经济学人下载:一周商业要闻

Business this week 

一周商业要闻

Oct 19th 2013 |From the print edition

America’s big banks reported earnings for the third quarter. Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo posted solid profits, though the mortgage-loan businesses in all three suffered. In contrast, JPMorgan Chase declared a $380m net loss, its first under Jamie Dimon as chief executive, as it set aside $9.2 billion for potential settlement costs in a slew of legal cases brought by American regulators. 

美国各家大型银行报告了第三季度的收入情况。尽管美国银行，花旗银行以及富国银行在抵押贷款业务中遭受了损失，但它们仍保持强劲的利润。相比之下，摩根大通银行却宣布净亏损3.8亿美元，这是自杰米·戴蒙担任其首席执行官以来出现的首次亏损情况；究其原因是摩根大通留出了约92亿美元的资金，用以支付美国监管机构提出的一系列法律案件中的潜在结算费用。

A light touch

低干涉

On a trip to China George Osborne, Britain’s chancellor of the exchequer, outlined proposals to smooth the way for Chinese state-owned banks to operate inLondon, such as classifying them as branches rather than subsidiaries, thereby avoiding rigorous scrutiny. International trading in the yuan has tripled over the past three years to $120 billion a day, withLondon emerging as the global hub.

英国财政大臣乔治·奥斯本到访中国，并概述了旨在为中国国有银行在伦敦开展业务铺平道路的几点建议。建议包括将中方的国有银行归入分行而非子公司，以避免受到严格的监管。随着伦敦成为全球中心城市，过去三年里，该地的国际贸易日成交额（以人民币结算）已达到1200亿美元，是过去的三倍。

BlackRock’s net income in the third quarter rose by 10% to $672m. In September assets under management at the giant investment company passed $4 trillion for the first time.

美国大型投资公司——黑石集团第三季度净收入6.72亿美元，涨幅达10%。今年九月，该公司管理的资产额首次超过了4万亿美元。

It emerged that Sir Hector Sants is taking three months off as head of global compliance at Barclays because of stress. Sir Hector used to headBritain’s financial regulatory authority. He was parachuted into Barclays with the responsibility of making sure the bank’s staff follow the letter of the law in the dozens of countries in which it operates. American authorities are investigating its capital-raising activities in theMiddle East.

有消息爆出，巴克莱银行合规负责人、前英国金融服务全球监管局CEO赫克托·桑特爵士由于压力过大，决定将休假三个月。桑特是空降到巴克莱银行的，他负责确保银行工作人员遵守与巴克莱打交道的国家的法律条文。美国当局正在对巴克莱银行在中东的融资活动展开调查。

In a regulatory filing Twitter disclosed that it will list shares in its eagerly awaited IPO on the New York Stock Exchange, a slap in the face for NASDAQ after the technical mishaps that beset Facebook’s flotation last year. Twitter also revealed that its revenue in the third quarter had doubled to $169m from the same period a year earlier, but that its net loss had tripled, to $65m.

在一份监管文件中，推特披露将在纽约证交所上市发行股票，它早已翘首以盼这一刻的到来。同时，此举也给纳斯达克一记响亮的耳光，因为去年由于技术失误，脸书在纳斯达克的上市计划一直备受困扰。推特还透露其第三季度的收益较去年同期翻了一番，达到1.69亿美元，但其净损失也增加了两倍，达到6500万美元。

Carlos Slim’s América Móvil gave up its bid for KPN, a Dutch telecoms company, after the foundation that looks out for the interests of KPN investors “and Dutch society more generally” exercised its right to buy 50% of the shares.

卡洛斯·斯利姆旗下的移动运营商墨西哥美洲电信公司放弃对荷兰皇家电信公司的收购。此前，一家基金会为了避免荷兰皇家电信公司投资人，或者从更广义上说整个荷兰社会的利益不受损害，它设法运用自己所拥有的认购期权收购了荷兰皇家电信集团每股不足50%的比例。

Apple appointed Angela Ahrendts as head of its retail operations. She has been the chief executive of Burberry for seven years and is credited with reviving the British fashion house with designs that eschew its ubiquitous plaid. Apple’s retail strategy could also do with a bit of a makeover; sales at its stores were down earlier this year for the first time since 2009.

苹果公司任命安吉拉·阿伦茨担任其零售业务总管。过去七年，阿伦茨一直担任巴宝莉公司首席执行官；她凭借故意回避该品牌的经典格子款的创新设计使巴宝莉得以振兴，人们认为她功不可没。苹果的零售策略可能也需要一些美化元素，因为今年，苹果经销商自2009年以来首次在销量上出现了下跌情况。

The “Double Irish”

“双面”爱尔兰

Meanwhile, the Irish government closed a tax loophole that had allowed Apple to register “stateless” subsidiaries in the country, through which it was able to shield $40 billion from the American taxman. But Apple and others can still set-up business inIreland and list a low-tax jurisdiction, such asBermuda, as their home country and park income in the lower-tax regime.

与此同时，爱尔兰政府填补了一个税收管理漏洞，因为苹果公司借助此漏洞在爱尔兰登记注册了一家“无国籍”的子公司，这样便能避免向美国税务机构缴纳400亿美元的赋税。但是，爱尔兰政府仍允许苹果等公司在此建立企业，并欢迎这些公司将百慕大等低税收区域选为母公司所在地，并根据当地的低税收制度储存公司收益。

In the biggest deal yet in mobile gaming, Japan’s Softbank acquired a 51% stake in Supercell, which is based inFinland, for $1.5 billion. Supercell has had success with two bestselling games that are free to download on smartphones and tablets, and then entice users into paying a fee if they want to quicken the pace of play.

日本软银以15亿美元的高价收购位于芬兰的游戏开发商Supercell，这成为了移动游戏里最大规模的交易。Supercell公司成功开发了两款最热门的游戏，并且可供智能手机和平板电脑免费下载；但是，随后如果玩家想加快游戏升级的速度，就需要支付一定的费用。

Blue greens

绿色主义

Big industry scored two wins when the European Union moved to water down policies on curbing emissions from cars and planes. The EU agreed to review a German proposal for more flexibility in reducing emissions from new vehicles (German carmakers produce models with lower fuel efficiency than French and Italian ones). And it presented amendments that will curb emissions on jets only when they enter EU airspace, after airlines objected to emission curbs on total flying times.

欧盟放宽了限制汽车和飞机碳排放量的政策，这算是大工业赢得的两场胜利。欧盟同意重新考虑德国的提议，在减少碳排放量时采取更为灵活的措施；这些措施是针对德国汽车制造商生产的新型汽车，它们的燃油效率比法国和意大利的要低。此外，由于航空公司反对欧盟对其总飞行时间内碳排放量的限制，欧盟还出台了关于喷气机进入欧盟领空碳排量限制的修订案。

The Italian government’s proposed bail-out of Alitalia drew criticism.Italy’s national airline has not made a profit in a decade and lost euros 1.6m ($2.1m) a day in the first six months of the year, but the government has proposed a share restructuring that is backed partly by the state-owned post office, Poste Italiane. International Airline Group, which owns British Airways, fumed that the plan was protectionist. 

意大利政府提议给意大利航空公司划拨援救资金，引来了一片骂声。这家意大利国家航空公司在过去十年没有任何盈利记录，今年上半年日亏损达到160万欧元（约合210万美元）；但是政府却提议进行股票重组，由该国的国有邮局——意大利邮政集团承担部分重组计划。拥有英国航空公司的国际航空集团怒斥此计划具有贸易保护主义色彩。

Royal Mail’s share price soared after it was floated on the stockmarket in the biggest privatisation inBritain since a sell-off boom in the 1980s and early 1990s. There were some differences with that time. Around 690,000 people applied for shares, far fewer than the4.5m who sought shares in British Gas in 1986. And investors traded their shares on the internet, despite the inevitable crashes on overloaded websites. One aspect struck a familiar ring. Despite being given 10% of the shares in Royal Mail, postal workers voted to strike in November.

英国皇家邮政挂牌上市，成为该国自上世纪八九十年代出现股票抛售潮以来规模最大的国有资产私有化项目；随后，其股价一路飙升。但情况每况愈下。约69万股民申购皇家邮政的股票，远远低于1986年申购英国天然气公司股票的450万人。尽管网络由于负载过重，不可避免的出现了系统崩溃现象，但股民们仍选择在网上进行交易。祸不单行，尽管皇家邮政的员工们获得了10%的企业股票，但是他们仍投票决定在11月举行罢工。