Reporter: Vikram Pandit is here. He became CEO of Citigroup in December 2007, less than a year ago. He now finds himself leading the company during its most difficult time. He joins me for his first television interview since the economic crisis engulfed his company. I’m pleased to have Vikram Pandit at this time, at this table to talk about Citigroup, as well as how he sees the circumstances of the economic crisis we face. Welcome.
记者：潘迪特先生现在做客我们的节 目。他2007年12月份成为花旗集团的 首席执行官，距现在还不到一年。他现 在正在领导公司走出其历史上最困难的 时期。自公司经历经济危机之后，潘迪 特先生第一次参加电视采访节目。很 高兴潘迪特先生能够在此时此刻跟我们 谈论有关花旗集团的情况，以及他对目 前我们所面临的经济危机的看法。欢迎 您。
Vikram Pandit: Charlie, thank you for having me.
潘迪特：查理，谢谢您邀请我来。
Reporter: It’s a pleasure to have you here, and I appreciate the fact that this is your first television interview. And I want to view it as a sense of a conversation. Let me begin by what you think of what Secretary Paulson announced today. I mean, a financial writer said to me, this is breathtaking.
记者：很高兴您能够来参加我们的节 目，我们也感谢您参加的首次电视采访 是我们的节目，我们就把它当做是一次 谈话吧。那我们就首先来谈一下，您对 今天财政部长保尔森对外宣布的事情的 看法。一个金融专栏作家对我说，那是 非常激动人心的。
Vikram Pandit: It is a very interesting plan. The plan is about reducing the rates on mortgages, ultimately to help people buy homes. And so, as he announced these $800 billion worth of securities that can be bought as a result of that, what’s already happened in the market is they’ve started trading better and they are about 50 basis points better. And if they are 50 basis points better, that 50 basis points gets translated directly into a mortgage to a homeowner. That’s the beginning of what we need to do, because ultimately we are going to have to attack housing.
潘迪特：那是一个很有趣的计划。计划 是有关降低抵押借款的利率，最终帮助人 们买房。所以，当他宣布人们可以购买价 值8000亿美元的有价证券的时候，市场 上发生的事情就是：人们的交易变得更 好，提高了大约50个基点。如果提高了 50个基点，这50个基点就直接转化为私 房屋主的抵押贷款。那是我们所要做的第 一步，因为最终我们将进军房地产。
Reporter: Yes. People say that constantly, that in the end this crisis will be averted because the housing market will turn around and we will have dealt with home mortgages and foreclosures. What else do you believe is necessary to happen and for the government to do?
记者：是的，人们对此作出的即时反应 就是：金融危机最终将会转移，因为房 产市场将会恢复，我们要处理有关住房 抵押和丧失抵押品赎回权的问题。您认 为还会有什么事情将要发生呢？政府需 要做些什么呢？
Vikram Pandit: There are three or four things that are going on, Charlie. We talked about housing. That is probably the most important thing. We have got to deal with it. The second part is that the banks and the financial institutions around the world have found themselves with more securities than they would like to hold today. That is called a deleveraging of financial institutions.
潘迪特：查理，还有3件或者4件事情将 会发生。我们刚才谈论了住房问题，那也 许是最重要的一件事情，我们必须要解 决。另一个问题是银行和全世界金融机构 会发现他们现在持有更多的有价证券，在 现如今的形势下，他们可能并不想要那么 多，这被称为“金融机构减债”。
Reporter: Right. All financial institutions are deleveraging.
记者：是的，金融机构都在进行减债。
Vikram Pandit: I think that’s right. Around the world. And there may be...
潘迪特：我想是这样的，而且这是世界范围的，也许会有...
Reporter: Around the world.
记者：全世界都这样。
Vikram Pandit: And the third part is, whenever we go through a cycle of this sort, it does start affecting the economy. So we’re heading into a market and the economy where unemployment is rising. And so as you think about what needs to happen, you have got to attack housing directly. And what Secretary Paulson did today is one step. There can be a lot of different things one can do on that. The last part is to try and figure out what do we do with these assets the banks don’t want?
潘迪特：第三是无论什么时候我们经历 一次这样的周期，它都着实会影响到经 济，所以我们现在正在朝向失业率上升 的市场和经济走去。所以你考虑一下， 应该做些什么事情以抵御这些情况，你 就会想到首先就要直接向房产业进军。 保尔森财长今天做的事情就是迈出了第失业一步。面对这种情况，很多人都会有许 多不同的做事方式。最后，我们就要考 虑，我们应该如何处理那些银行不想要 的资产。
Reporter: Right, these so-called toxic assets.
记者：是的，就是那些所谓的不良资产。
Vikram Pandit: Well, there’s—some of them are toxic, some of them are good.
潘迪特：对，但是有些是不良资产，有 些资产是好的。
Reporter: OK.
记者：原来是这样。
Vikram Pandit: There are just too many of them, and there has to be a plan to clean up these assets and have institutions and/or funds buy them. And that’s—the Treasury has been working on that. The Fed is helping that. And so we have some more work to do with that. But the last part is the most important one, which is if you attack housing，and at the same time unemployment is still rising, that doesn’t necessarily help us get out of where we need to be. And so we have to have a fiscal stimulus. And the president-elect has said that he’s considering that. It may be one of his first actions. We have got to have a fiscal stimulus to jumpstart this economy.
潘迪特：是的，那样的资产有很多，我 们必须要有计划的清除那些资产，并且 有机构或资金来购买它们。财政部已经 在为这方面进行努力了，美联 储也在努力，所以对此我们也 有很多事情要做。但是最重要 的是最后一部分，如果你进军 房产业，而同时失业率也在不 断上升的话，那对我们不一定 有利，因此我们必须还需要有 政府财政的剌激。总统当选人 说，他正在考虑这件事情，那 也许会是他采取的第一个行 动，我们必须要有政府财政的 剌激，才能够重新启动我们的 经济。
Reporter: You and most of the bankers you know agree with that, that we need the kind of physical stimulus that the president-elect is talking about, at the range of $500 billion, $600 billion, that will not only be involved in infrastructure, but also in terms of alternative energy and lots of other issues.
记者：对此您和大多数您认识的银行家 达成了一致意见，那就是需要总统当 选人所说的要为我们提供的物质剌激， 5000亿或者6000亿美元，那将不仅涉 及到基础设施，也包括替代能源和许多 其他的事情。
Vikram Pandit: I think that’s right. Now, one of the opportunities we have is to not only use the fiscal stimulus to jump-start the economy. We need to do that, but at the back end of that, we want to make sure that we’re attacking some of those issues for America that are going to be important long-term, like infrastructure, health care, those kind of things.
潘迪特：我想是这样的。现在，我们所 拥有的一个机会就是利用物质剌激重新 启动我们的经济，我们必须要那样做， 但是最终，我们要确保我们所做的事情对于美国人民来说是重要的、有长期效 果的，比如像基础设施、卫生保健那样 的事情。
Reporter: How do you size up the president’s economic team? Tim Geithner, who you’ve worked with, who you know, because of some of these negotiations. Larry Summers, of course you know.
记者：您怎样评价总统先生的经济团队 呢？包括与您在谈判中合作过的蒂姆? 盖特纳？还有您认识的拉里?萨默斯？
Vikram Pandit: I like it. I think it’s one of the best teams one could put together. I have known Larry somewhat. He’s a very smart man. He，s experienced. He actually is very good at looking through a lot of details and coming up with a theory. Geithner understands theories. He understands practice. He's a doer. And unfortunately, he has had a lot of experience in dealing with some of these things over the last six months. So it’s good to have him. It’s good to have Larry.
潘迪特：我很喜欢这个团队。我想这是 所能够组织起来的一个最好的团队，我 认识拉里，他是一个机智而且经验丰富 的人，事实上，他很擅长从大量细节中 形成理论。盖特纳能够明白理论，亦能 够理解实践，他是一个实干家。对他来 说不幸的是，过去的这6个月时间里， 有很多处理不良金融问题的经验，所以 这个团队有盖特纳真的不错，拉里也很 优秀。
Reporter: My impression is that Geithner was involved in the negotiations having to do~ that took place over the weekend—but he pulled back after it became public that he might be the secretary of the Treasury nominee.
记者：在我的印象里，盖特纳是由于协 约问题必须要那样做，那件事是周末的 时候发生的，当事情被公开之后，他要 离开这个团队，因为他可能会成为财政 部长的候选人。
Vikram Pandit: Charlie, we dealt with a lot of regulators over the weekend. And that is one of the wonderful things about what happened over the weekend. Everybody came together. And this was the FDIC，this was the OCC, this was the Fed, it was the Department of Treasury. It was the confidence in the financial system as a whole. And so, a lot of people are involved in trying to figure out, OK, we’re in this market, where we have a battle between fear and confidence.
潘迪特：查理，周末的时候我们处理了 很多事情，而那是周末发生的奇妙的事 情之一。每个人都走到一起，这个是联 邦存款保险公司，那个是货帀监理署， 这个是美联储，那个是财政部。这是大 家对于金融体系的整体信心，所以很多 人都试图去弄明白，我们正处于一个信 心与恐惧抗争的市场之中。
Reporter: Right. Tell me what had happened to Citibank. Not going all the way back-and I want to talk about risk management in a second—but why was the stock collapsing? And why did you feel it was necessary to say we need to do something about short selling?
记者：是的。请跟我们说一下花旗集团 的经历，不是所有的事情，我想要说一下 有关于风险管理的问题，为什么股票会崩 溃呢？为什么您认为有必要说，我们需要将其抛空呢？
Vikram Pandit: There’s no doubt that a lot of banks have come into this market with assets and securities that they wish they hadn’t had. These are loans，loans that they make. And in a tough market, they are challenge loans. And we knew that. We had those on our balance sheets. And we did everything we could to make sure we raised the right amount of capital. We raised a lot of it. We cut our cost structure correctly, and had a plan. We do have a plan to make sure that as we get out of these assets, the company starts making money. And our fear was that some of the issues- about Citi’s assets and asset quality were being translated into people taking action on the stock. Not only some people who had stock they were selling, but particularly short sellers.
潘迪特：无疑，有很多银行在打进市场时 都带有很多资产和有价证券，而这并不是 他们所希望有的，其中包括他们做出的借 款。但是在一个充满困难的市场之中，他 们这是在向借贷挑战。我们了解这个情 况，我们的资产负债表中有借贷的记录， 我们尽自己一切所能去确保我们增加适量 的股本总额。我们筹集了很多资金我们现 在正确地解除了我们的费用结构，并且我 们有一个计划以保证当我们摆脱那些资产 的时候，公司开始盈利。我们担心的一些 问题是花旗的资产和资产质量会转化成一 些人的股票，不仅仅是正在卖出股票的人 们，还有那些抛空的人。
Reporter: Or if you didn’t, what would happen?
记者：如果您不那样做的话，可能会怎 么样？
Vikram Pandit: That’s anybody’s guess, and we’ll never find out. Because when you look at what happened over the weekend, everybody got ahead of it.
潘迪特：这也是所有人的猜想，而我们 永远都不知道会如何。因为从周末发生 的事情来看，大家的想法都超前了。
Reporter: And you lost in a week 50 percent of your value?
记者：您在一周时间了损失了 50%的价 值，是吗？
Vikram Pandit: We did indeed. The stock price went down about 50 percent in a week. And so, I think it was important, as we all talked, that we got ahead of this. And that’s really what happened over the weekend.
潘迪特：确实是这样，股票价格在一周 之内下跌了 50%，因此我认为我们能够 跨过这个门槛是很重要的，这也正是上 周末发生的事情。