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May Li，男，我要去追逐心中的太陽，還要繼續努力的亞古獸
翻譯組全體成員如下：
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Why silver is the new gold
白銀為何是新的黃金？
英文部分選自經濟學人20250308期財經板塊
Why silver is the new gold
白銀為何是新的黃金？
Safe-haven demand and solar panels have sent its price soaring
避險需求和光伏產業助推白銀身價飆升
It is a fabulous time to be a gold bug. Not long ago, outing yourself as one was a good way of getting people to back away from you at an investment conference. The popular image was of someone in possession of their own electricity generator, stacks of water-purification tablets and several years’ supply of tinned food. Now it just features a shrewd investor. Since the start of 2023 the shiniest asset’s price has soared by nearly 60% in dollars. That is more than any of the world’s leading share indices—including, after a turbulent couple of weeks, America’s S&P 500.
現在是投資黃金的絕佳時機。不久前，在投資會議上，如果自爆黃金投資者的身份，總會讓人對你敬而遠之。那時，人們總覺得，投資者黃金的人往往自備發電機，囤積成堆的淨水片，還儲備數年的罐頭食品。而現在，黃金投資者已是精明投資者的代名詞。自2023年初以來，這種最耀眼的資產的價格飆升了近60%（以美元計），漲幅碾壓全球主要股票指數——包括經歷數週動盪後的美國標普500指數。
註釋：
gold bug：金螳螂，指對黃金有特殊喜好的人，通常是指投資者或收藏家。
2.shrewd：A shrewd person is able to understand and judge a situation quickly and to use this understanding to their own advantage. 精明的
Yet the sweetest vindication goes to fans of another precious metal. Even gold enthusiasts tend to view an ardent interest in silver as somewhat eccentric. To traders it is the “poor man’s gold” or “the devil’s metal”. For years those nicknames were justified by silver’s lacklustre returns and the wild ride its price took along the way. The devil’s metal is still not for the faint-hearted. But it has almost kept pace with gold over the past year and has outperformed it over the past five. With investment flows now following returns, a once-niche asset is inching towards the mainstream.
然而，真正揚眉吐氣的還是另一種貴金屬的粉絲。即便在黃金擁躉眼中，對白銀的狂熱興趣多少有些古怪。在交易者眼中，白銀是“窮人的黃金”或“魔鬼的金屬”。長期以來，白銀低迷的回報和一路以來價格的大幅波動，使得這些綽號名副其實。“魔鬼的金屬”仍然不是膽小者所能駕馭的。但過去一年，白銀幾乎追上了黃金的漲幅，過去五年的表現更是超過了黃金。如今，隨著資金被高回報吸引，這種一度小眾的資產正逐漸邁向主流。
註釋：
1.vindication：辯護，證明無罪
2.ardent：Ardent is used to describe someone who has extremely strong feelings about something or someone. 熱烈的
3.faint-hearted：If you describe someone or their behaviour as faint-hearted, you mean that they are not very confident and do not take strong action because they are afraid of failing. 膽怯的; 懦弱的
Logic suggests that silver’s price should move similarly to gold’s. It, too, is rare, pretty and inert, and so has been used to forge jewellery and coins for millennia. This long-established role as a store of value lends it “safe-haven” appeal when investors are nervous. As with gold, the fixed amount of silver in the Earth’s crust ought also to make it a good hedge against inflation. Sure enough, both metals’ recent rallies came as investors fretted over geopolitical chaos and persistently rising prices. In doing so they overcame another common tendency, for their prices to fall when real interest rates rise and vice versa, since they generate no income.
從邏輯上看，白銀價格走勢應與黃金類似。銀同樣稀有、美觀且性質穩定，因此數千年來一直被用於製造珠寶和鑄幣。因其長期作為儲值工具，在投資者感到不安時，白銀具有“避風港”般的吸引力。與黃金一樣，地殼中白銀存量有限，也應是對沖通貨膨脹的工具。果然，隨著投資者對地緣政治混亂和價格持續上漲感到擔憂，這兩種金屬最近都出現了反彈。此番回彈，金銀都打破了另一種共同趨勢，即在實際利率上升時，貴金屬因不會產生利息或收益而面臨價格下跌，反之亦然。
註釋：
fret over：為……煩惱：過度擔憂或焦慮某事，使自己感到不安或煩躁。
So much for theory. In practice, different levels of mining supply and industrial demand ensure that the silver-to-gold price ratio is changing all the time. Over the long term, that has led to decades of disappointment for silverites. For most of the 1970s you would have needed to sell 30 to 40 ounces of silver to buy one of gold. Today it would be more like 90.
理論歸理論，實際情況中，由於礦產供應和工業需求水平的差異，金銀價格比始終處於波動之中。從長期來看，這種波動導致過去幾十年白銀投資者屢屢受挫。上世紀70年代的大部分時間裡，你需要賣出30到40盎司的白銀才能買到一盎司黃金，而如今需要90盎司才行。
Speculators have been burned by the devil’s metal, too. After the global financial crisis of 2007-09, faltering industrial demand and a spotlight on haven assets meant silver’s price depended more than ever on traders’ whims. As a result, the silver-to-gold price ratio spent years moving in line with the gold price. A bet on silver became an amplified bet on gold—a relationship cherished by hedge funds, which would usually have had to pay for a margin loan to obtain such leverage. The relationship then fell apart towards the end of the 2010s, causing traders relying on it to lose their shirts, as silver abruptly fell out of fashion with investors.
投機者同樣在這“魔鬼的金屬”上吃過苦頭。2007-2009年全球金融危機後，工業需求疲軟，避險資產受到關注，使得白銀價格愈發依賴交易者的情緒。因此，金銀價格比在多年間與金價同步波動。導致投資白銀就像是在加槓桿押注黃金——這一關係受到對沖基金的青睞，因為在正常情況下，它們需要支付保證金貸款才能獲得類似的槓桿效應。然而，在2010年代末，白銀在投資者中突然失寵，導致依賴這種關係的交易者虧損，並最終使這種關係瓦解。
Now it is back in vogue. Central banks have spent years building up their gold reserves. In September Interfax, a Russian news agency, reported that its government would soon start buying silver, too. Last year was the first since 2021 that silver exchange-traded funds, which individuals use to buy commodities, saw net inflows. This year traders in New York have been draining London’s vaults of gold, amid fears that such imports may face tariffs in the future. They have been snapping up silver even faster—so much so, in fact, that the transatlantic price gap justifies loading bars of it onto commercial flights.
現在白銀又再度受到青睞。各國央行多年來一直在增加黃金儲備。去年9月，俄羅斯新聞機構Interfax報道稱，俄政府很快將開始購買白銀。自2021年以來，白銀ETF（個人用來購買大宗商品的投資工具）在去年首次出現淨流入。今年，由於擔心未來可能對黃金進口徵收關稅，紐約的交易者正大量從倫敦的金庫中提取黃金。而他們搶購白銀的速度非常快，以至於跨大西洋的價格差異擴大到了足以透過商業航班運輸銀條並獲利的程度
What is more, a widening gulf between supply and demand looks likely to keep the frenzy going. The annual supply of silver, driven by mining production and recycling, has contracted slightly over the past decade, according to the Silver Institute, a research outfit. Over the same period, industrial demand has surged by more than 50%, owing largely to silver’s use in solar panels. Imports into China, which manufactures large quantities of these, have shot up. Since mining capacity cannot be expanded quickly, the imbalance should continue to boost silver’s price for some time.
更重要的是，供需缺口不斷擴大或將推動這場白銀熱持續下去。根據研究機構白銀協會（Silver Institute）的資料，過去十年裡，由礦產開採和金屬回收決定的白銀年供應量略有收縮，而同期工業需求卻激增了50%以上，增長的主要原因是太陽能電池板中用銀量激增。作為太陽能電池板的重要生產國，中國對白銀的進口量大幅攀升。由於礦產開採能力無法迅速擴張，這一供需失衡還會持續一段時間內，繼續推高白銀價格。
As the world becomes a more fractious place, it is hard to imagine investors’ demand for haven assets falling soon. Meanwhile, the incentives for governments to store value in places beyond the reach of Uncle Sam are growing. That is a big reason why central bankers have been buying so much gold of late. Some may be tempted, along with Donald Trump, to include cryptocurrencies in their reserves. But there is another precious metal that could do the job, too. It is time for silverites to come in from the cold.
隨著世界變得越來越動盪，投資者對避險資產的需求短期內似乎難以下降。同時，各國政府愈發有意將財富儲存在遠離美國政府控制的地方，正因如此，多國央行近期大規模增持黃金。有些國家可能受到特朗普的啟發，考慮將加密貨幣納入儲備。然而，另一種貴金屬也能起到相同的作用。白銀投資者的“冷板凳”日子可能要結束了，白銀正迎來新的機會。
註釋
1.Silverites：n. one favoring use or establishment of silver as a monetary standard
Source:https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/silverites
延申閱讀：
1.《金價，漲瘋了！有人正將大量黃金從倫敦運往紐約》
Source:https://www.mbachina.com/html/xw/202502/608628.html
2.《特朗普官宣將五種加密貨幣納入戰略儲備，幣圈聞聲飆漲》
Source:https://www.guancha.cn/internation/2025_03_03_766966.shtml
翻譯組：
Martina，女，愛電影愛生活，愛金融經濟
Vivifang，女，本人豐富，日新月異，無法簡介
Hannah，女, 愛讀財經的金融小白經濟學人唯粉
校對組：
Alexis：Still figuring it out
Harold，不狂不放不申花
Rachel，心有懵虎，細嗅烏龜
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感想
Intro，男，政府臨時工，前理想主義者兼積極的悲觀主義者
白銀從來就不是新黃金！！
在貴金屬的市場中，總有人將白銀與黃金相提並論，但它們的投資邏輯卻有著本質的差異。白銀，作為工業金屬，其價格波動更多地遵循商品的供需規律；而黃金，則因其避險屬性和通用性，更貼近於一種特殊的金融資產。
白銀的工業屬性使其價格對經濟週期極為敏感。在經濟繁榮時期，白銀的工業需求旺盛，價格往往表現出較高的彈性。例如，在光伏產業的推動下，白銀的工業需求佔據了總需求的相當比例。2023年全球光伏裝機量達444GW，中國佔比48.7%，推動光伏用銀量從2022年的3,672噸增至2027年的8,156噸，年增速2.8%-5%。然而，這種需求並非一成不變。隨著技術的進步，光伏產業中“去銀化”的趨勢正在興起，這可能會在未來對白銀的需求造成影響。此外，白銀的市場容量相對較小，投機氛圍濃厚，這也導致了其價格波動大於黃金。
黃金則不同，它更像是一種“0利息債券”。作為一種非生息資產，黃金的價格與利率、通脹預期以及美元走勢等因素密切相關。在經濟不確定性增加或地緣政治衝突加劇時，黃金的避險需求會上升，推動其價格上漲。例如，2024年全球經濟不確定性增強，主要經濟體增長分化加劇，部分新興經濟體面臨債務困境、通脹高企與經濟增速放緩的多重難題，而發達經濟體復甦步伐不一，這種不穩定促使投資者尋求避險資產，黃金作為傳統避險港灣，吸引大量資金湧入。此外，黃金的通用性使其在全球範圍內被廣泛接受，這為其增加了額外的溢價。央行的增持行為以及全球“去美元化”的趨勢，也為黃金提供了長期的支撐。中國央行資料顯示，截至2月末黃金儲備規模達7361萬盎司，連續第四個月增持。
從投資邏輯的角度來看，白銀作為一種商品更適合富有經驗的期貨投資者來投資，而黃金可能更適合普通投資者和一般家庭作為儲蓄和保值的一個長期工具，尤其在現在這個動盪、離散、孤立的年代黃金可能正處在他的黃金時代。
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願景
