【正文】 ways collapse. Eventually the greatest fool is found, and once he is found, the process cannot continue. In many ways a speculative binge is like a chain letter. Everyone involved in a chain letter believes that he or she will get rich. But since all that is involved is a reshuffling of money, if someone does get rich, others must get poorer. Like speculative binges, chain letters die when the greatest fools have found and joined the chain. Text : Speculative binges can affect the production of an economy if they cause enough financial disruption. They will cause bankruptcies, reduce people39。 一般而言 ， 共有基金的投資種類和百分比依基金公司的目標與策略的不同而有差異 。如今的俄國經(jīng)濟比十年前要強很多。 Unit 2: Financial Investment Financial English Unit 2: ? Revision of Unit 1 ? Overview of Unit 2 ? Background information of Unit 2 ? Text ? Exercises ? Assignments Review of Unit 1 ? Exercises Checkup ? Question amp。 Sentence Translation— Suggested Answers 3. 俄羅斯的專家稱，國家的經(jīng)濟潛力將使得國家不必遭受相當大的經(jīng)濟損失就可以渡過經(jīng)濟危機。 股票型共有基金投資于股票市場 ， 債券型共有基金投資于債券 ， 也有一部分共有基金的投資涵蓋了股票 ， 債券 ，貴重金屬 ， 房地產(chǎn)等 。 selling one can take a great deal of time. If an individual saver has lent money directly to another person, the loan can also be an illiquid asset. If the lender suddenly needs cash, he must either persuade the borrower to repay quickly, which may not be possible, or he must find someone else who will buy the loan from him, which may be very difficult. Text : Although the intermediary may use its funds to make illiquid loans, its size allows it to hold some funds idle as cash to provide liquidity to individual depositors. Only when a great many depositors want to withdraw deposits at the same time, which happens when there is a run on the institution, will the financial intermediary be unable to provide liquidity. Unless it can obtain help from the government or other institutions, it will be forced to suspend payments to depositors. Text : A SOURCE OF SHOCKS AND BUMPS TO THE ECONOMY In addition to lending money to individuals and groups, there are other ways in which banks are part of financial markets. Banks borrow and lend funds among themselves in the federalfunds market. They buy and sell foreign exchange. They buy and sell government and mercial debt. And finally, one form of bank debt serves as money in modern economies, and banks create this debt as a result of their financial transactions. Text : Economists are concerned that financial intermediaries can be a source of shocks to the economy, bumps that can disrupt the normal flow of economic life. This concern arises for at least two reasons. First, bank debt serves as money, so disruptions to banks can affect the amount of money in circulation. Second, financial intermediaries are tied together through chains of debts and assets. Text : Because of these linkages, the failure of one financial intermediary can weaken others, increasing their chances of failure. As a result, there is the possibility that if a key financial intermediary fails, that failure can create a domino effect that could cause other financial institutions to fail, ultimately causing the financial sector to seize up and stop functioning. Serious disruption of the financial markets will disrupt the rest of the economy. Text : Portfolio Choice CHARACTERISTICS OF FINANCIAL ASSETS Portfolio choice involves decisions about the way we want to hold our assets (or to structure our liabilities). It is a fancy term for something we do all the time. For example, a yard sale is an example of portfolio adjustment. People holding a yard sale are attempting to convert assets in the form clothing and household items into cash. They are not changing the amount of assets they have, but rather the form in which they hold them. Text : From a macroeconomic perspective, most important cases of portfolio adjustment involve financial assets. When we look at financial assets, there are three characteristics that most people want to have in their assets. First, they like assets with low risk. Second, they want assets that are liquid, assets that can easily be converted to money and spent. Third, they like assets that give them a high rate of return. Because no asset bines all three characteristics, people face tradeoffs. Text : If they want a higher return, they usually have to accept more risk or less liquidity. For example, over the past half century the average return on holding mon stocks has been higher than the return on holding passbook savings in a bank. However, the high average return on mon stocks is the result of some stocks performing very well while others perform poorly. Investment in stocks can be quite risky. Text : BALANCE SHEET Many issues in portfolio choice can be illustrated with a balance sheet. A balance sheet is based on the definition of worth or wealth: (1) Net Worth = Assets Liabilities An asset is what one owns and a liability is what one owes. Using very elementary algebra, one can rewrite this equation as: (2) Assets = Net Worth + Liabilities Since this equation is based on a definition, the righthand and lefthand sides must equal each other or balance, and hence the name balance sheet. Text : Balance sheets provide a precise way to analyze banking transactions. The table below shows balance sheets of a hypothetical mercial bank and one of its customers. The deposits of customers are liabilities to the bank because they are amounts that the bank owes to them. On the other hand, these same deposits are assets for the customers. The loans the bank makes to consumers and businesses are assets to the bank but liabilities to the consumers and busines