哈佛大学教授:中国央行继任者最重要的事是处理坏账

网易研究局NO.194

网易研究局（微信ID：wyyjj163）独家稿件

3月19日，周小川卸任中国人民银行行长。作为新中国历史上任期最长的一位央行行长，周小川推动国有商业银行股份制改革、人民币国际化、人民币加入SDR、利率市场化改革……他参与了中国金融改革的每一个关键环节。全球政要、经济学家如何看待这位“超级行长”？

就这一话题，网易研究局（微信ID：wyyjj163）独家采访了包括美联储原主席格林斯潘（Alan Greenspan）、美国原副国务卿理查德·库珀（Richard N. Cooper）、哈佛大学经济学院原院长本杰明·弗里德曼（Benjamin Friedman）在内的多位全球政要和经济学家。

以下为哈佛大学经济学院原院长本杰明·弗里德曼教授的观点：

本杰明·弗里德曼（Benjamin M. Friedman）曾任哈佛大学经济学院院长，现为哈佛大学经济系教授，多次为美国政策制定者与公共职位候选人就经济问题提供建议。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：如何看待周小川行长在央行近16年的工作？

本杰明·弗里德曼：我认为周小川先生在担任中国人民银行行长期间不仅为银行，也为中国经济的健康发展做出了巨大贡献，我愿意就这两个方面分享一下我自己的观点。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：您如何看待周小川对中国金融市场改革的贡献？

本杰明·弗里德曼：首先我想谈一谈周小川在中国人民银行所起到的作用，在国外的银行界看来，周小川在职期间央行相比过去在其专业性上取得了巨大的进步，究其原因不仅是周小川本人对银行的杰出的领导能力和实施的货币政策，也归功于他所吸纳进入银行的多名经济学人才。

周小川在吸引、留住人才、以及为如此优秀的一批金融界精英提供支持方面功不可没，所以首先要对他在银行界的卓越领导能力表示我的敬意。

对于周小川行长在任职期间所采取的政策，我想讲一讲我认为最重要和最成功的三个方面。

第一，周小川在担任央行行长之前，中国的通货膨胀率很高且波动很大，货币和信贷在很多方面也不可控，我认为周小川上任之后出台的货币政策有效控制了通胀，同时也让货币和信贷变的更加可控，其实这两点对任何经济体的中央银行来说都是中心任务。央行在这方面取得了非常不错的进展，这也可以说是周小川的个人成就。

第二，具体地讲，世界各国都对中国经济在2007-2009年金融危机之后依旧能够保持非常稳定的增长的原因感到非常惊讶，我还记得2009年我在中国曾经参加过一个会议，当时参会的还有许多外国研究中国的专家，他们很多人都对中国经济能够继续保持增长表示怀疑，因为当时其它发达国家的经济都在经历严重的衰退，美国当时的经济处于1930年大萧条之后最严重的状况，但当时出席的中国经济学家都对中国经济保持继续增长非常自信，而他们的判断后来被证明是完全正确的。我们知道要取得这样的成就要依靠很多方面的共同发力，不仅是货币政策一项，还有政府投资项目和其他方面，但尽管如此，央行通过货币政策还是尽了很大的努力来实现中国经济的持续增长，因此我认为这是周小川任央行行长时非常重要的经济事件。

最后我想指出的是，人民币汇率和中国持续放开的资本市场价格在几年前是非常不稳定的，这原本可能会对中国经济增长造成严重的负面影响，但中国成功地度过了这一波动阶段，并且取得了很好的发展。当然除了央行的货币政策之外还有很多其它方面的原因，但央行毫无疑问在其中发挥了重要作用，这也是在周小川任央行行长期间发生的，我认为这也体现出他杰出的能力。

以上是我个人的三个方面的看法。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：为了应对2008年的金融危机，央行对其资产负债表进行了迅速扩张，许多人在当时并不认同周小川的举措，您对当时他采取的政策怎么看？

本杰明·弗里德曼：关于资产负债表的扩张，我们可以看一看在当时其它国家中央银行的做法。比如我自己的国家美国，金融危机之前美联储的资产负债表大概是8000亿美元，在其顶峰曾经达到过4.5万亿美元，也就是说美联储的资产负债表大约翻了5倍左右。再看一看其它发达国家的中央银行，其资产负债表大概也翻了这么5倍。英国央行和欧洲央行大概翻了3-4倍，但到现在也没有完全脱离金融危机的影响，日本央行资产负债表也大概翻了3-4倍、瑞典央行的资产负债表翻了3倍。所以可以看出当时世界各国的中央央行都在采取和周小川类似的措施，以便让本国经济保持稳定，所以我认为这没有什么值得批评的。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：所以您认为周小川是一位成功的、杰出的银行领导者吗？

本杰明·弗里德曼：是的，我认为在周小川卸任以后也不会被人们忘记，就像曾经的美联储主席保罗·沃尔克等知名人物一样，周小川的贡献在未来会被人们铭记。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：您认为在周小川卸任之后，中国金融市场的发展会出现怎样的变化？

本杰明·弗里德曼：其中最重要的，至少在我看来最重要的就是处理坏账。当然，我说的主要是银行的坏账，但同时也包括政府持有的坏账。我们知道中国经济最近几年的增长当中持有债务的升值起到了很大的作用，但这当中有很多都不能算是良好的资产。

所以我认为要处理这样的坏账需要很长一段时间，也是一个缓慢的过程。当然，我对中国处理这种问题的能力很有信心，所以应该不会对中国经济产生什么持续性的威胁，但这确实是迫切需要解决的问题。至少按照西方媒体的报道，中国政府正在采取坚决的措施来解决中国经济存在的问题。

另一个重要的方面就是提升银行的专业能力，我曾经和四大银行的许多高层官员交谈过，他们的许多决定都会受到政治因素的影响，我不是研究政治的，只是一名经济学家，但我希望在未来中国的发展能够让这些银行以更加专业的方式运作。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：人民币要实现国际化面临的最大挑战和困难是什么？

本杰明·弗里德曼：人民币的国际化不仅是一个货币层面的问题，而是货币背后市场层面的问题，也就是市场的安全性。比如美元的持有，现在很多人都有大量的美元存款，但这不是我们要讲的。比如中国现在有数万亿的美元存量，但这并不是中国的“美元存款”，而是持有着各种各样的以美元计价的资产。那么谈到货币国际化，其实要看其它国家的投资者能否具有参与这个国家资本市场的能力，这也是国际性交易最重要的原则。如果人们持有美元，他们可以同时将美元作为一种能够升值的资产，比如像国债交易和银行存款，中国的很多证券市场应该尝试推进这一点，并且也需要等待合适的时机，就像美元和欧元和其他货币一样。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：人民币在两年前加入了SDR，您认为这会对人民币的国际化起到推动作用吗？

本杰明·弗里德曼：我不这么认为，我对SDR的作用一直持怀疑态度，在我看来这只具有一些象征性的意义。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：所以您认为SDR更多的是概念性的是吗？

本杰明·弗里德曼：是的，我不认为有多少实质性的意义。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：最近一段时间，人民币出现了快速升值。

本杰明·弗里德曼：是的。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：同时美元指数出现了相对贬值，您对这种现象怎么看？

本杰明·弗里德曼：我对短期的汇率波动并不是很关注，作为一名经济学家，过于关注短期的汇率变化没有什么意义。但长期来看，人民币确实有可能继续对美元升值，美元将会继续贬值，不仅是人民币，其它国家的货币也是一样。这只是长期货币供需发生了变化。一部分因素是由贸易流通驱动，更重要的是因为投资组合的变化。25年之后，美元在投资组合中的角色可能会相对今天下降，而人民币的国际地位可能会提升，这种转变一定会在长期影响货币价值。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：您认为人民币是一个可靠的货币吗？是否可以长期持有以规避国际金融市场的风险？

本杰明·弗里德曼：我认为现在还不是，再过几年时间人民币应该会是一个可靠的货币，但现在还没有达到。这个问题也涉及到国际投资的便利性、市场流动性和资产的安全性等问题。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：所以您认为还需要很长时间才能实现吗？

本杰明·弗里德曼：我无法判断未来人民币国际化的进展速度，有可能再过二十年就可以实现，也有可能更快。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：您认为人民币和中国的经济政策会对世界经济产生重要影响吗？

本杰明·弗里德曼：中国经济政策对世界经济的影响是毫无疑问的，因为中国已经是世界的第二大经济体，再过几年中国就将成为世界的第一大经济体。而且中国正在越来越多地参与到国际贸易当中，本国市场也很开放，所以在中国发生的事件也会影响到中国的货币，当然也会影响到世界其它国家的经济。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：我们知道美联储和中国中央银行的领导层最近都发生了更迭，鲍威尔将会担任美联储的主席，您认为未来中美两国的金融政策会出现什么变化？

本杰明·弗里德曼：这是一个很有趣的问题。美国，我们有了新的美联储主席，我想美国的金融监管政策未来将会和过去保持一致、还是朝着错误的方向发展还要再过一段时间才能得出结论。自从2008年的金融危机以来，我们采取的新的金融政策已经运行了一段时间，虽然这些政策也存在一些问题，但我想特朗普政府和国会的一些人要废除这些政策是完全错误的，这可能会导致银行体系和“影子银行”的混乱。不要忘了十年前我们遭遇的经济危机，我不希望未来政策出现放松。

而中国的情况完全不同，因为中国有着不同的体制，也有其存在的问题，我认为中国需要保持高度警惕，十年前的金融危机时刻在提醒着我们要加强监管。格林斯潘认为金融体系需要自我监管，我想这种看法已经被证明是错误的，在当时没有看出这种错误观点的人们现在不应该再重蹈覆辙。放松监管是绝对错误的，我不希望任何国家再走这样的道路。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：您知道，中国的民众一直都对美联储的政策非常关注，您认为中国经济在多大程度上会受到美联储政策的影响？

本杰明·弗里德曼：这是一个很好的问题。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：中国有很多民众担心美联储的利率调整会影响到中国的经济。

本杰明·弗里德曼：这种看法没错，因为美元在世界金融体系当中占据着主导地位，所以当美国上调利率时世界其它国家的利率可能也会上调。作为中国这样的国家，就像我之前谈到的那样，处理好坏账是更加重要的，因为那些在今天就很棘手的坏账遇到利率的上调将会更难处理。

网易研究局（微信 ID ： wyyjj163 ）：您认为未来中美两国在金融领域会出现什么冲突吗？

本杰明·弗里德曼：我不这样认为，两个国家的利率是不可能完全平衡的，这从来没有发生过，因为每个国家对商品的生产和需求能力都是不同的，所以我不认为未来中美会有什么不可避免的冲突。（杨泽宇 李兆元）

本杰明·弗里德曼（Benjamin Friedman）曾任哈佛大学经济学院院长，现为哈佛大学经济系教授，被认为是“货币学派”的新领军者及全球化主义的权威研究者，多次为美国政策制定者与公共职位候选人就经济问题提供建议。代表作是《经济增长的道德影响》和《清算之日：美国经济政策在里根时代及其后的影响》

（附英文采访实录）

Q: From a perspective of an economist, how do you comment on Zhou Xiaochuan and his nearly 16 years’ work at PBOC?

A: I think governor Zhou has made a significant contribution, not only to the bank, but also to the health and well-being of the Chinese economy, and I’m glad to provide specific as you like what I have in mind in both regards.

Q: Can you briefly comment on his contribution on China’s financial market or reform?

A: Yes. Let me start off with his role at PBOC, and I think what’s clear to monetary economic sense of central banker outside China, is that during governor Zhou’s time in office, the PBOC has become significantly more professionalized, compared to banks in early history. And I point not only to governor Zhou himself in the way which he has run the bank and represented abroad, and also articulated the monetary policy, but to many of the economists whom he has brought into the bank.

As for the comment, I think governor Zhou deserves a lot of credit for attracting, maintaining and supporting such a high level group of people, and many others as well. I would begin with saluting governor Zhou’s success at professionalizing the bank.

Now next, I would turn to the success of the policy during governor Zhou’s term. And there I would point to three elements that strike me as important and successful.

First, if you look back to period before governor Zhou took office, inflation in China was both high and volatile, and also the growth of money and credits was relatively unrestrained in various periods. I think governor Zhou has done an excellent job in steering Chinese monetary policy so that inflation has become much better behaved, and the growth of money and credits was much more restrained, that after all is the central task of monetary policy in any economy. And I think the PBOC gets high marks now, for the way in which they’ve been able to make a lot of progress in this area during governor Zhou’s term in office, I think that’s a real achievement for him.

Second, more specifically, the rest of the world is extremely impressed with the way in which China manage to maintain its economic growth in the aftermath of the worldwide financial crisis of 2007-2009. I remember being in China, maybe 2009.I recall the foreign economists were there who study China, many of them were extremely skeptical that China would be able to maintain its growth rate. At the same time certainly the developed countries were experiencing a severe downturn, many of them like the United States was in the worst economic downturn since The Great Depression of the 1930s, the Chinese economists present were quite confident that China’s economic growth will continue, and they were right, they turned out to be exactly right. We all know this has to do with many things other than simply monetary policy and has to do with governmental investment programs, and other contributions. But nonetheless, it took some effort on the part of PBOC monetary policy to make that happen as well, so I think it was a significant economic event that took place during governor Zhou’s term.

And the third and the last element that I want to point to, is the period of extreme volatility both in the RMB exchange rate and also in the prices on the China’s security market that China sustained a few years ago. This could have been very bad for China and Chinese economic growth, but it wasn’t, it turned out China managed to work through this period of volatility and thrived very well. Once again, I’m sure this had to do with many elements of China’s policy other than just PBOC is doing, but for sure PBOC had a large part to do with it. This also happened on governor Zhou’s term, and I would give him a lot of credit for that as well.

Those are the three things I had in mind.

Q: But you know, in order to cope with the financial crisis in 2008, the balance sheet of PBOC expanded rapidly, some people didn’t agree with Zhou’s measures taken at that time, how do you like these policies?

A: I would look at the balance sheet expansion and like what other central banks were doing. Look at my own country here in the United States, before the financial crisis, the balance sheet of the Federal Reserve system was about 800 billion dollars, the peak was 4.5 trillion dollars, so that means the balance sheet of Federal Reserve multiplied by a factor about 5.If you look at other central banks around the developed world, the multiple was similarly about 5.Bank of England and European Central Bank it’s about 3-4, although they are still there, not through yet. And the Bank of Japan similar multiple, the Swedish Riksbank was about a multiple of 3.So in all of these cases, central banks did the policy that governor Zhou pursued, it was in keeping with other well-run central banks were doing at the time, so I certainly would not be critical.

Q: So I think from your perspective, you think Zhou is quite a successful and outstanding governor.

A:Yes,I do, I think he will be remembered in the future, in the same way that we look back at some of the crucial governors, we would call them the Chairman of Federal Reserve, people like Paul Volcker, I’m guessing he will be remembered in that way in the future.

Q: I would like to know what do you think of development and trend of China’s financial market after Zhou retires?

A: Well, I think there are still some tasks to be done. The most obvious one, at least most obvious to me, is dealing with the legacy of bad debts. I’m talking in part of the banks of course. But also, even the bad debts held by various prevention and even local governments, we all know that a large part of China’s economic growth in recent years has been financed by debts. Many of these debts are not really good debts in the way that we at least think of them.

So I think working through that legacy is going to take China quite a bit of time, it’s a slow process, and the magnitude of the problem in China is very large. I’m confident that it can be handled, so I don’t think this is any kind of substantial threat, but it is a real problem that needs to be taken care of. At least according to western press, some of the recent actions by the government seemed to show that they are very serious about planning to make progress, that’s one area in which I would think that progress need to be made.

I think the second would have to do with is, what I would call professionalization of the banks in my sense, in meeting people that are the personnel at the top level of the big four banks, in their positions, for political reasons rather than because they are the right people. I’m an economist, but I would hope that over time, China will evolve a way of allowing those institutions to be run in a more professional way.

Q: Could you talk about what do you think is the biggest challenge for RMB to be an international currency?

A: Well, it’s not just the challenge for the currency, it’s the challenge for the market behind the currency, the security of market. Because when you talk about people holding dollars, yes, I understand some people broad hold dollar deposits, that’s not really what we mean. For example, when we say China holds however many trillions of dollars, the dollars that China holds, we don’t mean they’re holding dollar deposits, we mean they’re holding various assets denominated in dollars. So talking about the use of currency internationally, we’re really talking about the ability of international investors to participate in a country’s security market, it has to do in the first instance with the trading, rules also has to do with what security is there to buy in the first place. So when it go back to the dollar, when we’re talking about people holding dollars, that means mostly they’re holding things like treasury deals, they’re holding things like Bank CDs. So I think there are some developments of security markets in China that needs to happen before we can think of RMB is having kind of opportunities connected to it, that the dollar is sterling and the Euro and other country’s currencies like that have.

Q: You know, that RMB has joined SDR for two years, do you think this will have a large impact for RMB to be internationalized?

A: No, I don’t think so. I’ve always been very skeptical of the SDR, I don’t think it has anything more than symbolic importance, to me, it doesn’t matter a bit.

Q: So you think it doesn’t make sense, only conceptional?

A: Yeah, I don’t think it has much practical significance.

Q: Did you notice that there has been a rapid appreciation of RMB recently?

A: Yes.

Q: And also the dollar index has recently been a little bit weakened, what do you think about this kind of appreciation, maybe relatively appreciated and depreciated?

A: I don’t have any view over a short run, thinking as an economist, it’s not helpful for assessing currency fluctuation in a short run. I think over a long period of time however, it’s likely that at least on a real basis, the RMB will appreciate relatively to the dollar, and the dollar will depreciate relatively not only to the RMB, but to other currencies as well. And this is just a matter of long run supply and demand for currencies, in part driven by notions of trade flows, but also by portfolio diversification I think. 25 years from now for example, I believe the role of dollar in international portfolios will be small than it is today, I believe the role of RMB will be larger, and that kind of shift is bound to affect currency values over the long run.

Q: Do you think RMB is a safe currency? I mean for foreign exchange reserve to avoid the risks from international financial market?

A: I don’t think it is there yet, over some periods of time, I’m confident that will happen, but I don’t think RMB is there yet. It goes back to the same issue of investment possibility and liquidity of market and safety of assets that we were talking about before.

Q: So you think there is still a long way to go?

A:I guess I don’t know how fast the transition will be, let’s say 20 years, I would like to think the transition will be completed by then, but maybe faster, I have no idea.

Q: Do you think the RMB and China’s financial policies have enough impact on the world’s economy yet?

A: I think it certainly does have an impact on the world’s economy, measured in terms that China is already the second largest economy. I don’t know what the latest forecast is, but within several short number of years, China will become the world’s largest economy in real terms. And China is increasingly involved in international investment flows, and markets open, China is already involved in trade flows, so what happens in China is what happens in Chinese currency, of course it is very important for the rest of the world.

Q:We all know that leadership of Federal Reserve and PBOC has both changed recently, Powell has come to his power, so what do you think of financial trends of China and the US will be like? And the trends of financial policies of these two countries will be like?

A: I think it will be very interesting. Talking about the United States, as you know, we have a new chairman of Federal Reserve, we have new people in the US treasury, and I think it remains to be seen whether the financial regulatory policy of the United States will remain the same or will go in very unfortunate direction. We had some amounted new regulation put in place, following 2007 to 2009 financial crisis, that regulation was not perfect by any means, I think the effort by Trump administration and many member of the Congress to remove some of the regulations is very wrong-headed, that is likely to open the way for the kinds of abuses with the banks and even what we call the Shadow Banking System. Stood the high crisis we had 10 years ago, I hope regulation is not relaxed in that way.

Now China is a different Case, China has different problems and different structure. I think the need for vigilance is real, looking at what happened 10 years ago shows the need for serious regulation. There was a view associated with people like Alan Greenspan, for example, the financial system is self-regulating, and I think many of those view was wrong before, but for anybody who didn’t know those view was wrong, he should have learned it was wrong from the crisis. The attempt here to roll back regulation is wrong-headed, I hope other countries do not move in that direction.

Q: You know, Chinese people pay much attention to the Fed’s policy, so how much do you think China’s economy is linked to the policy of Fed?

A: Oh, that’s a very good question.

Q: Many people are afraid that China’s economy will be influenced by Fed’s policy of interest rates.

A:I think that is true, behind what you said is a valid point that the dollar plays a disproportionate role in the world’s financial system, therefore when the United States raises interest rates, then interest rates around the world will go up, I think that is very true. So from perspective of a country like China, I think that means that the task which I indicated before, getting the bad debt problems under controls is all the more important, because those debts that are hard to service today’s interest rates will be even harder to service when interest rates go up.

Q: Will there be any conflict between China and the US? Regarding the financial fields?

A: No, I don’t think so. Country’s interests are not 100% aligned, that never happens, because countries have different production bases, different demand bases and so forth, I don’t see there is any need to believe that there is an inevitable conflict.