重回50美元的油价能否提振美国经济？

据芝加哥商业交易所集团（CME Group）发布的消息称，上周四，国际原油价格近6个月以来首次超过了50美元/桶。

近几个月来的油价反弹听起来是个好消息。因为自从去年夏天开始，人们就经常把股市下跌的黑锅扣在油价疲软上。

然而这一论断总是有些违背常识的。低廉的油价应该会对全球经济起到刺激作用，因为较低的能源价格使得企业和消费者能够有更多的资金用于消费其他商品。但油价的下跌也意味着需求下滑。实际上，股市在过去18个月中一直保持疲软这一事实，表明了很多投资人都将原油价格的走低解读为发达国家需求疲软和中国经济陷于停滞的结果。

既然现在油价又开始上涨了，我们是否可以认为，这对市场和美国经济来说是个好消息？

至于油价上涨对股市有无提振作用，最近的数据表明：“或许没有什么作用。”请看下方由比安科研究公司（Bianco Research）的策略师吉姆•比安科提供的这幅图表，它主要体现了油价与标普500指数的相关性。

according to the CME Group.

The rally in oil prices over the past several months sounds like great news. Ever since last summer, stock-market declines have been routinely blamed on weak oil prices.

The argument was always a bit counterintuitive. Cheap oil should be a stimulus for the global economy, as lower energy prices give businesses and consumers more money to spend on other things. But falling oil prices can also signal collapsing demand. Indeed, the fact that stock prices have stayed flat for the past 18 months suggests investors were interpreting the drop in crude as a sign of weak demand in the wealthy world and of a flagging economy in China.

So now that oil prices are on the way up, should we expect that to be good news for the market and the American economy?

When it comes to stocks, the latest data says, “Maybe not.” Take a look at this chart from strategist Jim Bianco of Bianco Research, which studies the correlation between stocks and the S&P 500:

从图中可以看出，在2016年年初的这段时间里，油价与股市是有相当大的相关性的，此后则并非如此。那么究竟出了什么问题呢？

比安科表示，这完全是由于信贷危机导致的。他在一封致客户的信里写道：“随着油价跌至35美元以下，很多人开始担心能源板块会出现信贷违约，从而影响银行业以及总体市场。因此在这段时间，股市与油价之间的相关性是很高的。”

因此，随着油价走高并且跨过35美元大关，我们可以预计，油价对股价的影响将会更小。

但油价的此轮上涨对总体经济有何影响？

在美国部分地区，影响还是相当大的。比如美联储近日的数据显示，2016年第一季度，汽车贷款的不良信贷率出现了近三年来的首次上升。如果仔细分析一下这一数据，你会发现，这种上升几乎全部集中在一些产油地区，而这些产油区有6%的就业率依赖于能源开采。油价的上涨显然会令这些地区松一口气，因为高油价会刺激能源企业开采更多的能源。

然而除此之外，鲜有证据表明在过去一年半里，能源价格的摇摆对美国经济整体有多大的影响。在油价猛跌的日子里，居民的消费支出水平并未出现显著变化。LPL金融公司的经济学家约翰•康纳利指出：“汽油价格的大幅下降，并未像一些人预计的那样，对总体经济或消费部门产生较大的提振作用，总体经济目前也仍然在努力恢复阶段。另外它也没有改变大体上不温不火的消费支出节奏。实际上，自从27个季度前的‘大萧条’结束时（即2009年第2季度）起至今，消费支出只累计增长了16%，远远低于前三次经济复苏期的头27个季度的30%的水平——这三次经济复苏也和今天的情况最有可比性。”

比石油价格更重要的，是就业和工资水平的增长。幸运的是，在原油市场近期持续波动期间，美国的就业增长始终保持着较为强劲的水平。那么工资水平是否显著上涨了？很不幸，美国人民还在翘首企盼中。但随着油价的走高，涨薪潮应该也不会太远了。 （财富中文网）

译者：朴成奎

As you can see, oil and stocks were pretty heavily correlated during the early part of 2016, but otherwise are not. So what’s going on?

Bianco says that it’s all about credit risk. “Oil prices below $35 lead to concerns of a credit event in the energy patch impairing banks and the overall market,” Bianco writes in a note to clients. “In these times the correlation between stocks and oil is high.”

Therefore, as oil prices climb farther away from that critical $35 threshold, we should expect the price of oil to matter less to stock prices.

But what about the overall economy?

In certain regions of the country, it may matter a lot. Recent data from the Federal Reserve, for instance, showed that delinquencies on auto loans had risen in first quarter of 2016 for the first time in three years. If you parse the data, however, you’ll find that the increase was almost all concentrated in oil-producing counties, where more than 6% of employment was dependent on energy extraction. Rising prices will surely provide relief in these areas, as higher prices encourage energy explorers to produce more.

But otherwise, there’s been little evidence during over the past near year and a half that the U.S. economy is affected much by swings in energy prices. As oil dropped precipitously, consumer spending levels didn’t change significantly.” The big drop in gasoline prices did not, as some expected, provide a big lift to the overall economy or the consumer sector, which continues to struggle in this recovery, nor did it change the overall tepid pace of consumer spending,” writes John Canally, economist with LPL Financial. “In fact, since the end of the Great Recession 27 quarters ago (the second quarter of 2009), consumer spending has only increased by a cumulative 16%, well under the 30% gain in the first 27 quarters of the last three economic recoveries, which are the most comparable to today’s recovery.”

Much more important than oil, it seems, is job and wage growth. Luckily, job growth has remained strong throughout the recent drama in oil markets. Significant wage gains? Americans are still waiting for those. But rising oil prices won’t delay the raises any longer.