

两国政权都在鼓吹着它们的太空实力，诚然，这些技术的获得绝非易事；但对旁观者而言，这些“民用”太空成果将如何对两国的陆基核项目进行补充这一问题正在深深困扰着它们。

India showed the way: its supposedly civilian space programme sometimes won generous outside assistance, even as nuclear help was denied for fear of advancing its suspected weapons-building. As a result

of the parallel effort, India now has missiles capable of delivering nuclear warheads on targets not just throughout Pakistan, but deep inside China too. Quite simply, the technology needed to lift a satellite off the launch pad and shield it from damage on its way into space is indistinguishable from that needed to launch a far-flying nuclear-tipped ballistic missile.

印度以身作则：尽管它国由于担忧核技术方面的帮助会促进印度疑似的核武器生产而拒伸援手，但它被推测为民用目的的空间项目却时常能获得外部的慷慨解囊。作为这一平行努力的结果，印度如今拥有了不但能够将核弹头投送至巴基斯坦全境、而且能打击中国腹地的导弹。道理很简单，将一颗卫星从发射台发射、并将它安全送入太空的技术，与发射一枚远程的携带核弹头的弹道导弹所需的技术区别甚小。

North Korea and Iran appear to be following suit. Kim Jong Il’s regime claims to have first embarked on its space adventures in 1998, when it launched a Taepodong-1 rocket over an alarmed Japan, across the Pacific towards a startled America. Mr Kim even issued a stamp to celebrate what was said to have been the successful launch of a satellite that had since been warbling patriotic tunes back from space. Oddly, no one else ever picked up its signal. A failed missile test, concluded America, after watching the rocket plop down in the Pacific.

朝鲜和伊朗看起来正紧随其后。金正日政权宣称，早在1998年朝鲜便踏上了太空征程，是年，它发射了一枚大浦洞-1型火箭，这枚火箭在越过了惊恐的日本后，飞过太平洋，直奔目瞪口呆的美国而去。对此，金先生还特意发行了一张邮票，以庆祝所谓的此后在太空吟唱爱国旋律的卫星被成功发射；奇怪的是，从未有谁曾收到它的信号。当看到火箭坠入太平洋之后，美国断定这是一次失败的导弹试射。

Whether the satellite was a figment of Mr Kim’s imagination hardly matters. The latest promised test-launch will violate resolution 1718, which bans North Korea from all such activity. This was passed by the United Nations Security Council in 2006, unusually with China’s backing, after North Korea first tried (but failed) to launch a still more capable missile and then conducted what is thought to have been its first nuclear test. Its determination now to carry on launching regardless has led to speculation in some quarters that the missile, assuming it launches successfully, could even be shot down by the new ballistic-missile defences that Japan and America have been frantically cobbling together to protect Japan from North Korea’s missile threats.

那颗卫星究竟是不是金先生的意淫已无关紧要，但最新承诺的试射将触犯禁止朝鲜从事所有这类行为的联合国安理会第1718号决议。这份决议是在2006年通过的，甚至连中国

都罕见地表示支持；此前，朝鲜尝试发射了一枚更具威力的导弹（不过以失败而告终），并在之后进行了被认为是该国历史上第一次的核试验。目前，朝鲜一意孤行继续发射火箭的决心已经引起了部分人士的猜测：如果火箭成功发射，那么它甚至有可能被近年来日美两国狂热拼凑出的、旨在保护日本免受朝鲜导弹威胁的新型弹道导弹防御系统击落。

Mr Kim seems to be using his missile preparations to grab the attention of the new Obama administration in America, and to raise the ante in the six-party nuclear talks. These have been stalled for months because of North Korea’s refusal to accept proper verification of its nuclear programmes; that will remain the case—or so the other five parties suspect—until the regime in Pyongyang squeezes extra goodies out of the Americans.

金正日似乎正在用这种导弹发射的准备活动吸引美国奥巴马新政府的眼球，并在六方会谈的牌桌上追加一份筹码。因为朝鲜拒绝接受对其核项目的适当查证，会谈已经中止数月；在其余五方看来，这种僵持局面仍将继续，直到平壤政权从美国人那里榨取出新的好处。

The test, if it goes ahead, will also roughly coincide with an annual joint military exercise between America and South Korea, at a time when relations between South and North have deteriorated badly. The North Korean media claim, not for the first time, that the two Koreas are at “the brink of war”, and that America is preparing a pre-emptive strike against the North.

如果付诸实施，那么这次试射也将在一个南北关系严重恶化的时期，与美韩年度联合军事演习的日期大致重合。朝鲜媒体宣称朝韩双方正处在“战争边缘”，而美国正在准备对朝方进行先发制人的打击，这一论调并不新鲜。

Certainly Mr Kim is determined to look as threatening as possible. Writing in the Washington Post on February 19th, Selig Harrison, who is a frequent visitor to North Korea, said that the foreign-ministry and defence officials he talked to recently had left him with the impression that North Korea’s stash of plutonium (which is exhibit-A in the six-party talks, though there are lingering concerns that Mr Kim has also dabbled in enriched uranium, another possible bomb ingredient) had already been “weaponised”—that is, converted into missile warheads.

当然，金先生决意尽可能地使自己看上去更可怕些。经常访问朝鲜的塞利格?哈里森于2月19日在华盛顿邮报上撰文指出，近期与他会谈的朝鲜外交与国防官员给他留下了这样的印象：朝鲜的钚储藏已被“武器化”，换言之，它们被变成了核弹头；（钚储藏是六方会谈中的主要议题；尽管还始终存在着对金正日涉足另一种可能的核弹原料——浓缩铀的关注。）

If that is the c

ase, then North Korea’s “satellite” test will be doubly alarming. Although the 2006 nuclear test was thought to have fizzled, it may nonetheless have helped North Korea master a design for the sort of smaller warhead that a missile could carry.

如果这一印象属实，那么朝鲜的“卫星”试射将加倍地令人警觉。尽管2006年的核试验被认为并不成功，但这仍可能有助于朝鲜掌握能用导弹投送的、更小的核弹头的设计技术。

But there is a further, bigger, worry even than Mr Kim’s theatricals. North Korea and Iran have long been collaborating on building missiles; the two are thought to have worked together in Iran to improve on basic North Korean missile designs at times when it has been impolitic for the North to test for itself. Iran has learned a great deal from this work; recently it has been making strides in its own missile technology. No one knows whether this collaboration has included warhead or other nuclear work too (though North Korea appears to have helped Syria to build a suspected and almost completed plutonium-producing reactor, which Israel destroyed in an air raid in 2007).

比起金先生的表演来，另一个问题引起了更深也更大的忧虑。朝鲜与伊朗在导弹研制方面的合作由来已久，外界认为在一些由朝鲜自行试验并不明智的时期，两国曾于伊朗境内，在朝鲜导弹的基本设计基础上携手努力，对技术加以改进。在这一过程中，伊朗在技术上获益匪浅；近期，它正在本国的导弹技术方面大步前进。无人知晓这一合作是否也涵盖了弹头或其他的核技术（尽管朝鲜似乎曾帮助叙利亚建造了一座疑似的、近于完工的产钚反应堆，这座反应堆在2007年被以色列通过一次空袭行动摧毁。）

Strutting its stuff
炫耀之举

North Korea is evidently quite happy to brandish its bombs. It flounced out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty back in 2003 after evidence emerged that it had been cheating on an earlier denuclearisation deal with America. Iran, by contrast, claims to be an NPT member in good standing. It insists that it has no use for nuclear weapons, and that all its nuclear activities, including a uranium-enrichment effort that continues to expand in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions and sanctions, are entirely peaceful in intent; the uranium, it says, is simply intended to fuel a future fleet of power stations.

朝鲜显然乐意挥舞它的核大棒。回溯至2003年，当一些有关朝鲜在执行其早先与美国达成的去核化协议时存在欺诈行为的证据浮出水面后，它突然退出了核不扩散条约。与之形成反差的是，伊朗则宣称自己是一个守规矩的条约成员国。它坚持核武器对它而言并无用处的观点，而它拥有的、包括不顾联合国安理会的决议和制裁而继续扩大规模的铀浓缩活动在内的所有核项目

都有着和平的初衷。按照它的说法，这些铀只不过是打算为未来的一系列核电站提供燃料而已。

Nothing if not brazen, it claims backhanded vindication in a controversial National Intelligence Estimate by America’s spooks, which concluded a little over a year ago that Iran had indeed had a bomb programme, but that it had stopped in 2003 when its formerly secret uranium activities came to light. But what that report failed to explain clearly was that Iran was continuing work quite openly on the two other necessary components of a weapons programme: first, uranium enrichment (with a bit of time and redirection of piping, low-enriched uranium can easily be turned into the highly enriched sort needed for a bomb) and efforts to produce plutonium; and second, the efforts under way for the development of a missile that could carry a nuclear warhead.

伊朗还厚颜无耻地将一份存在争议的、由美国间谍完成的国家情报评估作为对自己不发展核武器的间接证明，这份评估指出在一年多前，伊朗确实曾拥有一个核弹计划，但在2003年，当此前秘密的铀项目被曝光之后，伊朗停止了这一计划。尽管如此，这份评估却未能阐明伊朗仍在核武器计划所必需的另两个组成部分上光明正大地继续开展工作，这两个部分包括：一、铀浓缩与生产钚的努力（只需要一些时间并重新调整管道方向，低浓缩铀便可被轻而易举地转化为核弹所需的高浓缩类型）；二、正在进行的、对可携带核弹头的导弹的研发。


Bushehr: no need for Iran’s enriched uranium here
布什尔：此处无需伊朗浓缩铀

Iran is the only country so far to have built a uranium-enrichment plant before having even a single working reactor that would need its uranium as fuel for the reactor core. Even a Russian-built reactor at Bushehr that is now being put through its technical paces before coming on-stream later this year will operate on Russian-supplied fuel. Nor does it have sufficient uranium ore of its own to sustain a large-scale enrichment effort. Since uranium exports to Iran are prohibited by UN sanctions, its only option eventually will be to import more of the stuff illegally, using the nuclear black market that enabled it to get secretly started in the uranium business.

伊朗是迄今为止唯一的、在尚未拥有哪怕一座需要以本国铀元素充当堆芯燃料的已运作反应堆之前却已建成铀浓缩工厂的国家。即便是由俄方在布什尔建造的、正在进行启动前技术调试的反应堆，也将使用由俄国提供的燃料。而且伊朗本国也没有充足的能维持其大规模浓缩项目的铀矿石，因为联合国制裁中禁止各国向伊朗出口铀，所以它的唯一选择便是通过核黑市，这一当年使它在铀领域悄悄起步的非法途径进口更多的原料。

Nonetheless, Iran has just passed another n

uclear milestone. According to figures contained in a new report circulated to the 35-nation board of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN’s nuclear guardian, ahead of a meeting that opens on March 2nd, Iran has accumulated an unexpectedly large amount of low-enriched uranium—enough, says the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, for Iran to be confident that, should it proceed with further enrichment, it will have sufficient material for a single nuclear weapon.

无论如何，伊朗在核征程上又刚跨过了一座里程碑。在联合国核监管组织——国际原子能机构3月2日的会议召开前夕，根据一份散发给35国理事会的新出炉报告中包含的数据，伊朗已经积累了数量大得出人意料的低浓缩铀，根据位于华盛顿的科学与国际安全研究所的说法，这一数量已经使得伊朗自信无论其是否继续进行铀浓缩活动，它都将拥有足以制造出一枚核武器的原料。

What is more, the agency reported a big discrepancy (about 30%) between the amount of uranium Iran had earlier said it was producing and the amount now stockpiled. It is often hard to guess the real output of enrichment centrifuge machines, like Iran’s, in their first stages of operation. However, in the view of other experts, even rough calculations based on earlier figures should have told inspectors that the Iranian estimate was far too low. The IAEA is confident that all the enriched uranium is properly safeguarded. But safeguards are something Iran disregards when it suits.

更重要的是，机构还指出在伊朗早先宣布的铀生产数量与目前的储量之间存在巨大差异（约30%）。在运行的初始阶段，想要正确估测如伊朗所用的浓缩离心机的实际产出并不容易，但即便如此，另一些专家认为基于早先的数据所进行的粗略计算也应该使核查人员明白伊朗人给出的估计太低了。国际原子能机构对于所有的浓缩铀都得到了适当的保障这一点信心十足。但是对伊朗人而言，若觉得更为合适，这些保障措施将被视为一纸空文。

There have long been suspicions that Iran may be engaged in a parallel, possibly military, enrichment effort: in April 2006 without notice to inspectors, it removed and then put back a cylinder of the gas from which enriched uranium of either sort is spun, so that inspectors briefly lost track of the material it contained. When they were subsequently measured, the cylinder’s contents were deemed to be correct within an acceptable margin of error. But that does not rule out the possibility that a small quantity of the gas, calculated to fall within that error margin, was diverted to test some hidden centrifuges.

外界长期存在一种猜测：伊朗可能正在从事一项与之平行的、可能用于军事目的的浓缩活动。2006年4月，在没有通报核查人员的情况下，

伊朗方面移走了一罐可从中通过旋转分离出低浓缩铀或高浓缩铀的气体，在之后又悄悄归位，因此核查人员暂时失去了储藏于其中的原料的踪迹。事后当它们被加以测量时，圆罐内的物质数量被认为没有超出误差允许的范围。但这并不排除一小部分此种气体被移作他用的可能性，即取走一些经过计算不超过误差范围的气体用于测试隐匿的离心机。

As the IAEA’s latest report makes clear, Iran is also refusing them access, as required under its safeguards obligations, to the site where it is building its own plutonium-producing reactor, one that just happens to be ideally sized for making bomb material. And it will not answer increasingly pointed questions from inspectors about studies and other information provided by several governments that appear to show weapons-related work on uranium conversion, on high explosive testing for nuclear-trigger devices and—the evidence behind the doubts about Iran’s “space” programme—on development work to redesign the inner cone of a re-entry vehicle for Iran’s Shahab-3 missile, so as to accommodate a nuclear warhead.

正如国际原子能机构最新报告所阐明的那样，伊朗也拒绝了机构对正在建设本国一座在规模上对制造核弹材料来说恰好颇为理想的产钚反应堆区域的访问权，而这种权利是其保障义务所要求的。同时，伊朗也拒绝回答核查人员愈加尖锐的问题，这些问题涉及由多国政府提供的研究与情报，它们看起来反映了伊朗一些与武器相关的活动，包括铀转化、核触发装置的高爆测试以及为了能携带核弹头而重新为伊朗流星-3型导弹的再入部分设计弹体内锥面的研发等工作，后者正是对伊朗“太空”计划产生疑问的根据。

North Korea’s neighbours may be prepared simply to huddle together, trusting in the best efforts of diplomacy and missile defences. But countries in the vicinity of Iran are becoming more agitated. Israel’s probable new prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, has said a nuclear Iran poses a far graver threat than the global recession.

朝鲜的邻国们可能已准备好仅龟缩在一起，将希望寄于外交和导弹防御的最佳结果。但那些位于伊朗周边的国家却变得日益不安。以色列可能上台的新总理本雅明?内塔尼亚胡已经表示，一个有核的伊朗将比全球性衰退所带来的威胁严峻得多。

So Barack Obama and his new team—he has now appointed special envoys to deal with both Iran and North Korea—don’t have much time to show that their promised readiness to talk directly to Iran can produce results. And unless results are forthcoming, the long-running drama over Iran’s nuclear ambitions could rapidly escalate into a global crisis.

因此，巴拉克?奥巴马与他的新团队（他已经任命了处理伊朗与朝鲜问题的

特使）在表现他们所承诺的与伊朗进行直接谈判的意愿能够获得成果的时日已无多。除非成果即将诞生，否则围绕伊朗核野心展开的漫长剧作将可能迅速升级为一场全球危机。


发表于15:09 | 阅读全文 | 评论 0 | 编辑 | 分享 0纳斯达克：救援是坨屎2009-03-05Nasdaq bail-out index
纳斯达克的救援指数

Bailing the ailing
拯救病患

Mar 3rd 2009
From https://www.sodocs.net/doc/fa13723212.html,

How Nasdaq's bail-out index measures up to the S&P 500
纳斯达克的救援指数怎么能比得上标准普尔500指数呢？

AMERICA'S government has bailed out over 20 ailing companies since the demise of Lehman Brothers in September. And once, it seems, is often not enough. On Monday March 2nd AIG received a handout of $30 billion, the insurer's fourth so far. For brave investors who are keen to follow the value of their stake in companies deemed too important to fail, Nasdaq has created a handy bail-out index. A wince-inducing glance at the share performance of 25 firms that have gone cap-in-hand shows a 50% loss since the new index's inception on January 5th, double the decline of the wider S&P 500 index.

美国政府自9月雷曼兄弟倒闭以来，已经出手拯救了超过20家奄奄一息的公司。但人们似乎一度视为这还不够。本周一，3月2日，目前全球第四大保险公司AIG公司（美国国际集团）获得了300亿美元的援助款项。针对那些认同重要公司股票不会下跌，追求股票价值的大胆投资者，纳斯达克创设了易于市场操作的救援指数。看看一度受人尊敬的25家公司让人失望的股票表现，自1月5日建立这一指数以来，这25家公司的股票市值已缩水50%，是更具代表性的标准普尔指数500指数跌幅的两倍。



人像手中拿的纸上写着：救援是坨屎，呵呵


发表于12:41 | 阅读全文 | 评论 0 | 编辑 | 分享 0新闻集团：小鬼当家2009-03-05News Corporation
新闻集团

Home alone
小鬼当家

Feb 26th 2009
From The Economist print edition

The departure of Rupert Murdoch’s second-in-command raises big questions
默多克二号人物的离职引起轩然大波

LIKE any good actor, Peter Chernin timed his exit perfectly. According to people close to him, he told Rupert Murdoch of his decision to leave his job at News Corporation some months ago, but the news came in the thick of the Oscar triumph of “Slumdog Millionaire”, a [small-budget film distributed by Fox Searchlight Pictures [注1] of which Mr Chernin is particularly proud. He had been widelyexpected to leave: nearly 13 years serving the Murdoch family as chief operating officer, with diminishing prospects of becoming chief executive, was evidently enough. He leaves with an unusually generous severance package and the right to sell at least two films a year to News Corp’s Twentieth Century Fox.

如同任何好演员一样，皮特?谢尔尼

（Peter Chernin）选择退出的时机非常完美。据知情人士透露，数月之前他在新闻集团就告知默多克他辞职的决定。但消息传出时正值“平民窟的百万富翁”在奥斯卡上获奖，这是部小成本影片，由福克斯探照灯出品，由此皮特?谢尔尼深以为傲。他对辞职已经深思熟虑:近13年服务于默多克家族担任首席运营官，继续担任首席运营官而前程暗淡显然是不行的。他得到了格外慷慨的遣散费和一年至少两部电影卖给新闻集团旗下的二十世纪福克斯电影公司的权利。

Bloomberg

Time to go, methinks
我认为，是时候离开了


For investors in News Corp, Mr Chernin’s departure is worrying for several reasons. Could he see that things were about to get much harder for the company, making his job less enjoyable? Two decades ago, Mr Murdoch used the cashflow from newspapers to get into television and film. Now the pattern is reversed, with the businesses that Mr Chernin oversees in Los Angeles and elsewhere providing money to spend on print. Mr Chernin is believed to have disagreed with Mr Murdoch’s decision to spend $5.7 billion on Dow Jones, the parent company of the Wall Street Journal, in 2007. Investors who are sceptical about investing further in newspapers may have lost an ally. His departure also raises the question of whether the firm’s film and television assets will be as well-managed and profitable in future.

新闻集团的投资者，担忧谢尔尼先生的离开有以下几个原因。他是否看到公司的事情越来越难处理从而使他的工作不太愉快？二十年前，默多克用现金从报纸业进入影视业。现在的格局得到扭转，谢尔尼在洛杉矶监管的业务和其他地方提供的钱用在出版业。有人认为在2007年不谢尔尼同意默多克花57亿美元收购道琼斯，华尔街日报的母公司。投资者们怀疑进一步投资在报纸业可能已经失去了一个盟友。他的离职也引出了一个问题：公司的影视业资产是否管理良好和未来的可赢利性。

Mr Murdoch, who is almost 78, insists that he can do the number two’s job as well as his own, which means accepting 16 direct reports from the company’s senior executives. Even once he has streamlined that structure, notes Richard Greenfield of Pali Research, an independent research firm in New York, he will need to bring in a second-in-command.

默多克，年近78岁 ，坚持他可以把副手工作做像他自己工作一样的好，这意味着直接接受16份公司高管人员的报告。八里研究(Pali Research纽约一个独立的研究公司)的首席分析师理查德?格林菲尔德（Richard Greenfield）认为[注2]，虽已精简了公司的组织结构，他将还需要引进一位二号人物。

Who that should be raises the question of succession, an issue that has long vexed investors. From Mr

Murdoch’s point of view, the obvious candidate is his youngest son, James, 36, who has run the company’s European and Asian businesses well. At some point James was expected to move to America to gain experience of News Corp’s businesses there. But James, it seems, will stay in his current job, despite the opening in Los Angeles. Ideally, Mr Chernin would have stuck around long enough to have shown James the ropes in America, ensuring a smooth handover. Now that transition looks likely to be rockier.

谁是新闻集团继承人的问题，一直在投资者间争论不休。从默多克的角度来看，显然是他的小儿子，詹姆斯， 36岁，他运行公司在欧洲和亚洲区的业务。曾几何时詹姆斯被期望会转移到美国，积累公司在美国的业务经验。但詹姆斯，似乎将留在他目前的工作，尽管公司在美国洛杉矶开幕。理想的情况下[注3]，谢尔尼能留在公司足够长的时间以便詹姆斯熟悉美国的业务情况，以确保顺利交接。现在看来过渡可能布满荆棘。

“Slumdog Millionaire”, which was made for just $15m, might have gone straight to DVD in America had Fox Searchlight not spotted its potential, put it on cinema screens and reaped commercial as well as creative glory. Peter Rice, Fox Searchlight’s boss, is one of the talented executives that News Corp insiders point to as evidence that the gap left by Mr Chernin will soon be filled. Nonetheless, investors may soon get the answer to an intriguing question: how much of News Corp’s success in recent years was down to the mogul, and how much down to the professional manager?

“平民窟的百万富翁”，制作费用仅1500万美元，原本可以在美国直接发行DVD而福克斯探照灯却没有发现它的潜力，把它放在电影大屏幕上，获得商业的奇迹。彼得?赖斯（Peter Rice），福克斯探照灯的老板，是一位优秀的新闻集团的高管，指出，谢尔尼先生的离职所造成的空白将很快填补。尽管如此，投资者可能很快就会得到一个有趣问题的答案：近年来新闻集团的成功导致多少大亨的破产，多少职业经理人的失业？

译注：
注1：公 司 名：福克斯探照灯 / 英文：Fox Searchlight / 港译：福克斯探照灯 / 台译：福克斯探照灯
官方网站：https://www.sodocs.net/doc/fa13723212.html,
公司介绍：福克斯旗下专门代理发行低成本的独立制作或非美国影片的子公司。1996年开始挂牌营业，负责制拍“福克斯”集团通过的非主流小片的企画，也从他国买进具卖点的精彩电影来美国上映。最成功的代表作，是爱尔兰出品的文艺喜剧“一路到底-脱线舞男”，影片叫好叫座还入围奥斯卡最佳影片，掀起一阵爱尔兰小品喜剧跃上国际舞台的热潮。2000年“福克斯”集团最有希望问鼎奥斯卡的影片，仍是“福克斯探照灯”的“鹅毛笔”，比母

公司出品的励志军教片“男人的荣耀”，胜算大得多。2002年，代理的英国片“我爱贝克汉姆”卖座不俗。

注2：https://www.sodocs.net/doc/fa13723212.html,/i/2009-02-27/021********.shtml

注3：新闻集团宣布，经过长达数个月的谈判，由于无法同新闻集团老板鲁珀特-默多克(Rupert Murdoch)在待遇问题上达成一致，谢尔尼将在今年6月30日合同期满后离职。谢尔尼在致福克斯员工的一封信中写道：“作出这样的决定确实很难，自20年前加盟新闻集团以来，我在现在这个职位上一干就是12年，经历了30年的职业生涯，我准备迎接新的挑战。”

谢尔尼还是福克斯集团CEO，而《贫民富翁》的发行方便是福克斯旗下专门代理发行低成本独立制作影片的子公司福克斯探照灯。谢尔尼的离去带来了一系列令人颇感兴趣的问题，他的下一站会是哪儿？这对默多克的“传媒帝国”意味着什么？在席卷全球的金融风暴的冲击下，新闻集团亦未能幸免，过去半年内股价下跌54%，一年内下跌67%。早在去年8月，外界就开始猜测谢尔尼在5年合同期满后是否选择留任。当然，这种猜测是在传媒业开始走下滑坡以前做出的。

默多克对谢尔尼信赖有加，辅以重任，让他全权负责基于好莱坞的电视电影业务，这些业务为新闻集团贡献了最大份额的营业利润。但是，长期以来就存在这样一个疑问，那就是57岁的谢尔尼作为新闻集团的二号人物是否满意，是否愿意活在78岁的传奇媒体大亨默多克的阴影下。默多克多次暗示，他尚没有退休计划，同时明确表示希望有朝一日将CEO一职让给四个成年子女中的一个。外界认为，负责新闻集团亚洲和欧洲业务的詹姆斯-默多克(James Murdoch)的希望最大。

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