Investment banks- Wall Street is back

Investment banks投资银行Wall Street is back华尔街卷土重来American investment banks dominate global finance once more. That’s not necessarily good for America美国投行再次占据全球金融主导地位, 对美国未必好May 11th 2013 | From the print editionFOR a few tense weeks in 2008, as investment-bank executives huddled behind the imposing doors of the New York Federal Reserve, Wall Street seemed to be collapsing around them. Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy, Merrill Lynch collapsed into the arms of Bank of America. American International Group (AIG) and Citigroup had to be bailed out and the rot seemed to be spreading. Hank Paulson, the treasury secretary at the time, recalled in his memoir that: “Lose Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs would be next in line—if they fell the financial sys tem might vaporise.”2008年投行高层挤在纽约联储局里的那几个月，华尔街摇摇欲坠。

雷曼兄弟申请清盘；美林无力独支，被美国银行并购；美国国际集团和花旗集团被美国政府注资救市，即便如此灾难仍在蔓延。

当年的财长保尔森在回忆录中写道”接下来就是摩根和高盛了，他们也倒下的话，金融系统就灰飞烟灭了”Across the Atlantic, European politicians saw this as the timely comeuppance of American capitalis m. Angela Merkel, Germany’s chancellor, blamed her peers in Washington for not having regulated banks and hedge funds more rigorously. European banks saw the crisis as their chance to get one up on the American banks that had long dominated international finance. Barclays quickly pounced on the carcass of Lehman Brothers, buying its American operations in what Bob Diamond, the head of its investment bank at the time, called “an incredible opportunity” to gain entry to the American market. Deutsche Bank, a G erman giant, also expanded to take market share from American rivals. The dominance that American firms had long exerted over global capital markets seemed to have come to an abrupt end.大西洋另一面的政客认为这是美国式资本主义的报应。

德国总理默克尔指责华盛顿对银行和对冲基金的管理太松了，欧洲的银行则视危为机欲籍此主导国际金融秩序。

巴克莱迅速的扑向了雷曼兄弟的残骸，收购其美国业务，巴克莱当时投行负责人bod diamond称之为进入美国市场的”良机”。

德国巨头德意志银行也在美国扩张其市场份额。

美国长期的国际金融主导地位似乎将毁于一旦。

Almost five years on it is Europe’s banks that are on their knees and Wall Street that is resurgent. Switzerland’s two biggest banks, UBS and Cred it Suisse, which were expanding fast before the crisis, are still shedding assets. Royal Bank of Scotland, which for a brief time broke into the ranks of the world’s ten-biggest investment banks, remains a ward of the British government. The share of the investment-banking market held by European banks has slumped by a fifth since the crisis (see our special report), with many of the gains going to Wall Street’s surviving behemoths. JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup alone account for a third of th e industry’s revenues. Two European outfits, Barclays and Deutsche Bank, have managed to share in some of these spoils since the crisis. Both, however, face hostile regulations at home and abroad that seem likely to crimp their global ambitions. And although HSBC has increased its share of some investment-banking markets, it is still well behind Wall Street’s titans.近五年来，欧洲银行举步为艰，华尔街日益复兴。

危机前快速扩张的瑞士最大的两家银行瑞士银行和瑞士信贷现仍在剥离资产。

曾一度挤身全球十大投行之列的苏格兰皇家银行，现仍处于英国政府的庇护之下。

危机发生以来欧洲银行所占的投行市场份额下降了五分之一，大部分又被华尔街巨鳄吃回去了。

仅摩根，高盛和花旗三家就占了全球份额的三分之一。

巴克莱和德意志银行这两家欧洲的机构虽然在这次危机中占了点小便宜，但却由于本国和海外所面临的敌意监管导致其全球策略无法施展。

汇丰的投行市场份额也有所增长但仍不能和华尔街巨头相提并论。

What America got right美国做了什么The industry over which Wall Street is reasserting itself is very different from the one it dominated half a decade ago. Revenues globally have fallen by about $100 billion, or almost a third. Employment has plunged, with London alone shedding 100,000 jobs. Pay has fallen too. Higher capital requirements and other regulations, including America’s absurdly complicated (and still unfinished) Dodd-Frank act, are likely to erode the profitability of the industry. The stellar returns earned by banks before the crisis and the massive rewards paid to their employees are unlikely to recur soon, if at all.华尔街再次主导的这个行业和五年前已经不同了，全球收入减少了近三分之一，约一千亿美元。

工作机会也大大减少，仅伦敦就缩减了十万个职位。

薪酬也缩水了。

行业的盈利能力被更高的资本要求和其他监管法案所侵蚀，包括”多德-弗兰克法案“这样复杂得离谱的法案(其麻烦还未结束)。

危机前那样的暴利和丰厚的薪资奖金再也没有了，至少近期是不可能了。

One of the reasons that American banks are doing better is that they took the pain, and dealt with it, faster. The American authorities acted quickly, making their banks write down bad debts and rapidly raise more capital. Those that proved unwilling or unable, and even those, like Goldman, that claimed they didn’t need it were force-fed additional capital. As a result America’s big banks have been able to return to profitability, pay back the government and support lending in the economy. This has helped them contribute to an economic revival that in turn is holding down bad debts.美国的银行之所以能够好起来，其中一个原因是他们承受了痛苦，并且较快地解决了它。