這次的GameStop股價泡沫有何不同
By conspiring to drive up struggling companies’ stock prices, GameStop investors believe they beat Wall Street at its own game. But there are no clear-cut heroes or villains in this story, just some investors who will be able to weather their losses better than others.
藉由合謀墊高這種苦苦掙扎的公司的股價，GameStop投資者相信他們以其人之道還治其人之身，給了華爾街金融家一個教訓。然而實際上在這場角力中實無正邪之分，只不過是有些人比其他人更能承受虧損罷了。
來源：Jeffrey Frankel, Project Syndicate, 03 FEB 2021, 原文網址
In the last week of January, the price of stock in GameStop – an ailing brick-and-mortar video-game retailer – soared 323% for the week and 1,700% for the month. Nothing happened within the company to drive the increase; its fundamentals remain unchanged. It was a speculative bubble – but with a twist.
在一月的最後一週，一家處境困頓的遊戲零售實體業者GameStop的股價在一週內飆升了323%、一個月內漲了1700%。公司內部營運狀況並無任何變化，故無從導致這種股價暴漲。這終究是一個投機泡沫 - 只是狀況有點微妙的不同。
With any bubble, investors who get in and out at the right moment make a lot of money, while those who get in too late or stay too long suffer large losses. Participating in a speculative bubble is thus like playing roulette in a casino, with the financial-services companies (like Charles Schwab) and retail-investment platforms (like Robinhood) acting as the “house.”
在任何投機泡沫中，賺大錢的投資者在正確的時機買進與賣出，而那些太慢進場或是持有太久的人則蒙受極大損失。因此參與投機泡沫的人像是在賭場賭輪盤一樣，而金融服務公司像是嘉信理財與散戶投資平台像是羅賓漢則是莊家。
But the GameStop bubble is unusual, because it challenges both of the most common interpretations of financial markets. The first interpretation is that financial markets efficiently allocate capital to enterprises that have strong economic fundamentals and away from those that do not. The second is that big Wall Street traders speculate in ways that destabilize markets, making unseemly profits at the expense of the little guy.
然而GameStop泡沫極不尋常，因為這件事挑戰了金融市場兩大基本觀念。首先是金融市場應該會有效率的投入資本到經營穩健的企業、而遠離那些經營不善的公司。第二是華爾街大投資客的交易方式會造成市場的不穩定、並從散戶手中攫取過份的獲利。
The investors who purchased all those GameStop shares – often young, mostly amateur traders coordinating on message boards such as Reddit’s WallStreetBets – seem to subscribe to the latter interpretation. In their view, by conspiring to drive up struggling companies’ stock prices, the little guy was beating Wall Street at its own game. And, indeed, the hedge funds that had been short-selling GameStop have swallowed massive losses.
那些買了GameStop股票的投資人 – 通常很年輕、大多是業餘玩家、透過像是Reddit網站的股票投資留言板互相交流。這些人看來是對第二個觀念了然於胸。就他們看來，藉由合謀墊高這種苦苦掙扎的公司的股價，小蝦米也可以以其人之道還治其人之身，給了華爾街金融家一個教訓。而也沒錯，放空GameStop股票的避險基金確實遭受了極大的損失。
But this David-versus-Goliath narrative has serious flaws. In fact, there are no clear-cut heroes or villains in the GameStop story. For starters, both sides used the same tool: options trading. The hedge funds bought put options (“selling short”), betting the stock would fall. The small traders then bought call options (“going long”), betting it would rise. They did the same with other struggling companies, such as the movie-theater chain AMC Entertainment and the mobile-device manufacturer BlackBerry.
但是把這種事比喻為大衛對抗巨人歌利亞的情節則屬無稽之談。事實上在這場角力中實無正邪之分。首先，雙方都使用了相同的工具：選擇權交易。避險基金買入賣權（"放空"），賭這檔股票會下跌。而散戶們買入買權（"作多"），賭它會漲價。在其他經營陷入困境的公司像是連鎖電影院AMC娛樂與手機製造商黑莓公司，他們也都在做這樣的交易。
Short-sellers tend to generate more hostility than those who go long, but there is nothing inherently nefarious in their approach. On the contrary, they often fulfill a useful economic function. By betting against what they view as an overvalued stock, hedge funds drive the price closer to what a company’s fundamentals warrant. This practice can help to slow down the growth of price bubbles, whose implosion can be devastating – as the 2008 global financial crisis showed. Short-sellers also brought attention to dubious sales schemes in the nutritional-supplements industry in 2015 and dishonest accounting practices at the German company Wirecard last year.
放空的人自然會比作多的人引發更多敵意，但是這種交易方式本質並非拿來為惡。反倒通常能促進正當的經濟運作。避險基金可以藉由放空某些價值過高的股票，把這些股票的價值壓回與公司基本面相符。這種作法有助於減緩價格泡沫的成長，而由2008年全球金融危機可知，價格泡沫的爆破是極具災難性的。放空者也會讓大家注意到如2015年健康食品產業的可疑銷售模式與去年德國Wirecard公司的會計假帳醜聞。
The small GameStop investors are not villains, either. True, no one claims to believe that GameStop is actually worth $325 per share. Their motive for continuing to buy appears to be either to ride the speculative wave – much as casino habitués gamble for fun – or to inflict pain on the hedge funds as a sort of populist political message. They are within their rights to do both.
GameStop的散戶投資者自然也不是反派。誠然，沒人相信GameStop每股真的值325美金。他們持續買進的動機看來要不是搶佔在投機浪頭上 - 有如賭場裡的熟客下注只為取樂 - 或是以傷害避險基金的方式表達某種民粹的政治語言。他們自然可以兩者皆是。
To be sure, had a few big hedge funds colluded in the way the Reddit traders did, they could well have faced prosecution for illegal market manipulation. But this doesn’t apply to the GameStop investors, who were small, numerous, and open about what they were trying to do.
不可否認的，確有幾家大型避險基金跟Reddit使用者的方式一樣都在互相串通，他們當然可能會面臨非法操控市場的指控。但這不會發生在GameStop這些小型、數量眾多且把作法廣為週知的散戶身上。
Moreover, at a time of extreme wealth inequality, the GameStop investors are far more sympathetic figures, with everyone from US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York (on the left) to US Senator Ted Cruz of Texas (on the right) taking their side. Despite incurring huge losses, the hedge funds remain wealthy.
更有甚者，在當今貧富嚴重不均的情形下，GameStop的投資人的形象更令人同情，所以不管是左派的紐約眾議員亞歷山卓·歐加修-寇蒂茲或是右派的德州參議員泰德克魯茲通通都支持他們。即便承受了巨大的虧損，這些避險基金依然富到流油。
But some traders will suffer mightily. The novices who jumped on the GameStop bandwagon after the price had already begun rising and are keeping their shares to the bitter end – an approach known as “holding on with diamond hands” – will probably end up losing most of the money they invested. Many of these investors probably would not have invested without the urging of the social-media campaign and in some cases can ill afford the losses.
但有些投資人將會付出慘痛代價。像是那些在GameStop股價已經開始起飛後才上車的菜鳥，並且握著手上的股票堅持不放的 - 所謂的"抱股不放手"投資法。這些人可能最後會賠掉他們大部分的錢。要不是社群媒體中有人登高一呼，可能有許多人並不會做此投資。而且他們其實難以承受這樣的損失。
Complicating the story further, on January 29, Robinhood imposed restrictions on trading in 50 companies, including those on which the Redditors were betting – a move that caused GameStop and other stocks to nosedive and attracted the ire of Ocasio-Cortez and Cruz. (It has since narrowed the restrictions to just eight Reddit favorites.)
更為複雜的是，在1月29日，羅賓漢針對50檔股票施加交易限制，包含了那些Reddit使用者正在追捧的 - 這個動作造成了GameStop與其他家股價立即跳水，也引起了寇蒂茲與克魯茲的憤慨（後來羅賓漢將限制範圍縮小到只有8檔Reddit用戶關注的股票。）
One duty of financial regulation is to protect people who may not know what they are getting into from losing everything. So, the Securities and Exchange Commission released a statement announcing an investigation into the “regulated entities” – not the roulette players, but the house – to ensure that they “uphold their obligations to protect investors and to identify and pursue potential wrongdoing.”
金融監理的職責之一即在於保護那些可能不知道自己將要賠的一屁股的人。所以，美國證交會（SEC）發表聲明表示會針對"金融監管對象"展開調查 – 是針對莊家，而非散戶。以確保他們"履行保護投資者，與識別、追蹤潛在不法行為的義務。"
This is not the first time Robinhood has come under SEC scrutiny. In December, the company was fined $65 million for misleading customers about how it makes its money. (Robinhood led customers to believe they were getting the best price for their orders, but actually gave orders to firms that generated higher revenues for the company.)
這也不是第一次羅賓漢面臨證交會的調查了。在12月該公司因為誤導用戶其盈利方式已被罰款6500萬美元（羅賓漢讓用戶相信他們的交易單都是以最佳價格成交，但實際上則是以對該公司最有利益的方式成交。）
During the GameStop episode, Robinhood’s problem was that it had been operating with too thin a margin. When faced with both regulatory constraints (in the form of capital requirements) and demands from its market-clearing house that it put up more deposits to back its trading, it faced the prospect of being unable to pay off customers who had won their bets.
回到GameStop的事情上，羅賓漢的問題在於薄利多銷的經營模式。當同時面臨到監管規範（如最低資本需求）與它的清算所要求它存入更多交易保證金的情形時，它自然會搞到無法賠付所有贏錢的散戶。
Robinhood has been able to raise more capital, and will survive, albeit possibly in a diminished form. But a capable regulator like Gary Gensler, if he is confirmed as the SEC’s new chair, might decide to tighten the regulations that led Robinhood to restrict trading – say, by raising capital requirements.
羅賓漢能籌到更多資本，所以儘管可能會被裁減業務，倒也還活的下來。但一個像是蓋瑞甘斯勒這樣有為的監管者，要是他確定成為新任證交會主席，可能會決定更為緊縮讓羅賓漢限制交易的監管規範 – 例如說是提昇資本需求。
Robinhood’s customers have already concluded that the platform – supposedly created to democratize finance – stands exposed as a component of the financial establishment. But evidently they still believe in Reddit’s WallStreetBets. They are reminiscent of victims of past Ponzi schemes, who sometimes blame their losses not on the con artist behind the scheme, but on the authorities who shut it down.
羅賓漢的客戶已經認定它 – 本來預期會是金融民主化的一個平台，但還是暴露出它終究也身為金融圈建制派一份子的立場。但顯然他們仍相信Reddit的留言板。這讓人想起以前老鼠會騙局的受害者，他們有時候會把他們的損失怪罪在偵破騙局的當責機關，而不是老鼠會的始作俑者上。
註釋：
beat somebody at its own game: 以其人之道還治其人之身。
ailing: 困頓的
brick-and-mortar: 實體店家
speculative: 投機
unseemly: 過份的
for starters: 首先
nefarious: 邪惡
habitués: 法語，指常客
to be sure: 肯定的
to the bitter end: 堅持到底
diamond hands: 極為堅強不放手的，就算已經有鉅額虧損或是驚人獲利。
nosedive: nose + dive, 向下俯衝
ire: 憤慨
albeit: 儘管
Gary Gensler: 將被拜登提名為新任美國證交會主席。
reminiscent: 使人聯想起，懷念起
con artist: 騙子
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