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To think it all started out so well.
想想一切開始得如此順利。
When Goldman Sachs and Apple teamed up to launch a credit card in 2019, neither the storied investment bank nor the technology giant had much experience with consumer banking. That did not stop them from dreaming big.
2019年，高盛(Goldman Sachs)和蘋果(Apple)聯手推出信用卡，這家歷史悠久的投資銀行和這家科技巨擘在消費銀行業務方面都沒有太多經驗。但這並沒有阻止他們懷揣遠大的夢想。
They promised to offer “an innovative, new kind of credit card” with no fees and a cutting edge app “designed to help customers lead a healthier financial life.”
他們承諾提供一種「創新的、全新類型的信用卡」，沒有任何費用，並配備了一款尖端的程式，旨在幫助客戶過上更健康的財務生活。
Goldman chief executive David Solomon hailed the Apple Card as the “most successful credit card launch ever,” and analysts predicted that the partnership would shake up financial services.
高盛首席執行長蘇德巍(David Solomon)稱讚蘋果卡爲「有史以來最成功的信用卡推出」，分析師預測這一合作將撼動金融服務行業。
But five years on, the double act is a cautionary tale about what can go wrong when big companies try to reinvent retail finance on the fly without thinking through all of the ramifications.
然而，五年過去了，這個雙人組合成爲了一個警示故事，說明當大公司在沒有充分考慮所有後果的情況下，試圖快速重塑零售金融時，可能會出現的問題。
The top US consumer finance watchdog last week declared that Apple and Goldman had “illegally sidestepped” obligations to consumers in their haste to create a novel product. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau ordered the two groups to pay a combined $89mn for mishandling disputed charges and misleading customers about interest-free payment plans.
上週，美國頂級消費金融監管機構宣佈，蘋果和高盛在急於推出新產品時「非法規避」了對消費者的義務。消費者金融保護局(Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, CFPB)命令這兩家公司支付總計8900萬美元，原因是它們對有爭議的費用處理不當，並誤導客戶關於免息付款計劃。
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The partnership has also turned financially sour for Goldman Sachs, which is now trying to exit as it shuts down an ill-fated push into consumer banking that racked up billions in losses.
這一合作關係也使高盛的財務狀況惡化，高盛現在正試圖退出，因爲它正在關閉一項命運多舛的消費者銀行業務，該業務造成了數十億美元的損失。
The saga is partly a warning about hubris. Retail banking is not only harder than it looks but also heavily regulated by watchdogs who take their duties very seriously. That can put the regulators at odds with buccaneering entrepreneurs who want to shake up existing ways of doing business.
這個傳奇故事在一定程度上是對傲慢的警示。零售銀行業不僅比看起來更難，而且受到非常認真履行職責的監管機構的嚴格監管。這可能會使監管機構與想要顛覆現有經營方式的冒險企業家產生衝突。
Tech firms are used to launching in beta, a fancy way of saying that they put out a lightly tested product and then modify and improve it as problems are discovered. That attitude spilled over into the Apple Card. Goldman’s board was warned ahead of its August 2019 launch that the system for dealing with disputed charges was “not fully ready”. The bank, which would have had to pay penalties to Apple for a delay, opted to push ahead anyway.
科技公司習慣於推出測試版，這是一種花哨的說法，意思是他們發佈了一個經過簡單測試的產品，然後在發現問題時進行修改和改進。這種態度也影響到了蘋果卡。在2019年8月推出之前，高盛的董事會就被警告，處理爭議費用的系統「尚未完全準備好」。這家銀行本可以選擇推遲，但爲了避免向蘋果支付罰款，還是決定繼續推進。
In the first two years of the card’s existence, more than 150,000 customer-reported billing errors fell between the cracks in some way, the CFPB said. Apple often failed to send the reports to Goldman. When they did arrive, Goldman often failed to respond within legal deadlines — or at all. Customers were left on the hook for tens of thousands of charges that they disputed.
消費者金融保護局表示，在該卡存在的頭兩年裏，超過15萬個客戶報告的計費錯誤在某種程度上被忽視了。蘋果經常未能將報告發送給高盛。即使報告送達，高盛也經常未能在法定期限內回覆，甚至根本沒有回覆。客戶被迫承擔他們爭議的數萬美元的費用。
The CFPB also fined the partnership for the “confusing” way in which it offered a free instalment plan, saying that thousands of customers wrongly ended up paying interest anyway.
消費者金融保護局還因該合作伙伴提供「令人困惑」的免費分期付款方式而對其罰款，稱成千上萬的客戶最終錯誤地支付了利息。
Innovations contributed to the issues. Apple designed a distinctive user interface and integrated the card into other iPhone apps. It also insisted that everyone’s billing cycle coincide with the calendar month, because that was simpler for customers.
創新促成了這些問題。蘋果設計了一個獨特的用戶界面，並將卡片整合到其他iPhone應用中。它還堅持讓每個人的賬單週期與日曆月份一致，因爲這對客戶來說更簡單。
The card won top rankings in customer satisfaction surveys. But some cardholders got lost in key processes and failed to file forms or tick particular boxes. The single billing date led to huge surges in disputed charges that overwhelmed Goldman’s customer service.
該卡在客戶滿意度調查中名列前茅。但一些持卡人在關鍵流程中迷失方向，未能提交表格或勾選特定選項。單一的賬單日期導致爭議費用激增，使高盛的客戶服務不堪重負。
“You want to differentiate the product, but when you deviate from the norm, it can be confusing,” says Jason Mikula, a fintech consultant who previously worked at Goldman.
「你想讓產品與衆不同，但當你偏離常規時，可能會讓人感到困惑，」曾在高盛工作的金融科技顧問傑森•米庫拉(Jason Mikula)說道。
Entrepreneurs are often willing to pay that price for innovation. Financial watchdogs take a different view. There is a reason for that. If a fledging web search engine or a shaky chatbot offers less than perfect responses, where is the real harm? But charging customers unfairly or wrecking their credit scores causes measurable pain that regulators have a duty to prevent.
企業家往往願意爲創新付出代價，而金融監管機構則持不同觀點。這是有原因的。如果一個新興的網路搜索引擎或不穩定的聊天機器人提供的回應不夠完美，真正的危害在哪裏？但不公平地向客戶收費或破壞他們的信用評分會造成可衡量的痛苦，監管機構有責任防止這種情況發生。
The episode carries lessons that another group of swashbuckling financial groups should heed: money managers racing to sell alternative assets to wealthy individuals.
這一事件爲另一羣大膽的金融集團提供了教訓：那些爭相向富裕人士出售另類資產的資金管理者們應該引以爲戒。
Until recently, private equity and private credit firms took money almost exclusively from big pension funds and endowments and avoided most oversight that way. But now that the institutional market is saturated, they are jostling to offer largely untested products to retail investors who may or may not understand what they are buying.
直到最近，私募股權和私募信貸公司幾乎只從大型養老基金和捐贈基金中獲取資金，並透過這種方式避免了大部分監管。然而，現在機構市場已經飽和，它們正競相向散戶投資者提供大多未經測試的產品，而這些投資者可能並不清楚自己在購買什麼。
Some alts firms have partnered with traditional asset managers, others are opting to charge ahead on their own. I hope these new funds and model portfolios work brilliantly. If not, you can be sure that the watchdogs are going to be waiting with bared teeth.
一些另類投資公司已經與傳統資產管理公司合作，而其他公司則選擇獨自前行。我希望這些新的基金和模型投資組合能夠取得優異的表現。如果不能，你可以肯定，監管機構將會虎視眈眈地等待著。