股市學(xué)會適應(yīng)特朗普Twitter言論

Until this week the state of Ivanka Trump’s clothing brand was mostly of interest to fashion bloggers. No longer. Last week, the retail chain Nordstrom decided to stop stocking her clothes after sales of the Trump fashion label tumbled.

直至上周以前，關(guān)注伊萬卡•特朗普(Ivanka Trump)服裝品牌王國的，主要是時尚博客寫手。如今再也不是這樣了。最近，在特朗普(Trump)時尚品牌的銷量大幅下滑之后，美國零售連鎖店諾思通(Nordstrom)決定停止銷售伊萬卡的服裝。

Her father took revenge via his @realDonaldTrump account. He tweeted: “My daughter Ivanka has been treated so unfairly by @Nordstrom . . . Terrible!”

伊萬卡的父親通過其id為@realDonaldTrump的Twitter賬號實施了反擊。他發(fā)消息稱：“@Nordstrom對我的女兒如此不公……太差勁了!”

This is shocking on many levels. Never mind the fact that it looks unseemly for a president to attack any individual companies via Twitter, the onslaught against Nordstrom marks the first time that President Donald Trump has used his White House pulpit to protect his family brand (rather than merely complain about a policy issue). This crosses a new, and petty, line.

從許多層面來說，這么做都令人震驚。且不提一位總統(tǒng)通過Twitter網(wǎng)站向個別公司發(fā)起攻擊看上去不夠得體。對諾思通的抨擊標(biāo)志著，身為美國總統(tǒng)的唐納德•特朗普(Donald Trump)首次動用白宮講壇捍衛(wèi)其家族品牌(而不是僅僅抱怨某個政策問題)。此舉跨過了一條新的、小家子氣的紅線。

But there is a second, even more important, twist to this tale, one that might offer unexpected reassurance for corporate boards. After the tweet attack, Nordstrom’s share price briefly dipped. But it ended the day 4.1 per cent higher — even though the overall Standard & Poor’s rose by just 0.1 per cent.

但是，這個故事還有更重要的二次曲折，它可能給企業(yè)董事會帶來出乎意料的慰藉。在特朗普在Twitter上發(fā)動攻擊之后，諾思通股價雖短暫下跌，卻在當(dāng)天收漲4.1%——盡管大盤標(biāo)普(S&P)指數(shù)只上漲了0.1%。

This is striking. And it may not be a fluke. The Financial Times has crunched data on 30 cases in which companies have been targeted by that @realDonaldTrump account. The sample size is small and the data only start on January 1. However, this limited analysis shows that Mr Trump’s tweets have had surprisingly little effect on share prices so far, irrespective of the media hullabaloo.

這一點很有意思，而且它也許不是個別現(xiàn)象。英國《金融時報》曾對30宗案例的數(shù)據(jù)加以分析，這些案例中的企業(yè)都被@realDonaldTrump賬號攻擊過。樣本的數(shù)量很少，相關(guān)數(shù)據(jù)也只是從1月1日才開始統(tǒng)計。然而，這一有限的分析顯示：到目前為止，不論有沒有媒體炒作，特朗普在Twitter發(fā)布的消息對股價的影響都出乎意料地低。

Yes, an assault has sometimes dented a stock: when Mr Trump complained about Toyota’s Mexican plants on January 5, for example, the Japanese company’s share price fell about 1.2 per cent in the following 24 hours; similarly, the share price of CNN’s parent company, Time Warner, tumbled about 0.65 per cent on January 25 after an attack on the news station.

沒錯，有時候一次攻擊確實會影響一支股票：比如，1月5日特朗普抱怨豐田(Toyota)在墨西哥建廠后，這家日企的股價在24小時內(nèi)下跌了大約1.2%;與此類似，1月25日抨擊有線新聞網(wǎng)(CNN)后，CNN母公司時代華納(Time Warner)的股價下跌了0.65%左右。

But when Mr Trump criticised General Motors on January 3, the carmaker’s share price rose nearly 0.89 per cent in the first 24 hours after the market was open. When he attacked CNN on January 16, Time Warner shares rallied more than 0.77 per cent.

但是，1月3日特朗普批評通用汽車(General Motors)后，這家汽車制造商的股價在開盤后24小時內(nèi)上漲近0.89%。而1月16日他抨擊CNN時，時代華納股價上漲逾0.77%。

And while there is a little more evidence that a positive presidential tweet can boost a share price, the impact is relatively small. Fiat Chrysler and Ford, for example, enjoyed a share price rally after presidential praise. But when a Trump tweet celebrated Fox on Jan 21, the share price of its parent company, 21st Century Fox, actually fell.

與此同時，盡管有少量證據(jù)證明總統(tǒng)積極的Twitter消息可能提振一只股票的價格，其影響相對較小。比如，在得到總統(tǒng)贊賞后，菲亞特克萊斯勒(Fiat Chrysler)和福特(Ford)股價曾出現(xiàn)上揚。但是，1月21日特朗普在Twitter上說福克斯(Fox)好話后，其母公司21世紀?？怂?21st Century Fox)的股價實際上下跌了。

One might argue it is difficult to infer too much from a mere month’s worth of data, particularly given that, overall, the markets seem to be behaving in some perverse ways. Most notably, the overall level of stock market volatility has been astonishingly low since the start of the year, even though indices of global political and economic uncertainty stand at two-decade highs. This suggests that investors are so optimistic — or complacent — about the outlook for growth, that they will shrug off any amount of bad news, including bizarre tweets.

人們可以辯稱，從僅僅一個月的數(shù)據(jù)很難推斷太多東西，尤其是考慮到整體而言市場的表現(xiàn)似乎有些反常。最值得注意的是，自年初以來，即使全球政治和經(jīng)濟不確定性指標(biāo)都處于20年來最高水平，但股市的整體波動水平一直低得令人驚訝。這似乎表明投資者對增長前景非常樂觀(或者說自滿)，以至于他們對任何數(shù)量的壞消息，包括奇怪的Twitter帖子，都不加理會。

Another caveat: no one knows whether Mr Trump will actually turn his Twitter threats into tangible actions. If he ever slaps real import tariffs on car companies with plants in Mexico, for example, that will produce a much more dramatic effect than if he merely tweets about that threat.

另一個問題在于：沒人知道特朗普會不會把Twitter上的威脅化為實際行動。例如，如果他真的對在墨西哥建廠的汽車企業(yè)實施進口關(guān)稅，那造成的影響會比只在Twitter上進行威脅大得多。

But leaving aside those caveats, the message from the data is clear: corporate boards do not necessarily need to press the panic button if they end up in the president’s cross hairs. Yes, the experience will be deeply unpleasant. And yes, company boards certainly need to prepare. And, unsurprisingly, most large companies have already done this by conducting practice “drills” that borrow some of the public relations lessons learnt from weathering activist attacks.

但是拋開這些局限性，這些數(shù)據(jù)發(fā)出的信息是清楚的：如果企業(yè)成為總統(tǒng)的靶子，企業(yè)董事會不一定需要慌亂。沒錯，這種體驗會很不愉快。沒錯，企業(yè)董事會的確需要做好準(zhǔn)備。而且，并不令人意外的是，大多數(shù)大型企業(yè)已經(jīng)通過實戰(zhàn)“演練”做好了準(zhǔn)備——借助它們從應(yīng)對活動人士的攻擊中學(xué)到的一些公關(guān)經(jīng)驗。

In spite of all these war games — or, more accurately, precisely because these are taking place — those tweets may be losing some of their ability to shock. Investors and companies are adapting quietly to a new paradigm.

盡管(或者更準(zhǔn)確地說是因為)有所有這些戰(zhàn)爭游戲，那些Twitter帖子可能失去了一些沖擊力。投資者和企業(yè)正在悄悄適應(yīng)一種新的范式。

That will not please Mr Trump — he is a man who wants to wield power, after all. Nor will it reassure people who worry about the longer-term damage to America’s reputation, and business confidence, that might be caused by these capricious tweets.

對此特朗普不會感到高興——畢竟，他是一個想要呼風(fēng)喚雨的人。另一方面，那些擔(dān)憂特朗普“任性”的Twitter帖子可能在長期損害美國聲譽和商業(yè)信心的人，也不會因此安心。

But the next time that the president tries to bully a company with his @realDonaldTrump account — and there almost certainly will be a next time — corporate boards would do well to remember Nordstrom. Although the president is very powerful, there are limits to his practical and symbolic power, even if no one quite knows exactly where those limits will really lie.

但下次總統(tǒng)試圖用他的@realDonaldTrump恫嚇一家企業(yè)的時候——幾乎可以肯定會有下一次——企業(yè)董事會最好記住諾思通的例子。盡管總統(tǒng)的權(quán)力很大，他的實權(quán)力和象征性權(quán)力是有界限的，即使沒人準(zhǔn)確知道這些界限究竟應(yīng)該劃在哪里。

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譯者/何黎