人民幣納入SDR具有象徵意義 The renminbi receives a symbolic seal of approval

Whether the Chinese renminbi should be permitted to join the Special Drawing Right is one of those questions that appears economically substantive at a distance but rather more politically tokenistic from close up.

中國的人民幣應不應該被納入特別提款權(SDR)貨幣籃子？這個問題從遠處看似乎是個純粹的經濟問題，但從近處看則在更大程度上具有政治象徵性。

For some enthusiasts, the recommendation by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) staff that the renminbi become the fifth member of the basket quasi-currency — along with the dollar, euro, yen and sterling — will boost the Chinese unit’s claim to the status of a global reserve asset.

對一些熱衷者來說，國際貨幣基金組織(IMF)工作人員建議人民幣加入美元、歐元、日元和英鎊行列，成爲構成SDR這種準貨幣的第五種貨幣，將提振人民幣取得全球儲備資產地位的呼聲。

The truth is less dramatic. The IMF staff’s view — very likely to be ratified by its governing board — that the renminbi is “freely usable” and hence can join the SDR is presentationally important. The renminbi will have a new imprimatur of respectability from an institution with which it has often had a tetchy relationship. But it is not a substitute for Beijing continuing to liberalise financial markets and capital flows in order to promote the use of its currency abroad.

真相則不那麼具有戲劇性。IMF工作人員的觀點 （很可能得到其理事會的批准）是人民幣“可自由使用”，因而可以加入SDR，這在陳述意義上很重要。人民幣將從一個與其經常關係緊張的機構獲得一層新的名望。但它不能替代北京方面繼續開放金融市場和資本流動，以推動人民幣在境外得到使用。

For the most part, the SDR remains little more than an accounting device and an obscure class of official reserve assets created under the aegis of the IMF. It is neither a true currency nor a claim on the fund itself. The IMF’s members made much of their creation of nearly $300bn in new SDR assets in 2009 to boost official liquidity as part of the official response to the global financial crisis. Yet the unit has remained little used, and official SDR-denominated assets still have to be changed back into their constituent currencies to be workable. Accordingly they are little use for intervention purposes by central banks.

基本上，SDR仍只是一件會計工具，是IMF主持創建的一類讓人費解的官方儲備資產。它既不是一種真正的貨幣，也不是對IMF本身的債權。IMF的成員國大吹特吹他們在2009年創建近3000億美元新的SDR資產，以提振官方流動性，稱其爲官方對全球金融危機迴應的一部分。然而，這種單位仍然很少使用，而官方SDR計價的資產仍須兌換回其組成貨幣纔可用。因此，就央行的干預目的而言，它們沒什麼用。

Being in the SDR basket is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for a currency to be widely held in official reserves. Before the SDR was reformed in 1981, 16 currencies were members, including such unlikely global reserve assets as the Iranian rial, to no apparent end. By contrast, the Swiss franc is still quite widely held as an official store of value despite not being a member of the present-day SDR.

要讓某一種貨幣被官方儲備廣泛持有，被納入SDR貨幣籃子既不是必要條件，也不是充分條件。在1981年SDR得到改革前，其成員包括16種貨幣，包括一些貌似不可思議、也沒有明顯作用的全球儲備資產，如伊朗的里亞爾。與此相反，瑞郎儘管不是當今SDR的成員，但仍被當作一種官方的儲值手段廣泛持有。

If China wishes the renminbi to be widely used as a reserve asset, it needs to be prepared to create large amounts of the currency — as has the US with the dollar — and send it abroad. Beijing’s tight control of capital flows and its apparent fear of a large balance of payments deficit militate against that.

如果中國希望人民幣被廣泛用作一種儲備資產，它就需要準備好創建大量人民幣（就像美國大量創建美元那樣），並允許其流向境外。北京方面嚴格控制資本流動及其明顯畏懼大額國際收支赤字，對這一點有妨礙。

The decision’s political significance outweighs its economic import. By ruling that the renminbi is freely usable, the IMF has undoubtedly sided with those elements inside the Chinese system — notably the People’s Bank of China — who have consistently and rightly been arguing for Beijing to liberalise capital flows and the currency. Whether or not the decision will keep up the pressure for further deregulation or allow the Chinese government to rest on its laurels remains to be seen, but at least the signalling suggests that Beijing is moving in the right direction.

這個決定的政治意義超過它的經濟重要性。通過裁定人民幣可自由使用，IMF無疑站在中國體制內某些元素（特別是中國人民銀行）一邊，後者一貫而且正確地主張北京方面應當放開資本流動和匯率。至於這個決定能不能保持促使中國政府進一步放松管制的壓力，抑或讓它滿足於現狀，人們仍須拭目以待，但至少信號似乎表明，北京方面正朝着正確的方向前進。

Signalling, however, is about as far as this decision goes. Ultimately, the global use of a currency is based not on bureaucratic decisions taken at a supranational level but on national authorities establishing a record in competent monetary and financial policy and on the ready availability of the unit in question.

然而，發出信號也差不多是這個決定的最重大意義。最終而言，某一種貨幣的全球使用，並不取決於在超國家層面作出的官僚決定，而是取決於有關國家當局在貨幣和金融政策上樹立稱職的口碑，取決於相關貨幣的高度可獲得性。

At the margin, the inclusion of the renminbi in the SDR will be a boost for the forces of liberalisation within the Chinese system, and of the further integration of China within the structures of global economic governance. But anyone expecting the decision to act as an inflection point either for the international use of the renminbi or the credibility of the SDR itself is likely to be disappointed.

至少而言，人民幣被納入SDR將提振中國體制內推動開放、推動中國進一步融入全球經濟治理結構的力量。但是，任何人如果期待這個決定成爲一個拐點（無論是對人民幣的國際使用，還是對SDR本身的可信度而言），都很可能會失望。