不宜炒作欧洲复苏题材

    普遍预期不该出现这么大的偏差。学术界有些措手不及，没办法说清楚为什么这项数据会这么低迷，这么不理想。欧洲股市立即遭到卖盘打压，但大多数市场都处于困惑状态，这种情绪一直延续到了上周五。

    那么为什么会出现这样的情况呢？进一步分析表明，欧元区最大的成员国德国当月工业产值跌幅达到了令人恐惧的2.3%。德国是欧元区规模最大的经济体，德国工业产值的急剧滑坡对整体数据下跌产生了极大影响。看好欧元的人曾断言，德国将带领欧洲摆脱衰退的阴影。但情况似乎并非如此，至少目前不是这样。

    另一阵营的成员相信，真正的增长将来自那些遭到重创的成员国，也就是所谓的欧元区外围国家。但就拿爱尔兰来说，欧洲陷入危机后它一直被欧盟和投资者奉为转折的曙光，而且一直在鼓舞着后者的士气。然而，7月份爱尔兰工业产值减少了8.7%，令人感到震惊。葡萄牙的工业产值也下降了3.2%，而第二季度时，葡萄牙的GDP增长率还位居欧元区17国之首。

    更糟糕的是，工业产值数据所覆盖的五大类工业产品中，跌幅最大的是资本品。整个欧元区的资本品产值下降了2.2%，表明企业对未来的看法似乎并不像投资者那么有信心，原因是企业并没有向提高经济产出所必须的设备进行投资。这样的信息给看好欧元区的人带来了特别沉重的打击，原因是他们认为欧元区企业信心正在增强的依据正是此前不断上扬的采购经理人指数（PMI）。

    无视这项数据，同时继续和其他人快乐前行很有诱惑力，但真的这样做就会犯错。出现这样的工业产值数据并非偶然，它们所体现的是一种混乱状态，是主权债务危机过后欧洲一直未能理顺的政治和经济脉络。那次危机的根本原因，也就是大量主权债务和低迷的经济产出到今天依然没有改变。实际上，主权债务水平依然高得离谱，整个欧元区的失业率也在继续小幅攀升。包括法国和意大利在内，一些欧元区国家的预算赤字仍然远远高于GDP 的3%。也就是说，这些债台高筑的国家还在继续举债，这让它们成了风险较大的投资对象。如果这些国家的政府正在设法扭转这种趋势，出现这样的情况还可以理解，但他们并没有这样做。实际上，这两种因素正在让局势不断恶化。

    炒作欧元区题材是件很吸引人的事。今年第二季度欧元区GDP上升了0.3%，这是连续六个季度出现令人郁闷的负增长之后欧元区经济首次实现反弹。但欧洲股市随后上涨过猛，股指创下新高的动力纯粹是投机，与经济毫无关系。

    欧洲依然重病缠身，有充足的数据可以证明这一点。工业产值下跌表明结构性问题仍然在妨碍这片大陆摆脱困境。欧洲也许能非常好地解决自己的经济和政治问题，从而变得比以往更为强大——但很难相信短期内就会出现这样的局面。（财富中文网）

    译者：Charlie   

    This sort of error in consensus isn't supposed to happen to such a massive degree. Academics were caught off guard and couldn't truly explain why the number was so low and so off. There was an immediate knee-jerk sell-off in European equities but the sentiment on most trading desks was that of confusion, which has carried over into Friday's trading.

    So how did this happen? A deeper look into the numbers shows that Germany, the eurozone's largest member, posted a terrible 2.3% decline for the month. Being the eurozone's largest economy, its sharp decline contributed greatly to the overall negative number. But euro boosters claim that Germany is supposedly leading the continent out of recession. This, at least at the moment, appears not to be the case.

    There is another camp that believes that the real growth will come from those countries that were beaten down, the so-called peripheral eurozone nations. But Ireland, which has been held up by the EU and investors as the inspirational turnaround story of the crisis, saw its industrial production fall a mind-blowing 8.7%. That was followed by Portugal, which experienced the strongest growth in GDP among all 17 members of the eurozone during the second quarter, posting a 3.2% decline.

    It gets worse. Of all the five categories of industrial production surveyed, the one that experienced the largest decrease was capital goods, down 2.2% across the zone. This decline shows that businesses aren't as confident in the future as investors seem to be as they aren't investing in the tools necessary to increase economic output. European bulls took this information particularly hard as they had relied on a firming of the purchasing managers index (PMI) to justify their belief that confidence among businesses in the eurozone was going up.

    It is tempting to disregard this report and continue up the happy mountain with the rest of the herd, but to do so would be a mistake. These industrial production numbers aren't a fluke, they are indicative of the confusion and the political and economic disarray that continues to haunt the continent in the wake of the sovereign debt crisis. The underlying causes of that crisis, namely, high sovereign debt and weak economic output, remain in full force today. Indeed, sovereign debt levels remain off the scale and unemployment continues to inch upward across the board. Several eurozone nations, including France and Italy, continue to run budget deficits well in excess of 3%. That means they are adding to already massive debt loads, thus making them a riskier bet. That would be understandable if their governments were doing something to reverse this trend but they aren't. Indeed, both are making things worse.

    It is tempting to bet on the eurozone. The recent 0.3% bump in GDP during the second quarter was the first such increase after six depressing quarters of negative growth. But the subsequent rally in the European markets have gone too far with new highs based solely on speculation, not economic fact.

    Europe is still very sick and there is plenty of data proving it. The decrease in industrial production shows that the continent's structural issues continue to hold it back from the brink. Europe may very well solve its economic and political problems and emerge stronger than ever – but it's hard to see that happening anytime soon.