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Loans between companies is the fastest-growing category of shadow banking in China, but with next to no data on where such loans are going, their effect on the economy is a black box.
公司間貸款（委托貸款）是中國增長最快的一種影子銀行業務，這種貸款的去向幾乎無數據可查，所以對經濟的影響一直是個謎團。
But two academic papers published over the last year on such lending - known as entrusted loans - offer a rare glimpse into how these loans work. The findings? Entrusted loans may have become the single most important factor keeping China's property developers afloat. More broadly, the risk of such lending might be less than the huge issuance figures suggest.
不過去年發表的兩份學術報告讓人們有機會一窺其廬山真面目。根據這些報告，委托貸款可能已經成為中國房地產市場最重要的生命線，而從更廣泛的角度說，盡管委托貸款規模龐大，風險卻似乎并沒有數據預示的那樣大。
Nonbank or shadow lending has ballooned in recent years as regulators have repeatedly tried to cut off certain sectors of the economy from formal financing channels. But each time Beijing has tried to crimp one source of credit, another avenue appears to take up the slack.
近年來，由于監管部門切斷了某些經濟領域的正規融資途徑，非銀行信貸或影子銀行得到了迅速擴張的機會。政府每一次限制某方面的貸款，就會有另一條信貸途徑填補空缺。
Now it's entrusted loans. Such forms of lending increased by a net 2.55 trillion yuan ($407.38 billion) last year, equivalent to 29% of all new yuan bank loans issued during the year. That's up from 1.28 trillion yuan in 2012, when they stood at only 16% of bank loans.
委托貸款亦不例外。去年，中國委托貸款規模凈增人民幣2.55萬億元（4,073.8億美元），相當于全年新增人民幣貸款的29%。2012年委托貸款增加1.28萬億元，占當年新增人民幣貸款的比例僅為16%。
Based on a survey of nine major banks in Shanghai for a paper submitted in May, Wang Jiahui, an assistant researcher at the Shanghai headquarters of the People's Bank of China, found that in 2011 about 21% of all entrusted loans went to the property sector, up from 19% in 2010.
中國央行上海總部助理研究員王家輝在去年5月份發表的一份報告中指出，2011年，中國約21%的委托貸款流入房地產市場，高于2010年的19%。這份報告對上海九家大型銀行做了調查。
And in a paper late last year based on a review of entrusted loans that were issued by listed Chinese companies between 2004 and 2013, two academics at the Huazhong University of Science and Technology found that about 20% of such loans over the nearly 10-year period went to the property sector.
而華中科技大學(Huazhong University of Science and Technology)兩位學者去年晚些時候發表的一篇報告則顯示，在將近十年的時間里，大約有20%的委托貸款進入房地產業。這份報告考察了中國上市公司2004年至2013年發放的委托貸款。
If those results are representative of all entrusted loans nationwide - and that's a big if - then companies lent about 766 billion yuan to developers in 2013, marginally more than banks and more than twice the amount of funding trust companies provided. Some of these loans carry high interest rates and there are signs some borrowers are having trouble repaying them.
假設調查結果可以代表全國委托貸款的整體形勢，那么2013年中國公司向房地產開發商提供的貸款金額就達到人民幣7,660億元左右，比銀行發放的房地產貸款略多，比信托公司發放的房地產貸款高逾一倍。其中一些貸款利率很高，某些開發商已經出現償付困難。
Zhejiang Longsheng Group, a chemicals maker in eastern Zhejiang province, said in its 2013 earnings report that it extended the maturity on 199.5 million yuan worth of entrusted loans to three developers last year. The interest rates on those loans ranged from 23% to 25%. Longsheng officials declined to comment.
浙江化工生產商浙江龍盛集團股份有限公司(Zhejiang Longsheng Group，簡稱：浙江龍盛)在2013年的財報中稱，該公司去年把提供給三家開發商的價值人民幣1.995億元的委托貸款延期。這些貸款的利率從23%至25%不等。浙江龍盛管理人員不予置評。
Once a money spinner, entrusted loans are no longer generating major returns for Longsheng like they used to. The company earned 21.9 million yuan from loans it made to other companies last year, down 77% from 2012.
委托貸款曾是一項非常賺錢的業務，但現在不像過去那樣為浙江龍盛帶來巨額回報了。該公司去年通過向其他公司提供貸款獲利人民幣2,190萬元，較2012年減少77%。
For the most part, however, entrusted loans are lower risk than other types of shadow banking. They are mainly used by conglomerates to move cash between units, offering companies a way to manage resources in the course of everyday business. Such transactions usually carry very low interest rates. According to the two reports, about 80% of all entrusted loans are between these kinds of 'related parties.'
不過，總體來講，委托貸款的風險比其他類型的影子銀行業務要低。委托貸款主要被企業集團用來在各分公司之間轉移現金，它為企業提供了一條在日常業務中管理資源的途徑。這類交易的利率通常很低。據上述兩份報告顯示，全部委托貸款中約有80%是在此類“關聯方”之間進行的。
During good times, there are plenty of reasons to shuffle cash from one unit to another. For a group of companies tied together by common shareholders, it makes sense to use collective cash holdings to cover funding needs, rather than to pay more to borrow money from a bank.
在市場形勢好的時候，在子公司之間轉移現金可以有很多原因。對于一群被共同的股東聯系在一起的公司來說，用集體持有的現金滿足融資需求，而不是支付更高的利率從銀行貸款，這樣做合情合理。
However, when these sorts of transactions pick up during bad times, it could be that some units, such as steelmakers or property developers, can't pay their bills-from interest on a bank loan to payments owed to suppliers or wages due to employees. So money is diverted - as entrusted loans - from units that have cash to those that don't. To put it another way, the healthy parts of a corporation end up subsidizing those that are struggling.
不過，在年景不好的時候這類交易會增多，可能是因為一些子公司（比如鋼鐵廠商或房地產開發商）無力償債（從銀行貸款利息到拖欠供應商的款項或拖欠員工的工資）。一些資金以委托貸款的形式被從現金充裕的子公司轉移到現金不足的公司。換句話說，企業是在用狀況良好的業務補貼那些陷入困境的業務。
Without official data - or at least more extensive data - it's impossible to have a precise picture of where money from entrusted loans is going, or even assess how big a risk such lending poses to the economy. But based on a partial snapshot, they may have become a lifeblood for struggling industries-the property sector in particular.
在缺乏官方數據（至少是更詳盡數據）的情況下，對委托貸款資金流向哪里不可能有一個精確的描繪，甚至難以評估這類借貸給經濟帶來多大的風險。但根據部分信息，它們可能已經成為陷入困境的行業（尤其是房地產業）的生命線。
