经济学人05:大师级 Masterclass

 　　Business books quarterly; Book Review;

　　商业书籍；书评；

　　The success of hedge funds

　　对冲基金的成功

　　Masterclass

　　大师级

　　Two books analyse what makes hedge-fund managers great—and reach very different conclusions.

　　两本介绍对冲基金的成功之处的书——其结论大相径庭。

　　The Alpha Masters: Unlocking the Genius of the World's Top Hedge Funds. By Maneet Ahuja.

　　阿尔法（注）大师：揭秘世界顶尖对冲基金的智慧，Maneet Ahuja著。

　　The Hedge Fund Mirage¹: The Illusion of Big Money and Why It's Too Good To Be True. By Simon Lack.

　　对冲基金的海市蜃楼：巨资的幻象及其难以置信的原因，Simon Lack著。

　　Forget the one percent denounced by the Occupy Wall Street protesters. Hedge-fund managers have made so much money for themselves that they are in the top percent of the one percent. The billions they have raked in make bankers' bonuses look titchy. Their vaunted success trading stocks, bonds and other instruments has helped to transform a cottage industry into a behemoth; today hedge funds oversee² more than $2.1 trillion. A class of moneymen who once only managed funds for buccaneering, rich families now count the world's largest public pension funds and endowments as clients.

　　忘记"占领华尔街"运动中所诋毁的那百分之一。对冲基金经理帮自己赚的钱足以让其成为这百分之一中的佼佼者。他们捞回来上百亿的资金让银行家的分红显得寒碜。他们在股票，债券和衍生品交易上取得了令人赞赏的成绩，这也帮助产业从一家庭作坊式的产业成为龙头产业。今天对冲基金管理着超过2.1万亿美元。曾经为喜欢投机的富翁家族理财的金融家，现今已让世界上最大的公共养老金，基金会成为其客户。

　　Have hedge funds succeeded because of their investment genius, or their crafty³ marketing⁴? Two new books disagree on whether the hedge-fund managers' golden chalice⁵ is half-full or half-empty. Maneet Ahuja, a CNBC producer who worked briefly⁶ on Wall Street before taking a job at the Wall Street Journal, has written a homage⁷ to hedgies. She was in awe⁸ of Wall Street already when she was an intern⁹ at Citigroup (“I left the building with an offer for a semester internship¹⁰ in hand, convinced I had found my calling with the good guys—good guys with nice shoes”). She has never shed it. “The Alpha Masters” profiles 11 of the industry's best-known bosses, and looks at their investment philosophies and their famous trades. John Paulson made billions predicting the bursting of America's housing bubble; James Chanos, a short-seller, disrobed Enron; and Ray Dalio, the boss of Bridgewater, the world's largest hedge fund, makes a killing¹¹ for his investors¹² and keeps calm doing transcendental meditation¹³.

　　对冲基金的成功真的是因为他们投资的智慧么？还是因为他们处心积虑的市场企划？两本新书在对冲基金经理们的金杯里究竟是半桶水还是半桶空气的问题上产生异见。曾短暂任职于华尔街而后加入华尔街日报的CNBC制片人Maneet Ahuja，向对冲这帮家伙写了篇致敬。在她在花旗实习的时候就十分敬畏华尔街（"当我拿着一学期实习的录取通知书离开大楼的时候，这让我确信自己找到了一群好人——穿着名牌鞋的一群好人"）。他至今没有改变这一印象。《阿尔法大师》列举了11位业界最知名的总裁，并分析他们投资哲学和经典案例。约翰?保尔森因预测到美国房地产泡沫而赚了几十亿美元；卖空家James Chanos剥光了安然公司；世界上最大的对冲基金Bridgewater总裁Ray Dalio，为其投资者抓住猎杀机会而通过冥思竟作来保持冷静。

　　Throughout her book Ms Ahuja seems to be in a trance herself, in thrall¹⁴ to the glamour¹⁵ of her subjects. She never questions the judgment¹⁶ of her alpha-men and always gives them the last word. She devotes dozens of pages to Mr Paulson's rise in the hedge-fund industry, but glosses¹⁷ over his poor performance in 2011. His results have led some to speculate that he may have the unfortunate record of both earning and losing the most money in hedge-fund history. She quotes one of his 2011 letters to investors asserting that bank stocks—whose struggles pulled down his funds' performance—would rebound¹⁸ when the economy improves, never criticising what he did or pointing out that investors will have to wait ages to claw back such massive losses. Nor does she grasp at bigger themes or the many common factors that hedge-fund managers share. Is it ego¹⁹, courage, good networks or charisma²⁰ that has brought them more success than their fellow financiers?

　　Ahuja在她的整本书里都好似被催眠，完全被其采访对象的成功所迷住。她从来没有质疑她书中的阿尔法大师的判断力，视他们的话为至理名言。她为保尔森在对冲基金行业的冉冉升起洋洋洒洒写了十几页，而对他在2011年的糟糕表现则一笔带过。一些人怀疑保尔森可能会创造一个悲剧性纪录——对冲基金史上既是盈利最高也是亏损最多的经理。她引用了保尔森2011年写给股东信件里的话，他坚称连累该基金业绩的银行股在经济状况恢复时将反弹。而她从来没指责过他的所作所为，也并没有指出投资者需要等到天长地久才能从如此之深的亏损里爬出来。她也并没有抓住整个大环境或其他一些对冲基金经理的共通因素。究竟是自信，勇气，有关系还是魅力使得他们比金融业同行更成功？

　　“The Hedge Fund Mirage” attacks the Wall Street worshippers' blind adulation. Simon Lack, who spent 23 years at JPMorgan, an investment bank, selecting hedge funds to invest in, grew tired of the free hand that investors all too often gave managers. He has written a provocative²¹ book questioning a central tenet of the hedge-fund industry: its performance is always worth paying for. The promise of superior performance is wrong, he says. Of course some investors make a killing, but on average hedge funds have underperformed even risk-free Treasury²² bills. This is because the bulk of investors' capital has flooded in over the past ten years, whereas hedge funds performed best when the industry was smaller than it is now. What is more, it is hard to know how hedge funds actually fare, since indices that track industry performance tend to overstate the returns. Funds that do badly or implode²³ are not usually included in the indices at all.

　　《对冲基金的海市蜃楼》对华尔街追随者的盲目崇拜进行了攻击。曾在投资银行摩根大通(JPMorgen)工作23年的Simon Lack，当时的任务是分配在对冲基金的投资。后来厌倦了投资者常常给予管理者过多的自由。他写了本具有挑衅性的书来质疑对冲基金的核心：它的业绩是物有所值的。他写道，这些对优秀业绩的承诺是错误的。当然一部分投资者是会有所猎获的，但平均来说对冲基金的表现连无风险的美国国债都不如。这是因为大部分投资者的资金都是最近这十年才涌入的，而对冲基金表现最佳的时候是比现在小的时候。更有问题的是不知道对冲基金的表现究竟如何，因为追踪业界表现的的指数通常夸大回报。那些表现很差或破产了的通常都不包括在这些指数里。

　　Why would any client continue to pay for such mediocre²⁴ returns? One reason is that hedge-fund managers are incredibly good salesmen. In addition, industry insiders who are all too aware of hedge funds' shortcomings choose not to expose them, Mr Lack argues. Moreover, the common fee structure, in which hedge-fund managers keep 2% of assets as a “management” fee to cover expenses and 20% of profits generated by performance, has made many managers rich, but not their clients. Mr Lack calculates that hedge-fund managers have kept around 84% of profits generated, with investors only getting 16% since 1998. “Where are the customers' yachts?” is the title of one chapter. What is worse, the disastrous²⁵ dive of equity²⁶ markets in 2008 may have wiped out all the profits that hedge funds have ever generated for investors.

　　为什么客户要继续为如此普通的回报付费呢？其中一个原因是对冲基金的经理都是不可思议的优秀销售人员。同时Lack认为，非常了解对冲基金软肋的业内人士选择不披露它们。再加上通用的费用结构使得许多经理变得富裕，而非他们的客户。这些费用包括对冲基金经理每年保留总资产的2％作为支付开销的"管理费"和盈利业绩的20％。Lack计算自1998年起，对冲基金经理大约保留了84％的总利润，而投资者只拿到了16％。"客户的游艇去哪里？"是第一章的标题。更可恶的是2008股票市场灾难性跳水可能已经把对冲基金为投资者赚的所有利润都抹杀掉了。

　　Mr Lack places a good deal of the blame for this on investors who fail to ask tough enough questions and have not grasped that they “want yesterday's returns without yesterday's risk”. They invest money with the biggest, best-known funds “that look nothing like those whose aggregate²⁷ performance” they want to emulate²⁸. Instead investors should stand up to managers, negotiate more favourable²⁹ terms and put their money into smaller funds, which tend to perform better.

　　Lack将大部分指责都指向投资者，因为他们没有问足够深入的问题，并且没有意识到他们自己是在祈求"获得以前的回报却不希望承担对应的风险"。他们投资给最大，最有名的基金，而这些基金的累积表现跟投资者所希望模仿的表现相差甚远。投资者应该挑战经理们，跟他们协商一些更有利的条款，并将他们的钱放入小型基金里，因为这些小基金往往表现更好。

　　Mr Lack points out that large institutional investors always like to invest in bigger hedge funds. That way they need not worry about being the bulk of a small fund's investor-base. But he offers no solution for these large investors, who cannot put big sums into the small, nimble funds that he touts³⁰. Nor does he analyse how hedge-fund performance compares with other asset classes, such as private equity. As a result, the reader is left with a nagging³¹ unanswered question: would investors do better to avoid hedge funds altogether and, if so, where should they put their money in future?

　　Lack还指出大型机构投资者都喜欢投资大型对冲基金。这样他们不需要担心自己成为小基金的主要客户。大型机构不可能将大额资金放入他所推崇的那些敏捷的小基金里，而他并没有提出如何解决这些大型投资者所面临的问题。同时他也没有进行对冲基金跟其他基金的表现对比，例如私募基金。因此，这给读者留下了一个令人困惑的问题：投资者如果完全退出对冲基金，表现是不是会更好呢？如果是的话，他们以后又应该把钱投到哪里呢？

　　In his conclusion Mr Lack argues that most hedge-fund books are written by their “proponents”. His ambition was to spark debate and help to change the industry. Whether he succeeds or not remains³² to be seen. Hedge-fund executives have already reacted angrily to “The Hedge Fund Mirage”, which suggests that looking into the mirror may be painful. They rightly worry the days of easy praise are over.

　　在他的总结里他写道，大多数关于对冲基金的书都是由它的＂拥护者＂写的。他的野心在于将这场辩论点燃，并寄希望于此以改变整个行业。至于他在这一点上是否成功了，还有待考证。对冲基金总裁们已经对《对冲基金的海市蜃楼》一书表示愤怒，这显示了要面对镜子里的自己是痛苦的。他们担心民众对其慷慨赞美的日子已经终结，这倒不是杞人忧天。

1 mirage   

n.海市蜃楼，幻景

参考例句：

• Perhaps we are all just chasing a mirage.也许我们都只是在追逐一个幻想。
• Western liberalism was always a mirage.西方自由主义永远是一座海市蜃楼。

2 oversee   

vt.监督，管理

参考例句：

• Soldiers oversee the food handouts.士兵们看管着救济食品。
• Use a surveyor or architect to oversee and inspect the different stages of the work.请一位房产检视员或建筑师来监督并检查不同阶段的工作。

3 crafty   

adj.狡猾的，诡诈的

参考例句：

• He admired the old man for his crafty plan.他敬佩老者的神机妙算。
• He was an accomplished politician and a crafty autocrat.他是个有造诣的政治家，也是个狡黠的独裁者。

4 marketing   

n.行销，在市场的买卖，买东西

参考例句：

• They are developing marketing network.他们正在发展销售网络。
• He often goes marketing.他经常去市场做生意。

5 chalice   

n.圣餐杯；金杯毒酒

参考例句：

• He inherited a poisoned chalice when he took over the job as union leader.他接手工会领导职务，看似风光，实则会给他带来很多麻烦。
• She was essentially feminine,in other words,a parasite and a chalice.她在本质上是个女人，换句话说，是一个食客和一只酒杯。

6 briefly   

adv.简单地，简短地

参考例句：

• I want to touch briefly on another aspect of the problem.我想简单地谈一下这个问题的另一方面。
• He was kidnapped and briefly detained by a terrorist group.他被一个恐怖组织绑架并短暂拘禁。

7 homage   

n.尊敬，敬意，崇敬

参考例句：

• We pay homage to the genius of Shakespeare.我们对莎士比亚的天才表示敬仰。
• The soldiers swore to pay their homage to the Queen.士兵们宣誓效忠于女王陛下。

8 awe   

n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧

参考例句：

• The sight filled us with awe.这景色使我们大为惊叹。
• The approaching tornado struck awe in our hearts.正在逼近的龙卷风使我们惊恐万分。

9 intern   

v.拘禁，软禁；n.实习生

参考例句：

• I worked as an intern in that firm last summer.去年夏天我在那家商行实习。
• The intern bandaged the cut as the nurse looked on.这位实习生在护士的照看下给病人包扎伤口。

10 internship   

n.实习医师，实习医师期

参考例句：

• an internship at a television station 在电视台的实习期
• a summer internship with a small stipend 薪水微薄的暑期实习

11 killing   

n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财

参考例句：

• Investors are set to make a killing from the sell-off.投资者准备清仓以便大赚一笔。
• Last week my brother made a killing on Wall Street.上个周我兄弟在华尔街赚了一大笔。

12 investors   

n.投资者，出资者( investor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a con man who bilked investors out of millions of dollars 诈取投资者几百万元的骗子
• a cash bonanza for investors 投资者的赚钱机会

13 meditation   

n.熟虑，（尤指宗教的）默想，沉思，（pl.）冥想录

参考例句：

• This peaceful garden lends itself to meditation.这个恬静的花园适于冥想。
• I'm sorry to interrupt your meditation.很抱歉，我打断了你的沉思。

14 thrall   

n.奴隶；奴隶制

参考例句：

• He treats his wife like a thrall.他把妻子当作奴隶看待。
• He is not in thrall to the media.他不受制于媒体。

15 glamour   

n.魔力，魅力；vt.迷住

参考例句：

• Foreign travel has lost its glamour for her.到国外旅行对她已失去吸引力了。
• The moonlight cast a glamour over the scene.月光给景色增添了魅力。

16 judgment   

n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见

参考例句：

• The chairman flatters himself on his judgment of people.主席自认为他审视人比别人高明。
• He's a man of excellent judgment.他眼力过人。

17 glosses   

n.（页末或书后的）注释( gloss的名词复数 )；（表面的）光滑；虚假的外表；用以产生光泽的物质v.注解( gloss的第三人称单数 )；掩饰（错误）；粉饰；把…搪塞过去

参考例句：

• The movie glosses over the real issues of the war. 这部电影掩饰了这次战争的真正问题。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Time inevitably glosses over the particularities of each situation. 时间不可避免地掩饰了每种情形的特质。 来自互联网

18 rebound   

v.弹回；n.弹回，跳回

参考例句：

• The vibrations accompanying the rebound are the earth quake.伴随这种回弹的振动就是地震。
• Our evil example will rebound upon ourselves.我们的坏榜样会回到我们自己头上的。

19 ego   

n.自我，自己，自尊

参考例句：

• He is absolute ego in all thing.在所有的事情上他都绝对自我。
• She has been on an ego trip since she sang on television.她上电视台唱过歌之后就一直自吹自擂。

20 charisma   

n.(大众爱戴的)领袖气质，魅力

参考例句：

• He has enormous charisma. He is a giant of a man.他有超凡的个人魅力，是个伟人。
• I don't have the charisma to pull a crowd this size.我没有那么大的魅力，能吸引这么多人。

21 provocative   

adj.挑衅的，煽动的，刺激的，挑逗的

参考例句：

• She wore a very provocative dress.她穿了一件非常性感的裙子。
• His provocative words only fueled the argument further.他的挑衅性讲话只能使争论进一步激化。

22 treasury   

n.宝库；国库，金库；文库

参考例句：

• The Treasury was opposed in principle to the proposals.财政部原则上反对这些提案。
• This book is a treasury of useful information.这本书是有价值的信息宝库。

23 implode   

v.内爆，剧减

参考例句：

• The engine imploded.发动机内爆了。
• He has nightmares about the tanks imploding.他老是做油箱爆炸的噩梦。

24 mediocre   

adj.平常的，普通的

参考例句：

• The student tried hard,but his work is mediocre. 该生学习刻苦，但学业平庸。
• Only lazybones and mediocre persons could hanker after the days of messing together.只有懒汉庸才才会留恋那大锅饭的年代。

25 disastrous   

adj.灾难性的，造成灾害的；极坏的，很糟的

参考例句：

• The heavy rainstorm caused a disastrous flood.暴雨成灾。
• Her investment had disastrous consequences.She lost everything she owned.她的投资结果很惨，血本无归。

26 equity   

n.公正，公平，（无固定利息的）股票

参考例句：

• They shared the work of the house with equity.他们公平地分担家务。
• To capture his equity,Murphy must either sell or refinance.要获得资产净值，墨菲必须出售或者重新融资。

27 aggregate   

adj.总计的，集合的；n.总数；v.合计；集合

参考例句：

• The football team had a low goal aggregate last season.这支足球队上个赛季的进球总数很少。
• The money collected will aggregate a thousand dollars.进帐总额将达一千美元。

28 emulate   

v.努力赶上或超越，与…竞争；效仿

参考例句：

• You must work hard to emulate your sister.你必须努力工作，赶上你姐姐。
• You must look at the film and try to emulate his behavior.你们必须观看这部电影，并尽力模仿他的动作。

29 favourable   

adj.赞成的，称赞的，有利的，良好的，顺利的

参考例句：

• The company will lend you money on very favourable terms.这家公司将以非常优惠的条件借钱给你。
• We found that most people are favourable to the idea.我们发现大多数人同意这个意见。

30 touts   

n.招徕( tout的名词复数 )；（音乐会、体育比赛等的）卖高价票的人；侦查者；探听赛马的情报v.兜售( tout的第三人称单数 )；招揽；侦查；探听赛马情报

参考例句：

• Many vouchers are returned for cash, allowing touts and middle men to make a healthy margin. 许多月饼券都被兑换成现金，这让券贩子和中间商赚取了不蜚的利润。 来自互联网
• Spotting prey, the customary crowd of hustlers and touts swarmed around, jostling for my business. 照例有大群的拉客黄牛在寻觅猎物，他们争相过来抢我的生意。 来自互联网

31 nagging   

adj.唠叨的，挑剔的；使人不得安宁的v.不断地挑剔或批评（某人）( nag的现在分词 )；不断地烦扰或伤害（某人）；无休止地抱怨；不断指责

参考例句：

• Stop nagging—I'll do it as soon as I can. 别唠叨了—我会尽快做的。
• I've got a nagging pain in my lower back. 我后背下方老是疼。 来自《简明英汉词典》

32 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。