投资者对上海自贸区头一年表示失望

Investors have expressed disappointment over slow progress on easing capital controls and other financial reforms in the zone in the year since its launch. Data released on Friday confirmed the FTZ was a long way from becoming an international finance hub.

投资者表示，对于上海自由贸易区(FTZ)成立一年来在放松资本管制和推行其他金融改革方面进展缓慢，他们感到失望。周五发布的数据证实，上海自贸区距离成为国际金融中心还很遥远。

Cross-border renminbi fund flows totalled Rmb156bn ($25bn), just 15 per cent of Shanghai’s total cross-border flows, Zheng Yang, director of the Shanghai financial services office, said in a briefing.

上海市金融服务办公室主任郑杨在简报中表示，跨境人民币资金流动总额为1560亿元（合250亿美元），仅占全市总量的15%。

But Mr Zheng also hinted that more substantive changes may yet be in the pipeline, so long as they do not lead to volatile fund flows.

但郑杨也暗示，会有更多实质性变化，只要这些变化不导致资金流动异常波动。

“Free-trade [bank] accounts haven’t become a channel for hot money and arbitrage. Everything is normal. This is good preparation for the next step of conducting stress tests on capital-account opening,” he said.

他说：“自由贸易账户资金流动正常，没有成为热钱流入套利和资金向内渗透的管道，这为下一步资本市场压力测试提供条件。”

Last December the central bank established a framework for special FTZ bank accounts that enable easy transfer between overseas accounts. The rules also appeared to allow for transfers between FTZ accounts and bank accounts in the rest of China under certain conditions. In practice, however, regulators have been cautious about opening that channel.

去年12月，中国央行为自贸区账户创建了一套制度，让海外账户之间能够方便地转账。这些规则看上去也允许自贸区账户与中国其他地区银行账户在某些情况下相互转账。不过，监管者在实践中对放开这一渠道一直很谨慎。

“Right now moving funds from inside the FTZ to outside isn’t allowed,” Zhou Hong, president of the FTZ branch of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, told the Financial Times. “We call it the ‘second line’. Strictly speaking it’s still considered a cross-border transfer. Permeability is limited.”

“眼下从自贸区内向外转移资金是不允许的。”中国工商银行(ICBC)自贸区分行行长周宏表示。“我们称之为‘二线’。严格来说它仍被视为跨境转账。资金渗透能力有限。”

Such transfers are allowed only if the funds are used for trade or another approved purpose, she added.

她补充表示，这种转账只在资金用途为贸易或另一种被批准的目的时才被允许。

Indeed, regulators remain concerned about controlling the flow of speculative capital across borders. On Thursday the State Administration of Foreign Exchange said an investigation launched in April last year revealed $10bn in fake trade used as a cover for illicit fund flows.

事实上，监管机构仍关注于控制投机资金的跨境流动。周四，国家外汇管理局(State Administration of Foreign Exchange)表示，去年4月开启的一项调查已查出100亿美元的虚假贸易被用于掩护非法资金流动。

Some analysts remain cynical about the prospects for more broad-based capital-account opening, arguing that the creation of dedicated zones is a means to strengthen government control rather than relinquishing it.

一些分析师仍然对更广泛的资本账户放开前景感到怀疑。他们认为，政府设立特别区域是为了加强管控，而不是放弃管控。

“These zones create corporate black boxes through which the anointed may flow money in and out of China,” Anne Stevenson-Yang, founder of Beijing-based consultancy J Capital Research, wrote in a note on Monday. “Clear rules have not been promulgated; the regime is, as they say, crossing the river by feeling for stones. That means that some people have more flexibility than others, all under supervision of regulators who decide passage on a case-by-case basis or at least company-by-company basis.

“这些区域制造了企业暗箱，受到‘钦点’的人可以通过暗箱将资金转入和转出中国。”美奇金投资咨询公司(J Capital Research)创始人杨思安(Anne Stevenson-Yang)周一在一份简报中指出，“政府并没有公布明确的规则。整个机制是在所谓的摸着石头过河。这意味着一部分人拥有比另一部分人更大的自由，一切都在监管机构的指导下进行，它们按照每个具体案例、或至少每家公司的情况，决定该如何走。”

“If there were a general intention to open the capital account and make renminbi into an international currency, either no such filter would be needed or the rules governing the use of these channels would be explicit and transparent.”

“如果总体的打算是开放资本账户、让人民币成为国际货币，那么要么不需要设置这些关卡，要么这些渠道会有明确、透明的使用规则。”