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Investors have been snapping up the debt of some of the eurozone’s most indebted countries to lock in attractive yields, as the traditional dividing lines between the bloc’s riskier and safer bond markets become increasingly blurred.
隨著歐元區風險較高和較安全的債券市場之間的傳統分界線變得越來越模糊，投資者一直在搶購歐元區一些負債最重國家的債務，以鎖定有吸引力的收益率。
Traders have been encouraged by declining debt ratios in Italy, Portugal, Greece and Spain, say analysts. That has come on top of a broad rally in eurozone debt late last year on hopes of interest rate cuts, and helped narrow the gap between Italian and German borrowing costs — a key measure of eurozone risks — to 1.56 percentage points, near a two-year low. In October, the gap was more than 2 percentage points.
分析師們表示，義大利、葡萄牙、希臘和西班牙的債務比率不斷下降，令交易員受到鼓舞。在此之前，由於市場對降息的希望，去年底歐元區債務普遍上漲，並幫助義大利和德國的借貸成本差距(衡量歐元區風險的一個關鍵指標)收窄至1.56個百分點，接近兩年低點。10月份，這一差距超過了2個百分點。
The tightening of these spreads marks a major shift in sentiment across the euro area, just over a decade after a long-running debt crisis almost broke the single currency and led to bailout loans for a number of countries.
這些利差的收窄標誌着整個歐元區的情緒發生了重大轉變，而這距離一場曠日持久的債務危機僅過去了十多年。那場危機幾乎摧毀了該單一貨幣，並導致一些國家獲得救助貸款。
“We think 2024 will be the year when the boundaries blur between core and periphery,” said Aman Bansal, lead European rates strategist at Citi.
花旗(Citi)首席歐洲利率策略師阿曼•班薩爾(Aman Bansal)表示：「我們認爲，2024年將是核心區和外圍區之間界限模糊的一年。」
He pointed to falling debt to GDP levels among peripheral nations and higher net debt issuance in France and Germany.
他指出，歐元區外圍國家的債務與GDP之比正在下降，法國和德國的淨債務發行量也在上升。
Christian Kopf, head of fixed income at Union Investment, Germany’s third largest asset manager, said he had profited “handsomely” from buying the debt of Greece and Portugal, adding that their public debt ratios are falling.
德國第三大資產管理公司Union Investment的固定收益主管克里斯蒂安•科普夫(Christian Kopf)表示，他從購買希臘和葡萄牙債券中「獲利豐厚」，並補充稱，這兩個國家的公共債務比率正在下降。
“It’s really quite simple,” he said. “Bonds that yield more than German Bunds are likely to also return more — unless the issuer’s solvency deteriorates significantly, which is not the case in the euro area periphery.”
「這真的很簡單，」他說。「收益率高於德國國債的債券也可能獲得更高的回報——除非發行人的償付能力顯著惡化，而歐元區外圍國家的情況並非如此。」
According to IMF forecasts, debt to GDP will rise in France and Belgium over the next two years but decline significantly in Greece and Portugal, with modest declines also forecast in Italy and Spain.
根據國際貨幣基金組織的預測，未來兩年，法國和比利時的債務與GDP的比例將上升，但希臘和葡萄牙的將大幅下降，義大利和西班牙的預計也將小幅下降。
Eurozone debt prices have fallen this week ahead of the European Central Bank’s rate-setting meeting on Thursday, where investors will watch for any hints as to when the central bank will start lowering rates. Markets are pricing in 1.3 percentage points of ECB cuts this year.
本週，在歐洲央行週四召開利率制定會議之前，歐元區債務價格已經下跌，投資者將關注央行何時開始降息的任何暗示。市場預計歐洲央行今年將降息1.3個百分點。
Still, despite the ECB’s deposit rate currently at a record high of 4 per cent, economic growth has been higher over the past year in Spain, Greece and Portugal than it has been in Germany or France, while Italy’s economy has stagnated.
不過，儘管歐洲央行的存款利率目前創下了4%的歷史新高，但西班牙、希臘和葡萄牙過去一年的經濟增速卻高於德國或法國，而義大利的經濟則停滯不前。
“Spain and Portugal have suffered less from the impact of the Russian war against Ukraine as the Iberian peninsula was less dependent on energy imports from Russia, while the Next Generation EU common debt issuance programme has benefited smaller countries the most,” said Oliver Eichmann, head of rates fixed income at Europe, the Middle East and Africa at DWS. Next Generation EU was set up in 2020 to reconstruct the region’s pandemic-stricken economies.
DWS歐洲、中東和非洲利率固定收益主管奧利弗•艾希曼(Oliver Eichmann)表示：「西班牙和葡萄牙受俄羅斯對烏克蘭戰爭的影響較小，因爲伊比利亞半島對從俄羅斯進口能源的依賴程度較低，而下一代歐盟(Next Generation EU)共同債務發行計劃使較小的國家受益最大。」「下一代歐盟」於2020年成立，旨在重建該地區受疫情影響的經濟。
“There is a high likelihood that these established instruments will be used again in the future and that works in favour of less volatile spreads,” Eichman said.
「這些既定工具很有可能在未來再次使用，這對波動較小的利差有利，」 艾希曼表示。
The tightening of spreads comes in spite of the ECB’s announcement it would stop buying government debt earlier than planned and a gush of bond sales this month.
儘管歐洲央行宣佈將提前停止購買國債，而且本月將大量出售債券，但利差仍在收窄。
Citi forecasts a record €165bn of eurozone government debt will be issued this month, 13 per cent higher than January last year. But demand has remained robust as markets bet the ECB will cut rates this year, with Spain attracting the largest ever order book for a sovereign bond on January 10 while Italy received €91bn in bids for a 30-year debt sale, the largest Italian order book since the start of 2021.
花旗銀行預測，本月歐元區國債發行量將達到創紀錄的1650億歐元，比去年1月高出13%。但由於市場押注歐洲央行將在今年降息，需求依然強勁，西班牙在1月10日吸引了有史以來最大的主權債券訂單，而義大利30年期國債銷售收到了910億歐元的投標，這是自2021年初以來義大利最大的訂單。
Citi’s Bansal said that pressures from net issuance — after excluding bond redemptions and the ECB’s purchases — are greatest in the eurozone’s core countries, with France on track to issue a record €140bn net this year.
花旗銀行的班薩爾表示，歐元區核心國家的淨髮行——剔除債券贖回和歐洲央行的購買後——壓力最大，法國今年的淨髮行量將達到創紀錄的1400億歐元。
“France is slowly moving from a core to a periphery economy in terms of fiscal vulnerabilities,” said Tomasz Wieladek, chief European economist at T Rowe Price.
普信(T Rowe Price)首席歐洲經濟學家托馬斯•維爾德克(Tomasz Wieladek)表示：「就財政脆弱性而言，法國正緩慢地從核心經濟體轉向外圍經濟體。」
France’s annual budget deficit was 4.8 per cent of GDP in the third quarter of last year, up from 4.4 per cent the previous quarter, according to data from Eurostat this week, while Portugal, Greece and Ireland each clocked a surplus.
歐盟統計局(Eurostat)本週發佈的數據顯示，去年第三季度，法國的年度預算赤字佔GDP的比例爲4.8%，高於前一季度的4.4%，而葡萄牙、希臘和愛爾蘭均實現了盈餘。
Meanwhile, many investors believe that the ECB’s so-far untested transmission protection instrument, which allows the ECB to buy unlimited amounts of bonds of any member country judged to be suffering from an unjustified rise in its borrowing costs, offers protection against high interest rates for the bonds of “peripheral” countries.
與此同時，許多投資者認爲，歐洲央行迄今未經檢驗的傳導保護工具——允許歐洲央行無限額購買任何被認爲借貸成本不合理上升的成員國的債券——爲「外圍」國家的債券提供了防範高利率的保護。
Mary-Therese Barton, chief investment officer for fixed income at Pictet Asset Management, said she expected a continued convergence of eurozone borrowing costs this year owing to the “collectivity of risk” across the bloc, alongside growing pressure for the eurozone’s largest countries to boost spending on defence and the energy transition.
百達資產管理公司(Pictet Asset Management)固定收益業務首席投資官瑪麗-特蕾莎•巴頓(Mary-Therese Barton)表示，她預計今年歐元區借款成本將繼續趨同，原因是整個歐元區的「風險集體化」，以及歐元區最大國家在國防和能源轉型方面增加支出的壓力越來越大。
“Despite all the doom mongers on the European project there is just this border narrative about socialisation of the debt more broadly . . . in which case spread convergence makes every sense,” Barton said.
巴頓說：「儘管有很多人對這一歐洲項目持悲觀態度，但在更廣泛的意義上，債務社會化只是一種邊界敘事......在這種情況下，利差趨同是完全合理的。」
Additional reporting by Martin Arnold in Frankfurt
馬丁•阿諾德(Martin Arnold)法蘭克福補充報導
