2019年经济学人摇摇欲坠的经济(1)（打印版）

Turkey's president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, once called high interest rates "the mother of all evil".

土耳其总统雷杰普·塔伊普·埃尔多安曾称高利率是“万恶之母”。

Murat Uysal, its new central-bank governor, must then be close to angelic.

新上任的央行行长穆拉特·乌伊萨一定是一位接近天使般的人物。

Since Mr Erdogan sacked Mr Uysal's predecessor four months ago for refusing to slash interest rates,

自从四个月前，乌伊萨的前任因拒绝削减利率而被埃尔多安解雇以来，

he has cut three times, by a cumulative ten percentage points.

他已经削减了三次利率，累计减少了十个百分点。

The latest cut, of 2.5 percentage points on October 24th, was more than double market expectations.

10月24日最新一次降息2.5个百分点，是市场预期的两倍多。

After last year's aggressive tightening, easing now makes some sense. Inflation is back in single digits, after passing 25% last autumn.

在去年激进的紧缩政策之后，现在放松货币政策是有道理的。去年秋天，通货膨胀率超过了25%，现在又回到了个位数。

The lira has partially recovered from a battering that had pushed domestic prices up.

里拉已经部分从从推高国内物价的打击中恢复了过来。

In early October America threatened sanctions in response to Turkey's offensive in Syria.

10月初，美国威胁对土耳其实施制裁，以此回应土耳其对叙利亚的进攻。

The lira slumped, but after America brokered a ceasefire deal on October 17th, it steadied again.

里拉暴跌，但在美国于10月17日促成停火协议后，里拉再次稳定下来。

It strengthened further when Turkey's and Russia's presidents signed a similar agreement. That gave the bank room for the most recent cut.

当土耳其和俄罗斯总统签署了类似的协议后，这种稳定进一步加强。这为央行最近一次降息提供了空间。

Turkey crawled out of recession at the start of the year, but credit growth is still weak.

土耳其在今年年初走出了经济衰退，但信贷增长仍然疲弱。

Companies with hard-currency debt have been unable to borrow,

拥有硬通货债务的公司无法借款，

and banks sitting on $20bn-worth of non-performing loans (npls) have been reluctant to lend.

并且坐拥200亿美元不良贷款（npls）的银行一直不愿放贷。

Monetary policy alone will not fix the economy, says Selva Demiralp of Koc University: "Turkey needs to find a solution to the npl problem first."

单靠货币政策无法解决经济问题，科特大学的塞尔瓦·德米拉普称：“土耳其首先需要找到解决不良贷款问题的办法。”

In September the government ordered banks to reclassify debt of 46bn lira ($8bn) as bad loans.

9月，政府命令银行将460亿里拉（合80亿美元）的债务重新归类为不良贷款。

But doubts remain as to how banks will clear these loans from their balance-sheets.

但银行如何将这些贷款从他们的资产负债表中清除出去仍然存在疑问。