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导读

思维导图作者：
May Li，男，我要去追逐心中的太阳，还要继续努力的亚古兽
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精读|翻译|词组
Finance and economics | Buttonwood
财经 | 梧桐树专栏
英文部分选自经济学人20240120期财经板块

Wall Street is praying firms will start going public again
华尔街正祈盼上市热度回归
The IPO market is on its longest cold streak since 1980
IPO市场处在1980年以来最漫长的寒冬
注释：
Cold streak：In the context of gambling, a cold streak is along losing run experienced by a player. The term is used to describe a succession of consequent negative outcomes for a gambler or a team. In sports betting, the term means losing several bets in a row. The opposite of this is a player being hot.
Can you feel the chill? It is bone-deep, now. In 2021 capital markets were searing hot. On average, at least one new firm went public every working day. But financial districts today are icy. For two long years private companies have spurned public markets, as rising interest rates dashed lofty valuations and stock prices vacillated.
感受到寒意了么？现在，已是切骨之寒。2021年，资本市场炽热异常，平均每个工作日至少有一家新公司上市。但如今金融街区却冰冷一片。在长达两年的时间里，利率上行不断冲击市场估值，加之股价波动，私营企业公开募资的兴趣大减。
注释：
1.sear：Tosear something means to burn its surface with a sudden intense heat. 烧焦
2.spurn：If youspurn someone or something, you reject them. 拒绝
All this has been bad news for Wall Street. In 2021 America’s five largest investment banks together earned an average of $13bn per quarter through their dealmaking and initial-public-offering (ipo) desks. Over the next two years they managed barely half of that.
对华尔街来说，这一切都是坏消息。2021年，美国五大投资银行负责交易和首次公开发行（IPO）的部门合计平均每季度收入130亿美元。而接下来的两年里，他们的收入几乎砍半。
Could conditions soon thaw? Company bosses like to make their debut in a roaring bull market, when investors are cheery and liable to overpay. With markets now back near all time highs, that seems to be the case. And executives are encouraged by narrow credit spreads—the difference between the rates companies borrow at and risk-free rates on treasury bonds—which indicate investors do not expect financial trouble.
市场会很快回暖吗？公司老板往往喜欢在红火的牛市中闪亮登场，因为此时投资者正情绪高昂，愿意支付高价。随着市场重返历史高点，现在似乎正当其时。同时，信用利差（即公司借款利率与无风险国债利率之间的差异）的缩小也鼓舞了管理层，因为该指标说明投资者预计公司不会出现财务问题。
注释：
thaw：When ice, snow, or something else that is frozenthaws, it melts. (冰雪等) 融化
A strong economy helps, too, because it boosts demand for capital. So do high real interest rates, since they make the capital provided by an ipo more attractive. Given the resilience of the American economy, a Federal Reserve policy rate of 5.5% and underlying inflation around 3%, both conditions are in place.
强劲的经济能够提振对资本的需求，因此也有帮助。高企的实际利率也是利好因素，因为这使得通过IPO获得资金更具吸引力。考虑到美国经济的韧性，美联储政策利率为5.5%，基础通胀水平在3%左右，两大条件均得以满足。
注释：
underlying inflation：一般使用所有商品和服务价格计算出的CPI或PPI波动幅度，叫“headline inflation”，其中包括短期内价格可能大幅波动的商品或服务，这样计算出的结果有可能产生大幅波动。西方媒体为了吸引眼球，在标题中使用这种方法计算得出的结果，因此叫做headline inflation，根据其内涵可以意译为整体通货膨胀或一般通货膨胀。与此相对，剔除短期和一次性因素后计算得出的CPI或PPI波动幅度，称之为underlying inflation。
Sure enough, there is some evidence of activity picking up. Total investment-banking revenues were better than expected in the fourth quarter of 2023, climbing by 15% compared with the previous three months. On earnings calls bank bosses sounded cautiously optimistic about 2024. There are rumours that all kinds of firms, from skims, a pants purveyor founded by Kim Kardashian, to Stripe, a payments giant, are considering making their debut.
的确，市场出现了解封迹象。2023年第四季度投资银行总收入好于预期，环比增长15%。在业绩电话会上，投行高管对2024年的展望持谨慎乐观的态度。有传言称，各类公司都在考虑上市，从金·卡戴珊 (Kim Kardashian) 创立的内衣品牌Skims到支付巨头Stripe，不一而足。
注释：
1.Purveyor, purvey: to supply (something, such as provisions) usually as a matter of business
Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/purveys vt.供应
延申阅读：
1.《2024年Reddit、Shein和Stripe或引领美国IPO市场复苏》
Source: 
https://cn.wsj.com/articles/2024%E5%B9%B4reddit-shein%E5%92%8Cstripe%E6%88%96%E5%BC%95%E9%A2%86%E7%BE%8E%E5%9B%BDipo%E5%B8%82%E5%9C%BA%E5%A4%8D%E8%8B%8F-e88a3256
2.《卡戴珊内衣品牌Skims冲击IPO，估值40亿美元，是维密市值的2.6倍》
Source: https://xueqiu.com/1697254901/258165922
Still, executives are easily put off by volatility—and it is hard to describe recent stockmarket moves as anything other than unpredictable. Given that a month or so often elapses between filing for an ipo and actually going public, a steady march higher is far preferable to a rollercoaster ride. Such circumstances tend to mean that those who can wait, do. In even moderately difficult times firms often put off ipos altogether, rather than accept a lower price, and a stockpile of those waiting to go public builds up.
话虽如此，但市场一有风吹草动，各家高管马上兴致缺缺——最近的股市走势，除了“难以预测”一词，很难找到其他更合适的词语来形容了。鉴于从申请到实际上市通常需要一个月左右的时间，股价稳步走高远比坐过山车猛涨猛跌更可取。在这种情况下，等得起的公司通常选择观望。即使在稍微困难的时候，许多公司往往宁愿推迟IPO，也不愿接受较低的股价，此类抱着奇货可居心态的待上市公司越来越多。
注释：
1.Elapse: vi. 时间过去；消逝 PASS, GO BY
Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/elapse
2.Stockpile: n. a reserve supply of something essential accumulated within a country for use during a shortage n. 囤聚的物资
Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stockpile
It still feels as if the economic mood could spin on a dime. This could hurt newly public firms. Shares in Cava, a fast-casual salad seller, doubled in price when it went public in June. Other firms got excited and started chewing over their options. In August Instacart, another firm which specialises in flogging vegetables to the idle, and Arm, a British chipmaker, filed to go public. Yet by the time they made it to market in late September, interest-rate expectations were climbing and share prices were falling. Instacart was valued at $39bn in 2021. It went public with a market capitalisation of $10bn, and is now worth just $7bn.
当下的经济情绪仍瞬息万变，这对新上市公司可能会产生不利影响。23年6月份休闲快餐沙拉销售商Cava上市时，股价翻了一番。其他公司也因此感到振奋，开始思考上市的可能性。23年8月，另一家生鲜配送平台Instacart（美版美团，“懒人买买买”）和英国芯片制造Arm提交上市申请。然而，当它们于9月底成功登录市场时，加息预期却不断攀升，股价持续下跌。Instacart 在2021年的估值为390亿美元，上市时市值为100亿美元，而目前仅为70亿美元。
注释：
1.on a dime: in a very small area
these cars can turn on a dime
Source: 
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/on%20a%20dime
2.Chew over: 细想 to meditate on : think about reflectively
Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/chew%20over
3.Cava: Cava（风格化为CAVA），也被称为Cava Grill，是一家私营地中海快餐连锁餐厅，在美国各地设有分店。
Source: https://www.mg21.com/cava.html
4.Instacart: Instacart是一家在线杂货配送服务公司，成立于2012年，总部位于旧金山。它的创始人是Apoorva Mehta、Max Mullen和Brandon Leonardo，他们都是前亚马逊员工。Instacart的核心业务是通过手机应用或网站，让用户可以从当地的超市、药店、便利店等商家订购商品，并在30分钟内由Instacart的“购物者”送货上门。Instacart还提供广告和其他收入来源，以及面向零售商的软件即服务（SaaS）解决方案。
5.Flog:to force or urge into action
Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/flog
6.Arm:安谋控股公司（英语：ARM Holdings plc.，写作arm），又称ARM公司，是软银集团旗下的半导体设计与软件公司，全球总部位于英国剑桥，北美总部位于美国圣何塞，亦是一年一度的ARM技术大会（Arm TechCon）举办地。
Source: https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arm_(%E4%BC%81%E6%A5%AD)
延申阅读：
1.《Instacart上市了！这家美国最大的生鲜配送平台背后有哪些故事？》
Source: https://www.sohu.com/a/715038479_120423232
So when might the ipo winter truly give way to spring? In an attempt to answer this, Gregory Brown and William Volckmann of the University of North Carolina have built a mathematical model. It takes in variables including stockmarket returns, credit spreads and real interest rates, and uses these to try to predict ipo volumes.
那么，IPO何时能穿越凛冬迎来春天呢？为了尝试回答这个问题，北卡罗来纳大学的格雷戈里·布朗和威廉·沃尔克曼建立了一个数学模型。该模型通过分析股市回报、信用利差和实际利率等变量来预测IPO数量。
Their first find is that today’s market really is extraordinarily chilly. They define the ipo market as “cold” when the average of the number of ipos over the last three months is lower than it was three-quarters of the time between 1975 and 2020 (an average of 5.3 or fewer ipos per month). On that measure, this is the longest cold spell for American ipos since 1980. It is also much cooler than the model would anticipate. It says some 20 firms a month should have been going public by the end of 2023. Yet only one firm went public in December.
两位学者的第一个发现是，如今的市场确实是格外冷清。如果三个月内平均IPO数量低于1975年到2020年间平均水平的四分之三（平均每月不到5.3家），二人就将之定义为IPO市场“寒冬”。照此计算，如今就是美国IPO市场自1980年以来最漫长的寒冬。现实甚至比模型更加冰冷。模型预测到2023年底，每月应有约20家企业上市，然而12月只上市了一家企业。
Messrs Brown and Volckman suspect the market is suffering from a hangover. Far more firms went public in 2021 than their model implied should have done. The stockpile, in other words, was depleted. So despite the recent pause, followed by improved conditions, there are still not many firms ready to list.
二人怀疑（IPO）市场此番是宿醉后遗症。2021年上市的企业数远超他们模型预期的应有之数。换句话说，待上市公司的池子现已几近枯竭。因此，尽管有最近一段时间的“蓄水养鱼”，经济状况也有所改善，但是预备上市的公司仍不太多。
A true thaw, then, would take more than a few quarters of rising markets and economic resilience. It needs not only heat, but time as well. That is time in which unexpected developments—such as interest rates resuming their upward climb—could easily spook bosses all over again. So perhaps it is unwise to predict a heatwave. But some green shoots may eventually poke through the ice.
要使寒冬真正消融，仅凭几个季度的市场复苏和经济回升功力尚浅。春回大地不仅需要积热，还需要时间。在此期间，企业家很容易因不可预见的情况，比如恢复加息，而再次惊慌失措。因此，预测热浪即将来袭也许并不明智。不过，或许几缕新绿终将破冰而出。