日本当局对《日经》准确预报视而不见

Lucky guesses, or something more?

幸运的猜测，还是另有玄机？

The quarterly results season in Japan, which reached its peak last week, has been notable for the re-emergence of a notorious feature of the world’s second-biggest equity market: companies’ results trailed days in advance on the pages of the Nikkei newspaper.

上周达到顶点的日本上市公司季度财报公开季，非常引人注目，因为它再次呈现了世界第二大股票市场一个声名狼藉的特点：公司报告的业绩在几天前就被《日本经济新闻》(Nikkei newspaper)准确预报。

In some countries this might have authorities muttering about disclosure violations, or a lack of equal access to price-sensitive information. But in Japan, regulators seem to have turned a blind eye to the “Nikkei previews”, allowing stories to appear and then, within a few hours, letting companies issue rote statements saying the stories are not based on anything they have announced.

在一些国家，这可能导致监管当局抱怨这违反披露规定，或者投资者对价格敏感信息缺乏平等的获知途径。但在日本，监管机构似乎历来对“日经预览”视而不见，允许《日本经济新闻》上进行报道，然后在几小时内让公司发布机械的声明，称这些报道并非基于它们已公布的任何信息。

By then, however, the market has reacted, because the numbers seen by the 2.8m readers of Japan’s biggest business title are rarely wrong. “It’s absolutely assumed that if you try to run against it, you’ll get your face ripped off,” says Nicholas Smith of CLSA in Tokyo.

然而，市场到那时已有所反应，因为这份日本最大商业报纸的280万读者看到的数字很少出错。“绝对可以认为，如果你跟报上的数字对赌，你不会有好下场，”里昂证券(CLSA)驻东京的尼古拉斯•史密斯(Nicholas Smith)表示。

Last week, GungHo Online Entertainment disclosed sparkling results for the six months to December, thanks largely to its hit smartphone game Puzzles & Dragons. Yet the record numbers – operating profit of Y53.8bn ($525m) on sales of Y94.3bn – had been outlined in a story six days earlier, when the Nikkei said they were likely to be “about Y50bn” and “about Y93bn” respectively.

上周，GungHo Online Entertainment披露了截至12月的十分亮丽的半年业绩，主要得益于其受到热捧的智能手机游戏“智龙迷城”(Puzzles & Dragons)。不过，创纪录的业绩数字——销售额943亿日元，营业利润538亿日元（合5.25亿美元）——已出现在6天前的一份报道中，当时《日本经济新闻》表示，该公司的营业利润和销售额可能分别为“约500亿日元”和“约930亿日元”。

More shares in GungHo were traded on the day of the Nikkei story than on July 30, the day following the after-hours release of the results. Volumes on July 23 were more than 50 per cent higher than the previous 15-day average.

在《日本经济新闻》报道当日，GungHo股票的交易量高于其盘后公告业绩次日的7月30日。7月23日，该股交易量比前15个交易日的平均值高出逾50%。

GungHo issued the standard response on July 23 and later told the Financial Times that the Nikkei story appeared to be based on “guesswork”.

7月23日，GungHo公布了标准的回复声明，后来告诉英国《金融时报》，《日本经济新闻》的报道似乎建立在“猜测”的基础上。

The Nikkei declined to comment on its editorial policy other than to say its reporting was carried out “appropriately”.

《日本经济新闻》拒绝置评其编辑政策，仅仅表示，其报道进行得“很得体”。

Some say the previews are a harmless hallmark of a free press. So widespread is the practice, they argue, that market participants have grown used to it. But others say the practice hurts Japan at a time when the government is keen to sustain the interest of foreign investors.

有些人表示，预览是新闻自由的无害特征。他们辩称，这一做法是如此普遍，以致市场参与者对此已经习以为常。但也有人表示，在政府热衷于维护外国投资者权益的时候，这么做对日本是有害的。

Japan Exchange Group, operator of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, declined to comment on individual press reports, and said it had no comment on the “newsgathering methods” employed by the media.

东京股票交易所(Tokyo Stock Exchange)的运营方日本交易所集团(Japan Exchange Group)拒绝评论具体的媒体报道，并表示对该媒体的“新闻采集方法”无可奉告。