如果欧元被废除将会发生什么

  Sean Ross 2016年8月8日

欧盟在2016年上半年的处境非常艰难。英国在这期间公投决定退出欧盟，尽管完成退欧最早要在2018年实现。德意志银行、瑞士信贷和几乎所有的意大利金融机构都出现了重大问题。希腊经济形式仍然非常严峻，而且还有其他几个国家也正在朝这个趋势发展。最后问题可能是欧洲过度的官僚机制和欧洲央行，欧洲央行为了刺激经济增长推出了负利率政策。陷入困境的欧元岌岌可危，而整个欧元区似乎也将进入这种境地。

当前压力

目前欧元面临的最主要威胁是主要国家可能出现的背叛。法国、西班牙、意大利、瑞典、德国、匈牙利和波兰都有出现进行和英国类似的公投的趋势。希腊一直以来都在徘徊在经济崩溃边缘并可能第一个退出欧盟，而如果希腊用贬值的德拉马克偿还债务其外国债权人将遭受损失。

申根区的终结

欧元的崩溃可能危害1995年申根协定之后命名的“申根区”。根据该协议，26个欧洲国家同意允许人员、商品、服务和资本在欧元区的自由流动。不是所有的欧盟成员都是申根区成员，也不是所有的申根区成员都是欧盟成员，但是欧元的崩溃还是会影响这个区域内外国家的经济。

经济上，同一经济区可能出现竞争货币。例如，没有什么能阻止德国和意大利同时交易德国马克和意大利里拉。唯一使这种情况不能出现的情形是欧元区的崩溃使欧盟也面临解体的压力。

如果申根协议被废除，将会马上造成实际成本。欧元区内国家可能需要实行边界管制、设立检查站和其他因申根协议废除的内部管理。这些成本将会被转移到私营企业，尤其是那些依赖跨境运输和旅游的企业。

各个国家都会实行进口报价和关税，而这些措施可能是相互的，这必然将导致国际贸易下降并影响到经济增长。虽然影响的方式还不能确定，但是很显然，欧元的崩溃影响的不仅仅是欧元区国家。其他地区，尤其是作为主要贸易伙伴的北美和亚洲将会面临相应的金融和可能的政治后果。

对欧洲之外的影响

许多欧盟内部的经济好处并没有传递给外部贸易伙伴。例如，劳动力和资本的自由流动没有延伸到中国和美国，除非是外国消费者和生产商获得了一些国家的权限。这使我们很难预测潜在影响，因为可能会有更加支持经济增长的政策取代坐落在布鲁塞尔的官僚主义政策。另一方面，民族主义运动增加的经济独立可能会危及国际商业和金融市场。

在短期内，市场可能会增加负面反应并产生不确定性。欧盟是一个众所周知的商品，尽管它不完美，市场喜欢能预测的东西。在长期中，市场将会从再次增长的欧洲经济中受益。在2010到2015年间，欧洲的GDP增长率远远低于美洲、非洲、亚洲和太平洋地区。如果欧元崩溃后欧洲大陆能重回竞争性经济增长，那么全球经济很可能将会受益。

重新使用国家货币

停止使用欧元并使用原有的货币的正式称谓为“变更货币单位”。这个转换肯定要比2002年采用欧元简单的多，但是投资者还是要警惕不确定性的出现。

本质上说，变更货币单位可以归结为两个变化。第一个是在一个国家境内采用新的货币。这意味着想在的工资、价格和其他价值将会以大致相近的基础转换为新货币。第二个是新货币的国际价值需要在外汇市场定价。这取决于许多因素，包括每个国家的生产能力和货币贬值的风险。

很有可能许多像希腊这样的负债过奖想要通过变更货币单位减轻他们的还款压力。实现这个目标的方法之一是在变更货币单位的同时立即展开高通胀，因此降低需要偿还债务的购买力。经济学家有时将这种方式称为“即时内部贬值”。这种方法的缺点是对国家经济造成严重破坏，因为银行账户、养老金、工资和资产价值都将受到影响。

最近时间发生的相似情况是奥匈帝国崩溃后，该国成立于1867年并在1918年分裂。帝国解体后，许多成员国希望继续使用奥匈克朗作为货币。不幸的是，一些不负责任的政府使用高度扩张性的货币政策用于偿还一战带来的高额债务，使奥地利在20世纪20年代初出现非常严重通货膨胀。斯洛文尼亚、匈牙利和其他一些国家也出现了类似的情况。到1930年，每个之前的成员国都使用了由黄金或者白银支撑的新货币。

对银行、外汇和国际贸易的影响

如果欧元被竞争性的国家货币取代，对欧元的废除只会造成货币政策的长期变化。欧元区最初的理念只是在欧洲创建一个美联储的对手方。废除欧元将会把货币政策的管理权返还给成员国。例如，德国央行将会控制德国国内的利率和货币供应，而葡萄牙央行将会控制葡萄牙境内的。

银行可能在其国家货币下进行资本重组，他们可能会更加积极的补充外汇储备以用于贸易和和解。不同的汇率将会使不同国家持有的相同资产价值不同，并且在低通胀欧洲市场工作的工人相遇对于实行宽松货币政策国家的工人工资会增加。例如，高生产率国家的工人将会比的生产率斯洛文尼亚的工人更加容易的支付商品和服务。

然而，如果欧元崩溃，其他经济政策不太可能保持不变。即使欧盟技术上能幸存下来，移民和贸易也可能会被施加其他限制。支持欧元的政党将会遭受政治后果，使民族主义政党增加影响力并很可能实施新的财政政策。如果申根协议也被废除，可能在短期内会对经济造成极大的扰乱。

Here's What Will Happen if the Euro Fails

By Sean Ross | August 8, 2016 — 1:00 PM EDT

The European Union (EU) had a rough first six months of 2016. The United Kingdom voted to leave, though the Brexit process will not be complete until 2018 at the earliest. There are major banking troubles at Deutsche Bank AG (NYSE: DB), Credit Suisse Group AG (NYSE: CS) and virtually every Italian financial institution. Greece remains in terrible shape economically, and several other countries are at least heading in that direction. The final nail in the coffin might be the ineffective policies of the EU's overly bureaucratic government in Brussels, and the European Central Bank (ECB), which threw in negative interest rates as a Hail Mary to spur growth. A distressed euro may be looking at the brink, and the entire eurozone may not be far behind.

Current Pressures

The clearest danger to the eurozone is further defection from prominent governments. There are popular movements in France, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Belgium, Germany, Hungary and Poland for a U.K.-style referendum. Greece is consistently flirting with economic collapse and may be the first to leave the euro, though its foreign creditors might also suffer if repaid with devalued Greek drachmas.

End of the Schengen Area

A collapsed euro would likely compromise the so-called “Schengen Area,” named after the 1995 Schengen Agreement. Under this agreement, 26 separate European countries agreed to allow free movement of people, goods, services and capital within the borders of the eurozone. Not every member of the EU is also a member of Schengen, and not every participant in Schengen is part of the EU, but a collapse of the euro would nonetheless affect countries inside and outside of the region.

Economically, it is certainly possible to have competing currencies in the same economic zone. There is nothing preventing Germans or Italians from trading in both German deutsche marks and Italian lira, for example. That scenario only seems unlikely because an end to the euro would increase pressure to dissolve the entire EU experiment.

If Schengen falls, there are immediate practical costs to consider. Countries inside the eurozone would need to implement border controls, checkpoints and other internal regulations previously eliminated in the Schengen Agreement. These costs would spill over into private businesses, especially those relying on continental transportation or tourism.

To the extent that import quotas or tariffs are implemented by various member nations, and to the extent that those measures are reciprocated elsewhere, it would be a corresponding decline in international trade and economic growth. It is clear that the collapse of the euro would affect more countries than just European ones, though in uncertain ways. Other regions, especially major trading partners in North America and Asia, would face financial and possibly political consequences.

Impact Outside the EU

Many of the supposed economic benefits inside the EU did not transfer to external trading partners. The freedom of labor and capital did not extend to the United States or China, for example, unless foreign consumers and producers gained access to a member country. This makes it difficult to predict potential fallout, since it is possible that even stronger pro-growth policies could replace the bureaucratic super-state seated in Brussels. On the other hand, increased economic isolationism from nationalist movements threatens international businesses and financial markets.

In the very short term, markets would likely react negatively to added uncertainty. The EU is a known commodity, even if imperfect, and markets like predictability. In the longer term, however, the markets could certainly benefit from a once-again growing Europe. Between 2010 and 2015, Europe lagged significantly behind the Americas, Africa, Asia and the Pacific regions in real gross domestic product (GDP) growth. If a post-euro world returns continental Europe to competitive economic growth, it is very likely that the global economy will benefit.

Switching Back to National Currencies

The official term for leaving the euro and installing an old currency is called “redenomination.” Such a conversion would almost certainly be less complicated than coordinating the adoption of the euro in 2002, but investors should still be wary of uncertainty.

Essentially, the redenomination boils down to two broad changes. The first is the official adoption of a new currency within one nation’s boundaries. This means adjusting present wages, prices and other values to the new money in an approximately proportionate basis. Second, the international value of the currency needs to be priced into foreign exchange (forex) markets. This is based on many factors, including the productive capacity of each national government and the relative risk of devaluation for its currency.

It is likely that many indebted countries with lots of foreign creditors, such as Greece, would try to redenominate in such a way as to reduce their real repayment burden. One way to accomplish this is to redenominate and immediately begin a strong inflation, thus reducing the purchasing power of the repaid debt. Economists sometimes refer to this as “instant internal devaluation.” The downside to such a policy is that it creates havoc in the devalued country’s economy, since bank accounts, pensions, wages and asset values all suffer.

Close historical parallels can be found after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which stood between 1867 and 1918. After the empire fell apart, many member countries hoped to retain the Austro-Hungarian krone as currency. Unfortunately, several irresponsible governments used highly expansionary monetary policy to pay off the high debts from WWI, triggering hyperinflation in Austria by the early 1920s. Slovenia, Hungary and others experienced much of the same. By 1930, each former member nation had to use a new currency, often backed by gold or silver.

Impact on Banking, Forex and International Trade

If all that changed were the euro being replaced by competing national currencies, then the abolition of the euro would only create real long-term changes in monetary policy. The eurozone was originally sold, in part, by the concept of creating a European counterpart to the U.S. Federal Reserve. Getting rid of the euro would decentralize monetary authority back to the member nations; for example, a German central bank would control interest rates and the money supply in Germany, while a Portuguese central bank would control them in Portugal.

Banks could otherwise recapitalize in their national currencies, although they would likely have to keep more active foreign exchange balances for regional trade and reconciliation. The various exchange rates would change the relative values of some assets held internationally, and the workers in less-inflationary European job markets would see a relative income boost compared to European governments with loose monetary policy. For example, it is likely that workers in highly productive Germany would have an easier time affording goods and services produced in less-productive Slovenia.

However, it is very unlikely that other economic policies would remain unchanged if the euro failed. Even if the EU technically survived, other restrictions could be implemented on immigration or trade. Pro-euro parties would likely suffer political consequences, allowing for nationalistic parties to gain influence and maybe implement new fiscal policies. If Schengen also failed, the economic consequences could be extremely disruptive, even if only for the short term.

本文翻译由兄弟财经提供

文章来源：http://www.investopedia.com/articles/markets/080816/heres-what-will-happen-if-euro-fails.asp