What prevents the US from cutting off China from the SWIFT network and freeze Chinese assets in the US?

美国为什么没有切断中国与SWIFT的联系，冻结中国在美国的资产？

以下是Quora网友的评论：

Elizabeth Henderson

Absolutely nothing. The only possible thing I can think of is that they still want more loans from China. Once they default on China. They would no longer receive future loans. For future govt and national operations. So they are probably still concerned about that. But america would be free from previous obligations to China. Which is still a win.

If I was the President of China, I would sell off all remaining dollars and treasuries right now. Before america grows a pair of balls and actually defaults.

不为什么。我唯一能想到的可能就是他们还想从中国获得更多借款。一旦他们对中国违约，他们就不可能再获得借款，让美国政府和国家继续运转了。所以他们可能还比较担心的就是这一点。但美国能摆脱过去对中国的欠款，这仍然算是一种胜利。

如果我是中国的领导人，我现在就会抛售手头所有的美元和美国国债，赶在美国试图违约之前。

Pete Dunham

The fact that China trade with some countries in the Chinese Yuan instead of the US dollar, and China could freeze any assets that the USA has in China. SWIFT is controlled by the G10 banks and is overseen by Belgium.

事实上，中国和一些国家的贸易是用人民币结算的，不是美元，中国也可以冻结美国在中国的任何资产。SWIFT系统是G10银行控制的，由比利时监管

Os Jose

Why would the USA do such a drastic thing? These two countries may be at conflict with words but certainly not at war! it’s amazing the moderator does not see a question like this as nonsense?

为什么美国要如此决绝呢？这两个国家也许是会有口角，但肯定不会打仗！版主居然还能容忍这种问题，真是神奇了。

King of Bir Tawil

It is impossible to do so, both practically and legally.

But if miraculously US is able to cut China out of Swift, then it would be more devastating for US dollar, as you cannot buy everything made in China all of sudden, USD will simply useless at that point.

And I am sure China will simply use its digital Yuan to continue trading, without USD.

这种事在实操上和法律上都是不可能的。

但如果美国真的发疯，把中国赶出Swift，那么这对美元来说将是灭顶之灾，因为你不能一下子就买到所有中国商品的替代品，届时美元将毫无用处。

我相信中国会简单地绕过美元，使用数字人民币继续交易。

Henry Young

There is nothing to prevent US from doing this stupid move.

The thing is the cost of doing so.

没有什么能阻止美国采取这个愚蠢的举动。

唯一要考虑的是这样做的成本。

Thomas Pauken II

BEIG: Talk about a very dumb idea and if implemented that would inflict serious damage on the US, as well as global economy. Let’s ponder the faulty logic here.

这是一个非常愚蠢的想法，如果美国真的付诸行动，将对美国和全球经济造成严重损害。我们可以想一想这个逻辑的错漏之处。

China is the world’s second largest economy and its position as an economic power will remain vigorous whether the rest of the world pushes ahead on decoupling against China or not.

The country has over 1.4 billion people and it’s unrivalled as a global leader in manufacturing and exports. Not even the US stands close in comparison as a manufacturing powerhouse. Plus, Chinese consumers can sustain the domestic economy amid hard times.

中国是世界第二大经济体，无论其他国家是否想要“与中国脱钩”，中国的经济大国地位都非常稳固。

中国拥有14亿多人口，在制造业和出口方面是无人能及的全球领导者。相比之下，美国作为制造业大国也无法与之相提并论。此外，中国消费者足以在困难时期支撑国内经济。

China’s ‘Dual Circulation’ paper introduced by the chinese has proven to have been a game-changer. The new policy announced Beiing would embrace globalism and multilateral platforms but only if western powers and other sovereign governments return the favor to support China as a good partner.

Nonetheless, Beiing had warned of the potential that a rising number of countries could choose to distance themselves from China, which could lead to increasing efforts for them to decouple from the Chinese economy. Yet, Dual Circulation addresses that concern.

事实证明，中国推出的“国内国际双循环”是一项改革举措。这项新政策宣布，中国将积极拥抱全球主义和多边平台，但前提是西方大国和其他主权国家政府也友善支持中国。

中国曾警告称，越来越多的国家可能会选择与中国保持距离，这可能会导致它们加大与中国经济脱钩的努力。但国内国际双循环解决了这个问题。

The alternative approach for Beiing is to boost domestic consumption and services sectors, while localizing supply chains. If foreign countries attempt to disrupt China’s cross-border trade and investments, Beiing can rely more on localization and its consumer base.

中国的另一种做法是提振国内消费和服务业，同时将供应链本地化。如果外国试图扰乱中国的跨境贸易和投资，中国也可以更多地依赖本地化及国内消费者基础。

So we can return back to the Quora question and pose the hypothetical that Washington, Brussels, London, Delhi, Tokyo and Canberra all choose to coordinate on efforts to block SWIFT international bankwire transactions from China-based bank depositors.

The global banking system would be severely impacted and that would require the entire banking structure to get re-wired to ensure the technical block stays in effect. Additionally, the banks will lose out on charging transaction and transfer fees and that will hurt their bottom lines.

因此，我们说回这个Quora的问题，假设华盛顿、布鲁塞尔、伦敦、德里、东京和堪培拉都决定一起阻挠中国银行储户通过SWIFT进行国际电汇交易。

全球银行系统将受到严重影响，这会迫使整个银行结构重新调整，确保技术区块的有效性。此外，银行也会在交易和转账费用方面蒙受损失，伤及银行业的根本。

Companies and people conducting business dealings with the Chinese will struggle to get money transferred. Projects under construction and receiving investments from the Chinese could be shut down due to lack of funds and China would not be blamed for it.

We could be talking about hundreds of billions of US dollar at stake if SWIFT blocks all transfers to and from banks in China. The develo countries with close connections to China would get devastated as they rely on China’s Belt & Road Initiative to construct vital infrastructure, such as new roads, bridges and railways.

所有和中国人做生意的公司和个人都难以调配资金。正在建设和接受中国投资的项目可能会因为缺乏资金而关停，而中国对此没有任何责任。

如果SWIFT禁止所有出入中国银行的转账，我们可能会面临数千亿美元的风险。与中国关系密切的发展中国家将受到重创，因为它们依赖中国的“一带一路”来建设重要的基础设施，如新的公路、桥梁和铁路。

Sovereign governments in the Emerging Markets can tap into financing from China-based AIIB (Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank). But if SWIFT blocks the AIIB, they lose out on a precious resource.

To learn more about how the AIIB is hel the develo nations to build key infrastructure you can read more about it from Brookings

新兴市场的主权政府可以从总部位于中国的亚洲基础设施投资银行获得融资。但如果SWIFT封锁亚投行，他们就失去了一个宝贵的资源。

若想了解更多关于亚投行如何帮助发展中国家建设重要基础设施的内容，你可以阅读布鲁金斯学会的资料

As reported by Brookings:

“China’s response to this changing growth dynamic is partly external and partly internal. On the external side, it is no coincidence that this period of excess capacity at home is the moment at which China launched expensive new initiatives, such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), the BRICS Bank, and the ‘One Belt, One Road’ initiative in order to strengthen infrastructure both on the westward land route from China through Central Asia and on the southerly maritime routes from China through Southeast Asia and on to South Asia, Africa, and Europe.”

据布鲁金斯学会报道：

“中国对这种不断变化的增长动力的反应一部分来自国际社会，一部分来自国内。在国际方面，这一时期中国国内产能过剩恰好是中国推出新举措的时间，这并非巧合，比如亚洲基础设施投资银行、金砖国家银行和“一带一路”等，加强了从中国经中亚向西陆路和从中国经东南亚向南海上路线以及通往南亚、非洲和欧洲的基础设施建设规模。”

From my personal perspective, I don’t believe Washington will pull the trigger by shutting down SWIFT on Chinese cross-border banking transactions in the future unless a real war erupts.

从我个人的角度来看，我不相信华盛顿会在未来率先动手，在SWIFT系统中关闭对中国的跨境银行交易服务，除非两国之间真的爆发战争。

KokHin Lim

Do you want to get the bad news or the good news first.

The bad news is China's digital yuan totally disable USA from even knowing, hearing or feeling about China's transaction. It enable China to totally trade without swift all together.

你想先听听坏消息还是好消息？

坏消息是，中国的数字人民币完全让美国无法了解、知晓或感受中国的银行交易。中国可以在没有swift的情况下进行贸易。

Wenjie Piao

cutting off the largest trading Nation from your system. and your currency and financial system would love to withstand.

you'd better be ready to provide everybody else at least the same amount of products and market.

where are they?

真要是切断了最大贸易国与你们系统的联系，你们的货币和金融系统应该很乐意承担后果。

你们最好要做好准备，为美国人民提供相同规模的商品和市场。

可是，该上哪儿找呢？

Colin Riegels

Is it true that worries are mounting that China could be kicked out of the Swift financial messaging system or cut off from its foreign assets if relations with the US worsen?

I would be deeply astonished if either of those things happen. To be honest, I am still slightly astounded that they happened (to a certain extent) to Russia. But Russia has to invade a sovereign nation for that to happen. And Russia is pretty peripheral to the US economy. Unlike Russia, China is absolutely central to the US economy.

是不是越来越多的人开始担心，如果中美关系恶化，中国可能会被踢出Swift金融系统，或失去中国在海外的资产？

如果这些情况真的发生，我会非常吃惊。说实话，我对俄罗斯的遭遇也是多少感到有些惊讶的。但那是因为俄罗斯进攻了一个主权国家，这才导致了这样的结果。俄罗斯对美国经济来说是无足轻重的。但中国和俄罗斯不同，中国对美国经济绝对至关重要。

Mike Breen

Same reason you don’t shoot yourself in the foot, though the US has been increasingly doing that anyway by demanding the world does as the USA says or no US financial market access.

Alternatives are being developed.

Now take a look at that and tell me why the world should continue to put up with that?

就好比你不会搬起石头砸自己的脚对吧，虽然美国越来越霸道，要求其他国家都要听美国的话，否则就不让他们进入美国的金融市场。

但大家都在研究其他替代方案。

现在想一想，然后告诉我为什么各国要继续忍受它？

Samuel Williamson

US doesn’t have direct control over SWIFT. It really is as simple as that.

It’s a company registered in Belgium, and while the US government has significant influence over it, it is still a European company, subject to Belgian and EU laws.

More info on SWIFT:

Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication - Wikipedia

美国对SWIFT并没有直接控制权。就是这么简单。

SWIFT是一家在比利时注册的公司，虽然美国政府对它有重大影响，但它仍然是一家欧洲公司，受比利时和欧盟法律的约束。

关于SWIFT的更多信息：

世界银行间金融电信协会-维基百科

Joseph Boyle

Iran or even Russia mean little to the US economy, and discarding some Iran business is a small price for China and others to pay.

China (or more generally East Asia half of which is China) is central to the US economy. Cutting off credit would reduce US-China trade to a cash or barter system of clumsily balanced trade. This would balance trade but at the expense of devastating the goods economy at least in the short term. The dollar’s exchange rate would likely plunge.

伊朗甚至俄罗斯对美国经济都没有什么意义，放弃一些伊朗业务对中国和其他国家来说都是微不足道的。

中国(或者更广泛地说，东亚有一半也都是中国的)是美国经济的核心。切断信贷将使美中贸易变成一种现金交易或实物交易的体系，难以实现贸易平衡。虽然可以平衡贸易，但代价是至少会在短期内破坏商品经济，美元汇率会大幅下跌。

Zane Liu

Because doing so would completely destroy the US.

Right now, the US is in control of international trade and financial systems. The entire world buys into the system based on trust that the US will protect their assets and maintain the international order.

Cutting China off from SWIFT will swiftly see all nations of the world abandon the US.

Actions speak louder than words. Nobody will trust the US-backed international order, and quickly leave it, if the US were to do something like cutting China off from SWIFT.

因为这样做会彻底摧毁美国。

现在，美国控制着国际贸易和金融体系。各国基于美国会保护他们的资产、维护国际秩序的信任，都选择加入了这个体系。

切断中国与SWIFT的关系会迅速导致世界各国摒弃美国。

事实胜于雄辩。如果美国真的干出切断中国与SWIFT的关系等事，没有人会继续相信美国支持的国际秩序。

Masao Miwa

Probably nothing. The US froze Japanese assets before it declared war on Japan. Others will notice, that will be the absolute sign that the US cannot be trusted in the world community. Having said that, Russia, China, India, the EU, and Iran have been working on an alternate system to SWIFT. China has been selling US assets. Chinese FDI went negative on 2018, a sign that they are selling their US assets. They have been unloading their treasuries. Better hurry before nothing is left to freeze or steal.

美国在对日宣战前也曾冻结了日本的资产。其他国家会注意到，这是美国在国际社会种逐步丧失信任的迹象。因此，俄罗斯、中国、印度、欧盟和伊朗一直在研究一个可以替代SWIFT的系统。中国一直在抛售美国资产。2018年，中国对美直接投资降为负值，这表明中国正在出售在美资产。中国一直在抛售国债。在资产被冻结或被盗抢之前最好尽快处理干净。