香港人民幣Hibor大幅回落 CNH Hibor plummets to 8.31%

The overnight CNH-Hibor rate has finally plummeted after two record highs, suggesting the People’s bank of China feels it has made its point to investors and things can now return to normal.

在兩次升至創紀錄高度之後，隔夜香港人民幣銀行同業拆借利率(CNH-Hibor)終於大跌，這暗示，中國央行(PBoC)在成功收窄在岸和離岸人民幣匯率價差之後，已把自己的意圖傳遞給了投資者，局面可能會迴歸常態了。

The rate is the overnight borrowing cost, between banks, for offshore renminbi, chiefly in Hong Kong. It’s not too widely cited but this week took on massive importance when it spiked, first jumping 939 basis points to a record-high 13.4 per cent on Monday, and then sky-rocketing to 67 per cent on Tuesday. Today it returned to 8.31 per cent, which is still more than double the six-month average of 3.82 per cent.

CNH-Hibor是離岸人民幣、主要是香港人民幣的銀行間隔夜借款成本。Hibor未被廣泛引用，但本週，它體現出了相當大的重要性。它先是週一大漲939個基點、升至13.4%的創紀錄高度，然後週二飆升至67%。今天，Hibor回落至8.31%，這仍是6個月均值3.82%的兩倍多。

The sharp increase indicated the market for CNH, or offshore renminbi, had dried up as the central bank mopped up liquidity to narrow the widening gap between the renminbi’s offshore and onshore rates. By heavily reducing the supply of CNH, shorting the renminbi – which involves borrowing the currency at market rates – became prohibitively expensive.

Hibor大幅升高表示，隨着中國央行吸收流動性，以縮小不斷擴大的離岸人民幣(CNH)和在岸人民幣之間的差價，CNH發生了乾涸。通過大幅降低CNH的供應，做空人民幣——涉及以市場價借入人民幣——的成本高得異乎尋常。

“Speculators aggressively betting against the CNY via the CNH were punished by exorbitantly high Hibor rates for the CNH,” said analysts at DBS in a note on Wednesday.

“由於借入CNH的Hibor高得厲害，大肆通過CNH做空在岸人民幣(CNY)的投機者受到了懲罰，”新加坡星展銀行(DBS)的分析師週三發表報告稱。

CNH-Hibor is set each day at 11:15am local time, by averaging rates sent in from banks authorised to submit quotes. Within minutes of the rate spike on Tuesday, the offshore and onshore renminbi rates converged, for the first time since October.

Hibor是在當地時間每天上午11:15根據獲授權提供報價的銀行提出的利率平均值設定的。週二，Hibor飆升幾分鐘之後，人民幣離岸和在岸匯率自2009年10月以來第一次趨於一致。

After this show of force, it’s likely many short-sellers will second guess the risk-reward scenario of betting on a decline in China’s currency.

這次力量展示之後，許多做空者很可能將對押注人民幣下跌的風險報酬做一番事後諸葛。

“The central bank can easily exert influence in the CNH market, against a small and declining pool of CNH liquidity (about RMB1.5-2tn) and with the suspension of onshore-to-offshore funding links,” noted HSBC analysts in a note today. “Speculative interests, given their leveraged nature, are likely to be expressed in the forward curve, rather than with cash transactions in spot. As such, they can be very vulnerable to a rise in overnight CNH funding costs.”

“由於CNH流動性（約1.5萬億至2萬億元人民幣）不大且不斷縮小，且從在岸到離岸的融資渠道暫時切斷，中國央行可以輕而易舉地對CNH市場施加影響，”匯豐(HSBC)分析師在今天的報告中指出，“由於帶有槓桿特點，投機性力量可能會表現爲遠期價格曲線，而不是現金現貨交易。這樣一來，隔夜CNH融資成本升高可能會對他們造成很大影響。”

The tug-of-war between speculators and the PBoC isn’t over, but it’s not a surprise that rates were pulled back today.

投機者與中國央行之間的拉鋸戰並未結束，但Hibor被拉低，不會令人感到意外。

Meanwhile, banks in Hong Kong are offering higher interest rates on renminbi deposits, indicating banks are willing to pay a premium to hold China’s currency. Here’s a good chart from Nomura:

另一方面，香港的銀行爲人民幣存款提出了更高的利率，表明他們願意爲持有人民幣支付溢價。