万花筒 2008-09-17&09-19 华尔街金融危机浅析
时间：2018-12-11 作者：英语课 分类：万花筒2008年
We used to have five major Wall Street firms, now we are down to two, and the meltdown of the three that we've seen, although Merrill by the way is not a meltdown. It was sold at a premium 1 and a big number actually, which is, I think, has been underreported. But reason that at least two of these firms have melted down is because the model that has reigned 2 on Wall Street for decades is really a very bad model, especially for shareholders 3. These companies are focused on the employees and are run completely for the benefit of their employees and not the shareholders. Let me give you some examples.
Lehman had the leverage 4 of around 30 times, er, its book value which was over 20 billion, so it had a 700-billon-dollar balance sheet (which) was lately reduced to around 600 billion when they were claiming to (quote) "Deleverage", so that's like having a mortgage on your house, that's a 97% mortgage, if the value of your house drops, inevitably 5 in a bubble market in housing which is one of the reasons why these companies are in trouble, you lose all your equity 6. That's what happened to these firms, they were enormously over-leveraged, and when the market turned against them, they lost all their book value which we just saw clearly was illustrated 7 by what the banks decided 8, ah, on Sunday, when they decided not to bail 9 them out.
Um, but, when they get lucky, and interest rates drop which has happened almost all through Lehman's history, cause' it went public in 1994, the value of those assets swells 10 enormously and they all look like geniuses, but eventually the market turns against them, the leverage bites the wrong way, and none of the huge pay that these companies are paying out to their employees ever comes back. Uh, and We saw pay-scales at Lehman and all these firms, they are unprecedented 11 in and outside of Hollywood, maybe, or maybe hedge funds. And they were completely undeserved, because they were strictly 12 making money because of luck and huge leverage.
- You have to pay a premium for express delivery.寄快递你得付额外费用。
- Fresh water was at a premium after the reservoir was contaminated.在水库被污染之后，清水便因稀而贵了。
- Silence reigned in the hall. 全场肃静。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
- Night was deep and dead silence reigned everywhere. 夜深人静，一片死寂。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
- The meeting was attended by 90% of shareholders. 90%的股东出席了会议。
- the company's fiduciary duty to its shareholders 公司对股东负有的受托责任
- We'll have to use leverage to move this huge rock.我们不得不借助杠杆之力来移动这块巨石。
- He failed in the project because he could gain no leverage. 因为他没有影响力，他的计划失败了。
- In the way you go on,you are inevitably coming apart.照你们这样下去，毫无疑问是会散伙的。
- Technological changes will inevitably lead to unemployment.技术变革必然会导致失业。
- They shared the work of the house with equity.他们公平地分担家务。
- To capture his equity,Murphy must either sell or refinance.要获得资产净值，墨菲必须出售或者重新融资。
- This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
- There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。
- One of the prisoner's friends offered to bail him out.犯人的一个朋友答应保释他出来。
- She has been granted conditional bail.她被准予有条件保释。
- The waters were heaving up in great swells. 河水正在急剧上升。
- A barrel swells in the middle. 水桶中部隆起。
- The air crash caused an unprecedented number of deaths.这次空难的死亡人数是空前的。
- A flood of this sort is really unprecedented.这样大的洪水真是十年九不遇。