BBH's Hart Sees $5 Trillion Commodity Market Strained by Choke Points

BBH的Hart：咽喉要道受阻让5万亿美元大宗商品市场承压 资本监管以及霍尔木兹海峡等关键海上运输要道的地缘政治干扰，正锁死数百亿美元的贸易营运资金，大幅推高全球供应链的融资成本。 本期内容深入剖析了规模达4万亿至5万亿美元的大宗商品贸易融资市场，详细解读了贷方如何利用有担保的自偿性信贷额度为全球原材料的流转提供资金支持。Lewis Hart阐述了利用期货合约对冲实物头寸的机制、在极端追加保证金情形下的流动性管理方式，以及依据“信贷5C原则”开展信贷尽职调查的方法。此外，讨论还涉及霍尔木兹海峡等地缘政治瓶颈对营运资金的影响，以及为石油或铜等可对冲大宗商品融资与为腰果等不可对冲货物融资之间独特的结构性差异。 大宗商品融资是一个规模达4万亿至5万亿美元的市场，在全球20万亿美元的贸易体系中运行，支撑着关键原材料的生产、运输和仓储。 (5:00) 为提高资本效率，实物大宗商品贸易商利用有担保的自偿性信贷额度，该额度会根据标的大宗商品的市场价格浮动与调整。 (5:00) 贸易商通过将实物多头头寸与期货市场上的账面空头头寸配对，来化解运输过程中的价格波动风险。 (10:00) 大宗商品价格的快速飙升会触发实时的账面追加保证金通知，给实物贸易商带来巨大的短期流动性需求。 (10:00) 承销机构依赖“信贷5C原则”（品德、资本、能力、抵押品、条件），并在市场动荡周期中将品德置于首位。 (14:15)

Lewis Hart of Brown Brothers Harriman explains that commodity finance represents an essential $4 trillion to $5 trillion segment of global trade, functioning as a capital-efficiency engine for physical merchants rather than a speculative market. Lenders structure secured, self-liquidating credit facilities that continuously convert moving physical inventory into accounts receivable while navigating intense liquidity and supply chain risks. Self-Liquidating Credit and Futures Margin Exposure (5:00) Commodity finance operates through secured, self-liquidating lines of credit designed to fund raw materials without locking up corporate capital. Hart explains that physical merchants act as supply chain managers, buying inventory like copper cathode or green coffee on bank credit. As goods transit and sell, physical collateral converts into accounts receivable, which pay off the loan upon buyer settlement. These borrowing bases float dynamically with underlying raw material prices rather than remaining fixed. To protect lenders from price swings, borrowers must maintain a matched hedge: a long physical inventory position offset by a short futures position. However, this creates liquidity exposure. When commodity prices spike during transit—such as copper surging mid-voyage—merchants face immediate cash margin calls on their paper hedges. Consequently, trading houses require substantial standby credit lines simply to fund hedge maintenance until cargo docks and sales clear. Collateral Governance, Basel IV, and Private Capital (20:00) Securing commodity loans requires strict operational controls and legal title governance. Hart identifies borrower character as paramount among the classical Five Cs of Credit, given that managerial integrity determines recovery during market crises. Lenders establish legal control through negotiable bills of lading using the phrase "to the order of," later transitioning to warehouse receipts. To mitigate operational exposure, banks refuse suboptimal storage and structure facilities so that defaulted collateral is liquidated in situ rather than physically repossessed. The lending landscape has shifted markedly away from traditional European institutions. Driven by heightened capital costs under Basel IV, past credit losses, and ESG pressures, many traditional banks retrenched. In their place, non-bank institutional investors and private credit funds have entered the market, drawn by short-duration assets, floating interest rates, inflation hedging, and low correlation with public equities. Choke Point Disruptions and Trapped Working Capital (25:00) Geopolitical friction illustrates how transport bottlenecks trap circulating capital. Hart notes that while commodity analysts track volume, bankers monitor balance sheet velocity. In the Strait of Hormuz, roughly 100 stranded commercial vessels immobilize tens to hundreds of billions of dollars in inventory. Furthermore, market volatility sharply escalates borrowing needs; financing a single Aframax tanker carrying 700,000 barrels of crude climbed from $40–45 million to $70–75 million following recent regional tensions. Prolonged diversions compound these financial strains. Bypassing Red Sea choke points via the Cape of Good Hope adds 10 to 15 sailing days, compounding vessel charter rates, insurance, and working capital costs. Delays also activate complex maritime legal doctrines, contrasting standard port demurrage penalties with "frustration of voyage." While merchants currently benefit from liquidity buffers built after recent supply shocks, extended disruptions threaten to exhaust existing capital shields. Futures Viability and Non-Hedgeable Supply Chains (40:00) Not all commodities support standardized futures trading. Hart notes that viable futures contracts require high product homogeneity, sustained price volatility, and dual commercial hedging interest from producers and consumers. While computing power exhibits characteristics suitable for emerging futures markets, goods like onions fail primarily because high perishability undermines warehouse settlement. For non-hedgeable agricultural goods lacking futures markets—such as cashews and pistachios—banks underwrite credit against bilateral physical forward sales with verified buyers rather than exchange-traded hedges. These markets feature complex midstream processing, illustrated by raw West African cashews shipped to Vietnam or India to safely extract toxic, urushiol-coated kernels. Financing these multi-stage, non-hedgeable supply chains requires banks to rely on localized merchant relationships and diversified sourcing. Hart emphasizes that commodity finance fundamentally relies on the rapid turnover of working capital and strict collateral control. An unresolved question is whether merchant liquidity buffers and incoming non-bank capital can withstand increasingly permanent geopolitical choke points without triggering systemic liquidity strain across global supply chains.

布朗兄弟哈里曼银行（BBH）企业咨询与银行业务主管刘易斯·哈特指出，规模达4万亿至5万亿美元的大宗商品贸易融资是维系全球实物供应链运转的隐形支柱；该业务依赖以实物资产为抵押的自偿性循环信贷与严格的期现对冲，但当前正面临地缘航运咽喉引发的巨额资本冻结及巴塞尔协议等监管收紧的深层挑战。 自偿性信贷与大宗商品现货供应链 (5:00) 在全球约20万亿美元的贸易融资总盘子中，专业大宗商品融资占据4万亿至5万亿美元。哈特指出，实体大宗商品贸易商并非单边押注价格涨跌的投机客，其角色本质是供应链管理者，主导着从智利阴极铜到未烘焙咖啡豆的全球跨境调配。由于大宗货品运输需要庞大流动性，贸易商极少以全额自有资金垫付，而是普遍利用银行提供的抵押型自偿性循环授信额度（secured, self-liquidating line of credit）支撑运营。 该结构运作方式类似于供应链专用信用卡：银行提供资金专项采购符合资质的现货库存；货物售出后，抵押品即转化为应收账款，并在买方付款时自动清偿当期借款。与常规静态企业贷款不同，该授信具备高度动态性，贷款额度会随底层商品现货价格（如铜价处于每磅4美元、6美元或7美元）的涨跌实时浮动调整，确保存贷资产与真实市值紧密匹配。 期现对冲逻辑、追缴保证金与仓储质押 (10:00) 大宗商品从产地运至终端消费地常耗时数月，为规避在途价格波动，放贷银行要求贸易商执行期现对冲（持有实物多头的同时建立期货空头）。但这种机制伴随着显著的流动性风险：若货物运输途中价格暴涨（例如铜价从每磅3.00美元跳涨至3.50美元），纸面空头头寸将面临巨额且实时的追缴保证金（margin calls）。贸易商必须向银行大额追加借贷以维系空头头寸，否则可能在现货尚未结算前因纸面亏损陷入流动性挤兑，此前极端的镍逼空事件便印证了这种结构性脆弱。 除了金融端对冲，银行对实物货物的仓储保管设立了严格门槛。针对前高盛CEO劳埃德·布兰克费恩关于咖啡仓库腐烂发臭的传闻轶事，哈特强调，新奥尔良或新泽西等枢纽港口的专业仓库能对温度与湿度实施精准受控，确保麻袋装青咖啡豆免受霉菌与害虫侵蚀。银行信贷尽调会严格审核仓储资质，若仓储环境未达标，存货将无法被纳入合格抵押品。 监管挤出、借款人品格与提单货权控制 (14:15) 在传统信贷“5C原则”（品格、资本、能力、抵押品、环境条件）中，哈特认为管理层的“品格”（Character）是最为核心的考量，市场剧烈动荡时借款团队的信誉直接决定贷款能否安全回收。过去十年间，巴塞尔协议IV对信用证和结构性贸易融资提出了更为严苛的资本拨备要求，叠加2015年大宗商品暴跌损失及ESG转型压力，导致大量传统欧洲银行撤离该领域。拥有206年历史的BBH等专业机构选择留守，而非银机构投资者则被大宗商品融资的短期浮动利率、抗通胀属性及与主流股票市场的低相关性所吸引，开始稳步介入。 在日常物权监控上，银行依赖贸易融资的核心法律凭证——载有“凭指示”（to the order of）字样的可转让海运提单（negotiable bill of lading）来确立对在途货物的法律控制权。货物入库后物权转为仓库收据，客户提货必须获得银行许可并签署信托收据。即便发生借款人违约，银行也是在货物所在的储罐或仓库就地变现处置，而非直接将实物拉回自持。 海峡瓶颈与在途冻结的巨额营运资本 (25:00) 地缘政治危机展现了商品研究员与贸易银行家视角的显著差异。例如在霍尔木兹海峡受阻期间，宏观分析侧重于全球20%原油供应受限，而商品银行家关注的核心则是巨额“被困流动资金”（trapped capital）。根据五角大楼数据，海峡滞留约100艘商业船只，意味着数百亿甚至超千亿美元的营运资本被迫冻结在水面上，严重阻碍了商品金融依赖的周转速度。 这种延误会造成融资成本的非线性攀升：危机前为一艘载重约70万桶原油的阿芙拉型（Aframax）油轮融资约需4000万至4500万美元，危机爆发后单船融资需求骤增至7000万至7500万美元。此外，为规避红海威胁绕行好望角需额外增加10至15天以上的航程，直接推高了租船费率与保险支出。尽管大型贸易商在经历2020年疫情与2022年天然气冲击后积累了充足的资本缓冲，但若咽喉要道长期受阻，滞期费乃至“航次受阻”（frustration of voyage）等法律争端将持续侵蚀企业流动性。 非对冲商品风控逻辑与期货金融化门槛 (30:00) 对于腰果、开心果及松子等缺乏成熟期货市场的农产品，银行无法依赖交易所衍生品进行价格风险对冲。以腰果供应链为例，未加工坚果从西非运往越南或印度加工（期间需剥离带有毒漆酚涂层的果壳），再分销至全球。针对此类非对冲商品，银行的授信依据转向实体合同核查，要求贸易商提供与认证终端买家（如食品制造巨头）签署的远期承购协议，以锁定下游销售价格来对冲单边风险。 在论及某一商品是否适合衍生品金融化时，哈特提出了三大核心门槛：商品的高度标准化与均质性（homogeneity）、持续的高价格波动率，以及产销两端强烈的对冲商业意愿。目前市场尝试建立的算力芯片期货虽具高波动性，但均质化仍待验证；而洋葱虽具价格波动，却因极易变质无法支持长期仓储与实物交割。哈特指出，大宗商品融资机构身处能源、金属与农产品供应链的最上游，往往能在集装箱运费与钢材异动中，先于官方宏观经济数据（如PPI和CPI）数月察觉到通胀端倪。 哈特指出，大宗商品贸易融资的稳健运行高度依托法理维度的货权穿透、跨期套保纪律以及借款主体的商业道德。然而，国际航运扼要通道的长期受阻、在途冻结的数千亿美元营运资本，以及巴塞尔框架下传统银行资本的持续收缩，正在加速推高全球实物贸易的融资摩擦。当局部地缘对抗转化为常态化的背景阻力时，非银资本与实物贸易商能否长期承受激增的利息负担与周转迟滞，仍是全球供应链面临的核心不确定性。

## Background 本期内容由彭博（Bloomberg）旗下的《Odd Lots》栏目于 2026 年 6 月 1 日通过播客及网络平台发布。节目页面介绍指出，在大宗商品港口、货船与卡车运输的背后，存在着一个决定谁来出资并在危机时首当其冲的金融管道；本期邀请布朗兄弟哈里曼银行（Brown Brothers Harriman）企业咨询与银行业务主管刘易斯·哈特（Lewis Hart），深入探讨大宗商品融资的实际运转、风险定价机制、仓储管理优劣，以及可对冲商品（如原油）与缺乏期货市场的商品（如腰果）在融资模式上的本质差异。 ## TL;DR 节目深入揭示了全球实物贸易中每年高达 4 至 5 万亿美元的大宗商品融资体系，指出贸易商本质上是依赖自偿性循环授信额度（Self-liquidating line of credit）管理供应链时空错配的管理者，而非单纯的价格投机客。对话详细拆解了海运提单的物权控制、“多现货、空纸货”对冲模式在暴涨行情中面临的致命追加保证金（Margin Calls）压力，以及《巴塞尔协议4》与监管成本导致欧洲传统大行离场的原因。针对霍尔木兹海峡地缘危机，嘉宾测算了上千艘商船滞留所冻结的数百亿至上千亿美元营运资金，并对比了腰果等小众不可对冲商品的实物锁价风控逻辑，最后延伸探讨了算力（如英伟达芯片）期货等新兴衍生品所需的同质性与高波动条件。 ## Atmosphere & style 全片在严谨冷峻的银行信贷逻辑与鲜活生动的全球贸易实景之间形成了绝佳平衡，主持人 Tracy 与 Joe 默契好奇的追问与老牌银行家 Lewis Hart 游刃有余的剖析碰撞出极高密度的信息增量。对谈氛围既有审视数十亿美元在途资产被困海峡时的紧绷与慎重，又穿插着关于腰果外壳生漆毒素、德州甜葱轶事以及行业冷知识的轻松调侃。听众仿佛跟随着资金与货轮深入到全球贸易最隐秘的运转齿轮之中，真切感受到物理世界物流受阻在金融管道中掀起的剧烈流动性波澜。 ## Bulletin - `05:00` 全球实物大宗商品融资每年规模高达 4 至 5 万亿美元，是 20 万亿美元全球贸易融资中高度专业化的核心子集，本质是为流动中的实物供应链提供动态流动性支持。 - `06:30` 实物贸易商核心依赖自偿性循环抵押授信额度（secured self-liquidating line of credit），其额度随底层现货市价实时盯市浮动，并在货物交付转为应收账款后实现回款闭环。 - `25:00` 地缘咽喉冲突引发严重资本被动沉淀：以霍尔木兹海峡受阻为例，滞留的约 1,000 艘商船冻结了数百亿至上千亿美元营运资本，单艘 Aframax 油轮装运成本从危机前约 4,500 万美元骤增至 7,500 万美元。 - `23:44` 在缺乏期货对冲市场的商品（如腰果、松子）融资中，银行无法依托纸货套保抵御波动，转而深度依赖下游实物远期交付合约与对全产业链物流货权的排他性控制。 ## Key takeaways - `00:00` 实物大宗商品贸易商本质上是全球供应链与时空错配管理者而非单边价格投机客，其核心诉求是通过银行信贷最大化自身资本效率。 - `06:30` 大宗商品融资采用自偿性闭环机制：贷款发放时直接质押在途存货，货物交付后自动转为应收账款，最终买家结清款项后优先偿还银行贷款。 - `10:00` 大宗商品贷款具备动态盯市（Mark-to-Market）弹性，银行通常按浮动抵押市值的 75% 至 80% 以上放款，授信额度随行就市调整。 - `11:15` 经典‘多现货、空纸货’对冲存在致命的现金流挤压风险：当现货价格大涨时，期货端未结清的巨额追加保证金（Margin Calls）可能将贸易商逼入流动性危机。 - `12:35` 银行对仓储质押开展极为严密的现场尽调，通过设立‘合格仓储地点要求’审查温湿度与防虫能力，防范抵押物降解与仓单造假风险。 - `14:02` 信贷审核遵循‘5C 原则’，其中借款人的品格与商誉操守（Character）居于首位，因为面对极端黑天鹅行情时，管理团队的诚信直接决定处置成败。 - `20:00` 由于《巴塞尔协议4》大幅抬高资本计提成本、运营管理极度密集以及欧洲银行面临 ESG 转型压力，传统欧美大行过去十年纷纷退出该领域，而 BBH 等老牌机构长期坚守。 - `21:28` 海运提单（Bill of Lading）是贸易融资的核心物权凭证，其载明的‘凭指示’（to the order of）条款确立了银行对在途货物的法律处分权。 - `21:28` 远洋货物卸入陆地仓库后，银行通过法定仓单与信托收据（Trust Receipt）放行物料加工，借款人须在限期内以合格应收账款替换抵押品以防敞口暴露。 - `27:30` 面对霍尔木兹海峡等海运咽喉封锁，银行的首要应急程序是核实船员安全与经纬度坐标、启动战争险审查，并剖析租船合同中的滞期费与航程受阻免责条款。 - `30:00` 在遭遇外生性地缘冲击导致的违约时，银行倾向于协商展期而非盲目逼债，并在承保前端通过严格的‘供应链分散化原则’防范单一产区依赖。 - `35:00` 腰果供应链呈现出西非采摘原籽、运往东南亚脱除含漆树酚外壳并加工、再出口欧美的漫长格局，中游加工环节沉淀了产业链绝大部分附加值。 - `38:00` 银行在借贷中极力避免接管并清算实物抵押品；即使发生违约，原油等流动性商品也会在储罐等所在地就地折价挂牌抛售。 - `40:00` 某种底层商品能否演化出成熟的期货市场取决于‘同质性’（标准化程度）与‘价格高波动性’，当前算力与存储芯片恰好满足这一衍生品化条件。 - `43:20` 大宗商品融资处于产业链最前端，银行账目异动往往先于官方宏观经济数据反映通胀传导；而卡车货运因柴油成本占比极高，普遍依赖柴油期货进行交叉套保。 - `45:00` 红海与苏伊士运河危机迫使货轮绕行好望角，额外增加 10 至 15 天航程直接大幅抬高了在途资金成本，倒逼中东与贸易商探索跨半岛陆运管道等替代基础设施。 ## Detailed walkthrough ### `00:00` 大宗商品世界的浪漫幻想与金融化现实 播客节目一开始，主持人 Tracy Allaway 与 Joe Weisenthal 聊起了各自对大宗商品领域的印象。Tracy 回忆起自己刚入行从事财经新闻报道时的初衷：她当年非常渴望成为一名大宗商品记者。在她当年的浪漫想象中，跑大宗商品新闻是一件“真实且鲜活”的工作，不像华尔街那些仅在屏幕上闪烁跳动、毫无实体感的数字代码。她幻想着自己能登上海轮，陪伴着堆积如山的煤炭、铝锭或铜矿石漂洋过海。Joe 亦深表赞同地指出，金融圈人人都爱把“这是个人际关系驱动的业务（relationship business）”挂在嘴边，但在大宗商品市场，人际关系和信任是真真切切的底层支柱，而非一句空洞的陈词滥调；与此同时，大宗商品看似同质，但批次之间的细微品质差异意味着它们往往并不具备完美的同质可替代性（fungibility）。 然而，现实远比单纯的货船运输复杂。Tracy 坦承，自己过去严重低估了大宗商品市场深度的“金融化（financialization）”。就像此前节目讨论霍尔木兹海峡局势时所揭示的，一艘货轮的航行牵扯着极其庞杂的保障体系：保险人、再保险人、货运险、船体险（hull insurance）以及各类责任险层层嵌套。在资金与融资维度，同样存在着一套错综复杂却鲜为人知的运转网络。 Joe 从第一性原理（first principles）的角度剖析了其中的金融逻辑：大宗商品贸易的核心诉求是“资本效率（capital efficiency）”。假设一家公司要将数千吨电解铜从一地运往另一地，无论运输和采购的绝对成本有多高，没有任何一家成熟的贸易商愿意将自有全部流动资金砸在途中。合理的做法必然是仅支付一小部分保证金或首付款，其余绝大部分依靠借贷融资，待货物运抵港口交付、买家付款后再清偿贷款。这样才能在漫长的采掘、采购与远洋交付周期中，时刻保证自身现金流的机动性与流动性。 ### `05:00` 4到5万亿美元的隐秘管道：何谓大宗商品融资？ 为了揭开这套隐秘管道的面纱，节目邀请到了 Brown Brothers Harriman（布朗兄弟哈里曼银行，BBH）的企业咨询与银行业务主管 Lewis Hart。Lewis 在大宗商品融资领域深耕多年，开场时 Tracy 还打趣地问他究竟更懂大宗商品融资还是更懂 90 年代的 Hip-Hop 与 R&B，引来 Lewis 会心一笑。 谈及大宗商品融资的本质与体量，Lewis 给出了一个惊人的对比定位： - 全球实物商品贸易规模每年约达 20 万亿美元，绝大多数都通过贸易融资（trade finance）计划运作。 - 大宗商品融资（commodity finance）是贸易融资中高度专业化的核心子集，每年的市场规模高达 **4 到 5 万亿美元**。 ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: Trade Finance and Commodity Finance Scale accDescr: 全球20万亿美元贸易融资大盘与其中4到5万亿美元大宗商品融资的体量层级结构 subgraph WorldTrade["全球实物贸易金融体系"] TF["全球贸易融资 (Trade Finance)<br/>约 20 万亿美元"] subgraph CFSub["专业子集"] CF["大宗商品融资 (Commodity Finance)<br/>约 4 到 5 万亿美元"] end end TF --> CF ``` Lewis 将其形容为“人人都视而不见的最大的 4-5 万亿美元级市场”。为什么如此庞大的资金网络在主流媒体上几乎悄无声息？因为大宗商品融资的日常业务是“枯燥无味”的。在运转良好的情况下，货轮按时靠泊、仓单安全交接、应收账款如期结清，根本没有媒体博眼球所需的戏剧性冲突。公众通常只有在供应链发生重大危机、仓库造假暴雷或者地缘政治冲突截断咽喉要道时，才会猛然意识到这套金融管道的存在。 ### `06:30` 典型客户画像：实物贸易商与“动态资产融资” Joe 提出疑问：大宗商品融资的典型客户究竟是谁？他们在银行购买的到底是什么金融服务？如果说普通购房者从银行购买的是 30 年期分期付款能力以保护个人现金流，那么大宗商品玩家购买的又是什么？ Lewis 解释道，大宗商品融资从本质上讲就是**“为运动中的物体提供融资（the business of financing motion）”**。其最典型的服务对象是**实物大宗商品贸易商（physical commodity merchants）**。这一角色有着极其深厚的历史渊源，不仅能追溯到文艺复兴时期的美第奇家族与意大利威尼斯商人，甚至可以延伸到公元前（B.C.）的地中海早期贸易。 大众对“大宗商品交易员”普遍存在误解，以为他们是整天盯盘单边投机价格涨跌的赌徒。Lewis 强调，实物贸易商的核心角色绝非投机客，他们本质上是**供应链管理者（supply chain managers）**。无论是在能源、基础金属还是农产品（如用麻袋装运的生咖啡豆、整船的阴极铜）领域，贸易商负责协调全球各地的产销时空错配。 贸易商从银行购买的核心金融工具是**自偿性循环抵押授信额度（secured self-liquidating line of credit）**，其底层运作机制具有高度独特的资产质押与闭环特征： 1. **专款专用与底层质押**：额度类似于一张高额信用额度，但只能用于采购符合准入标准的大宗商品实物。 2. **自偿性闭环（Self-liquidating）**：贷款发放的瞬间，银行就确切知道客户买了什么货、何时出售、以及未来的还款来源是什么。货物采购后先作为存货（inventory）质押给银行；货物交付给买家后，质押物自动转变为对应的应收账款（accounts receivable）；当最终买家付清货款后，款项优先归还银行贷款。 3. **循环周转（Revolving）**：贷款随着采购与交付周而复始地借出与还清。 4. **浮动价值与价格弹性**：绝大多数传统商业银行偏爱固定金额借贷，但大宗商品融资的独特之处在于授信金额是“浮动（floating）”的。无论电解铜价格是每磅 4 美元、6 美元还是 7 美元，融资结构必须具备动态弹性，以满足客户在商品价格剧烈波动时对流动资金的弹性需求。 ### `10:00` 大宗商品供应链中的资金沉淀与盯市贷款机制 大宗商品的物理流转背后隐藏着庞大的资本需求。以日常的一磅咖啡为例，咖啡豆可能需要跨越两千多英里，从南美洲的种植园出发，经过脱壳研磨、加工处理、出口装船，运抵美国经过烘焙厂烘焙，最终才摆上曼哈顿精品咖啡馆的货架。在这一长达数月的链条中，买方通常需要提前数月签订采购协议，但最终确定合同条款并实际付款的时间点往往是在货物装船起运之时。此时，谁也无法断言届时的市场价格究竟是每磅 3 美元、2 美元还是 1 美元。大宗商品贷款机构的核心特点之一就是对抵押存货进行实时盯市（Mark-to-Market）。如果客户以一磅铜作为抵押，不论当前市价如何变动，贷款方通常会按照抵押物市值的 75% 到 80% 甚至更高比例提供融资，授信额度随行就市动态调整。 ```mermaid flowchart LR accTitle: 大宗商品物流与盯市融资流程 accDescr: 展示咖啡等大宗商品从产地到零售终端的供应链及银行动态盯市授信机制 subgraph Logistics["物理供应链流转"] A["产地种植与初加工<br/>（南美洲等）"] --> B["装船海运与出口<br/>（锁定合同并付款）"] B --> C["本土烘焙与加工<br/>（美国加工厂）"] C --> D["终端零售消费<br/>（曼哈顿咖啡馆）"] end subgraph Finance["动态盯市融资"] E["物理存货抵押"] --> F["实时盯市估值<br/>（Mark-to-Market）"] F --> G["按估值 75%~80%+ 放款"] end B -.-> E ``` ### `11:15` 期货对冲的悖论：做多现货、做空纸货与致命的追加保证金 面对价格波动的不确定性，大宗商品贸易商普遍利用期货与衍生品市场来对冲价格风险，避免抵押物贬值侵蚀贷款本金。最经典的运作模式是“多现货、空纸货”（"long physical, short paper"）——即在持有物理库存的同时，在期货市场上做空等量合约。这种对冲机制在常规情况下运行平稳，然而一旦现货市场行情大涨，衍生品端就会产生剧烈的现金流压力。例如，一艘载着定价 3 美元/磅的铜正从智利运往美国佐治亚州，若海运途中铜价飙升至 3.50 美元/磅，借款人为了维持空头对冲仓位不被强平，必须向交易所支付大额追加保证金（Margin Calls）。此时客户不得不向银行借入更多流动资金，而在货轮靠港交付、买家付清货款之前，该对冲头寸必须持续开放，追加保证金的规模往往难以预料。这正如此前大宗商品市场著名的“伦镍逼仓事件”所展现的困境：许多实体贸易商即便在现货头寸和对冲方向上“完全站在正确的一侧”，却依然可能被期货端的追加保证金逼入绝境。 ### `12:35` 仓库现场尽调：从劳埃德·布兰克芬的咖啡轶事到仓储风控 针对大宗商品质押贷款的尽调过程极其严密，甚至细化到仓储设施的具体品质。主持人谈及高盛前首席执行官劳埃德·布兰克芬（Lloyd Blankfein）在 J. Aron 时期的经历，传闻称当时存放大量咖啡豆的仓库恶臭扑鼻、生满虫害且极易霉烂。刘易斯·哈特澄清道，优质仓库里存放的原粮状态其实体验并不差，他曾实地走访过新奥尔良和新泽西的众多咖啡仓库，那里堆满了装在粗麻袋里的未烘焙生咖啡豆（Green Coffee），散发着自然的清香。生咖啡豆的保质期相对较长、降解缓慢，但仓储管理的关键在于防潮与质量管控。因此，专业银行在放贷前会制定严格的“合格仓储地点要求”（Location Eligibility Requirements），明确规定货物存放在指定的优质仓库内方可获得贷款，而在风控不合规的仓库内则坚决不予授信。 - **地理合格标准**：银行会详细审查仓库清单，明确列出哪几家仓库的存货具备抵押资格，排除环境恶劣或管理不善的仓储点。 - **生鲜品类储存要点**：未烘焙生咖啡豆虽有一定货架期，但对空气湿度和防虫极为敏感，专业仓库必须具备严密的温湿度防护与装卸能力。 ### `14:02` 信贷尽调的“5C”原则与商人品质（Character）的核心地位 在评估一笔大宗商品融资时，银行需要考量价格风险、交易对手信用风险以及复杂的国际地缘风险，尤其是质押商品是否处于顺畅的运输流动之中。而在布朗兄弟哈里曼银行（Brown Brothers Harriman, BBH）的审查框架中，首要核心始终是企业管理者与所有者的动机、声誉与操守。在传统的“信贷 5C 原则”（Character 品格、Collateral 抵押品、Capital 资本、Capacity 还款能力、Conditions 经营环境）中，借款人的“品格与性格”（Character）被奉为圭臬。大宗商品融资从本质上讲是一门建立在深度信任关系上的生意；当市场暴起暴跌、极端行情降临时，借款人在逆境中的应对行为与商业道德才是决定一笔贷款最终能否平稳化解风险的最关键因素。 ### `15:10` 资产负债表运作与机构投资者的跨界入场 在资金来源与风险承担结构上，大宗商品贸易融资过去主要由少数欧洲大型跨国银行主导。然而在过去十年间，由于监管合规与资本新规等多重因素，许多传统欧洲银行纷纷收缩或退出该领域，导致美国本土能够深耕这一专业领域的银行寥寥无几，而 BBH 便是其中少数坚守的资深机构。对于每一笔业务，BBH 都会将绝大部分信用风险保留在自家的资产负债表上，但同时也会根据敞口规模，将部分风险银团化（Syndicate）分销给合作银行。近年来，非银机构投资者（Institutional Investors）对大宗商品融资资产类别表现出了浓厚兴趣：这类资产具备期限短、浮动利率、天然防通胀以及与传统股票市场低相关性等显著优势。曾经被极少数专业银行垄断的私密信贷圈层，正在逐步向更广泛的机构投资市场打开大门。 ### `20:00` 传统银行退出大宗商品融资的深层原因与 BBH 的长期坚守 在谈及为何近年来许多大型商业银行纷纷缩减甚至退出大宗商品贸易融资业务时，刘易斯·哈特（Lewis Hart）指出，这背后主要交织着监管、运营成本与行业周期的多重推手。首先，以《巴塞尔协议4》（Basel IV）为代表的银行资本监管要求日益严苛，显著抬高了开立信用证（Letters of Credit）等贸易融资工具的资本计提成本，压缩了业务利润空间。其次，该业务具有极高的“管理密集度”（administrative intensity）。在全球范围内追踪流转中的货物抵押品需要庞大的人力与深厚的专业经验，即便数字化进程正在逐步推进，人工把控与业务专长依然无可替代。哈特自豪地提到，布朗兄弟哈里曼银行（Brown Brothers Harriman, BBH）从事该业务已有长达 206 年的历史，“跨越了两个多世纪的积淀已深植于公司的 DNA 之中”，这也是他们能够历经风浪始终坚守的原因。 除了监管与管理门槛，过去十年的宏观市场冲击也是促使银行离场的重要催化剂。2015 年能源市场的深度回调让不少参与其中的银行遭遇亏损；随后，在欧洲银行中尤为盛行的 ESG 压力与气候政策，促使部分机构主动将资源从传统大宗商品融资转向可再生能源领域。不过，哈特强调，全球范围内依然存在着一批穿越周期的核心银行机构，凭借对贸易流程的深刻理解，在极低的违约损失率下维持着稳健而可观的业务回报。 - **巴塞尔资本协议约束**：Basel IV 对表外项目与短期贸易信贷的风险权重调整，使得开具信用证的资本成本居高不下。 - **历史沉淀与机构承诺**：BBH 拥有 206 年的大宗商品融资历史，高度依赖经验丰富的专业团队进行人工合规与物流跟踪。 - **能源周期与 ESG 转向**：2015 年油价暴跌带来的坏账，叠加热度渐增的 ESG 考核，直接加速了欧洲银行业退出化石能源贸易融资。 --- ### `21:28` 提单（Bill of Lading）的魔力与追溯货物的核心机制 当被问及银行如何追踪处于远洋运输中的抵押品，以及这与普通人在公共海事网站上追踪一艘从沙特出发的化肥货船有何区别时，哈特生动地将海运提单（Bill of Lading）形容为“贸易融资的护身符”（the talisman of trade finance）。作为兼具物权凭证与货权转移功能的关键单据，一份可转让提单的核心精髓在于印有“凭指示”（to the order of）这四个关键英文单词。这四个字确立了谁拥有对货物的最终处分权：写在指示后面的实体，在法律意义上实际掌控着整批在途货物。 在实际操作中，银行会将提单编号与彭博终端的海事追踪应用（Bloomberg Marine Tracker）等公开与专有数据源相结合，在船只航行出现异常偏差或地缘突发事件时介入实时定位监控。而当远洋货物抵港、卸入陆地仓库后，银行的管控手段则转换为仓单（Warehouse Receipt）——如果仓单上同样载明“凭指示”条款，它便具备同等的物权属性。哈特描绘了一个生动的日常放货场景：客户致电银行，请求提取“五袋咖啡豆或一份卡布奇诺的原料”交付给下游烘焙厂，银行团队在核实后出具一份“信托收据”（Trust Receipt）予以放行。作为交换，借款人必须在约定的有限天数内，以合规的应收账款（Account Receivable）替换原本的实物抵押品，从而确保银行的债权闭环不留敞口。 ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: 大宗商品贸易融资抵押物形态流转 accDescr: 展示从在途提单到仓单、信托收据及应收账款的闭环转换过程 subgraph Transit["远洋运输阶段"] BL["海运提单 (Bill of Lading)<br/>核心物权条款: 'to the order of'"] Tracker["彭博 Marine Tracker / 卫星定位监控"] BL -.-> Tracker end subgraph Storage["仓储流转阶段"] WR["法定仓单 (Warehouse Receipt)<br/>确立仓库货权控制"] TR["信托收据 (Trust Receipt)<br/>允许客户提取部分物料加工销售"] BL --> WR WR --> TR end subgraph Settlement["回款闭环阶段"] AR["合格应收账款 (Accounts Receivable)<br/>限期替换实物抵押品"] Cash["销售现金回款 / 清偿授信敞口"] TR --> AR AR --> Cash end ``` --- ### `23:44` 无期货对冲市场的大宗商品融资挑战：从坚果到腰果 对话随后切入到地缘局势的现实背景——霍尔木兹海峡（Strait of Hormuz）的封锁风险。主持人指出，外界通常只关注穿越海峡的原油，原油拥有深度极佳的期货市场来管理价格波动与下行风险；但与此同时，诸如开心果等大量农产品同样需要通过该海峡运输，而终端上根本查不到任何开心果期货合约。缺乏对冲工具的现货大宗商品，银行究竟敢不敢提供融资？ 哈特笑着爆料称，他的一位同事就赫然坐在美国“花生与树坚果协会”（Peanut and Tree Nut Association）的董事会席位上。他澄清道，由于食品过敏隔离标准等严格法规，花生（草本）与树坚果在行业内被严谨细分，连协会名称都必须兼顾两者。BBH 长期活跃于许多外界意想不到、完全没有衍生品对冲市场的冷门大宗商品领域，例如腰果（cashews）和松子（pine nuts）（相对较少涉足开心果）。在缺乏期货锁定远期收益的情况下，大宗商品银行家的授信逻辑与风控评估方法被迫发生根本转变，必须更加倚重借款商的自有资本实力、下游买家的真实履约信用以及极度细致的物理货权排他性把控。 - **对冲工具的缺失**：腰果、松子等高价值树坚果不存在流动性成熟的衍生品交易市场，贸易商无法进行空头套期保值。 - **细分领域的行业专长**：银行高级从业人员深入参与 Peanut and Tree Nut Association 等专业行业组织，透彻理解行业分级、防潮损耗与质量检验细节。 --- ### `25:00` 霍尔木兹海峡危机：被困资本、天价运费与流动性挤压 站在大宗商品银行家的视角审视霍尔木兹海峡危机，哈特的关切点与普通原油分析师大相径庭。宏观分析师紧盯“全球 20% 原油运输受阻”、现货溢价（backwardation）以及首行近月合约的暴涨，而商品银行家最直接的焦虑是：“究竟有多少营运资本（working capital）被实打实地锁死在了海峡里？”大宗商品贸易商与贷款银行赖以生存的根基在于“自偿性贷款”（self-liquidating nature）和“货币周转速度”（velocity of money）——买入、运输、交付、收款、偿付贷款，然后立刻开启下一轮循环。 依据五角大楼与航运监测机构的数据，当时海峡附近滞留了大约 1,000 艘商船。哈特粗略算了一笔账：被困在这些船只上的流动资金规模达数百亿甚至可能超过 1,000 亿美元。雪上加霜的是，在途货物停滞的同时，贸易商在期货市场建立的套保空单可能因盘面飙升而面临巨额追加保证金通知（margin calls），这将对企业的现金流造成致命挤压。更为严峻的是运力与单船货值的剧烈膨胀：一艘典型的阿芙拉型油轮（Aframax）载油量约为 70 万桶，在危机爆发前（2 月 28 日之前）整船货值与运输综合成本约为 4,000 万至 4,500 万美元，而危机发生后瞬间飙升至 7,000 万至 7,500 万美元。如果银行无法提供高度灵活、快速调高额度的信贷额度（line of credit），贸易商根本无法承受单批次货运成本几乎翻倍的流动性吞吐。 不过哈特表示，由于经历了 2020 年新冠疫情（长滩港集装箱船大排长龙）以及 2022 年俄乌冲突（欧洲天然气供应链剧烈重构）的严峻压力测试，主流大宗商品贸易商（commodity merchants）普遍吸取了教训，事先储备了丰厚的流动性缓冲与资产负债表资本。因此截至目前，整个商品融资管道尚未出现破裂迹象，银行界也在积极支持。但哈特发出警告：如果海峡关闭长达数月之久，被困天量资本所引发的链式反应将把现有体系推向承受极限。 | 核心评估维度 | 危机前基准水平（2026年2月28日前） | 海峡封锁危机后水平 | 银行与贸易商面临的流动性影响 | |:--- |:--- |:--- |:--- | | **Aframax 油轮单船货值** | 约 4,000 万至 4,500 万美元 | 约 7,000 万至 7,500 万美元 | 单笔装运占用的流动资金额度暴增逾 60%，需银行临时扩容授信 | | **滞留商船与被困资本** | 正常流转（通航顺畅） | 约 1,000 艘商船滞留海峡周围 | 数百亿至上千亿美元营运资本周转停滞，自偿机制受阻 | | **衍生品端现金流表现** | 基差风险可控，对冲保证金稳定 | 近月合约价格暴涨引发 Margin Calls | 贸易商在现货无法变现的同时需持续填补期货空头保证金 | --- ### `27:30` 船只受阻后的银行应急处置流程与风控检查 面对一艘由银行提供融资但因地缘冲突受困于霍尔木兹海峡的油轮，哈特梳理了商品银行家在突发危机下的标准风控应急反应步骤。这种机制化的条件触发是银行在危机中保全资产的关键。 首先，银行家必须化身最审慎的现场质检员，首要任务是确认“我的抵押品是否安好”（Is my collateral okay?）：核实船员的人身安全、油轮确切的锚泊经纬度，并评估该船是否不幸滑入实质性交火的交战区（war zone），以排除物理灭失或扣押减值风险。其次，全面调取并审查相关保险单据，严密核实战争险（war risk insurance）及海损险是否覆盖全面且持续有效。最后，法务与风控团队将逐字深研贸易商与船舶运营方签署的租船合同（charter contract），明确滞期费（demurrage）、不可抗力免责条款以及绕航权利归属，从而划定各方的法律责任边界。只有在这一系列前置防御审查全部就绪后，银行才能在风暴中计算出最终的安全垫。 ### `30:00` 地缘危机下的航运合同纠纷与借款人承受力 当大宗商品船只因地缘冲突或海峡封锁而受阻时，海运合同条款就会成为各方争端的核心。在航运界，滯期费（Demurrage）通常是指商户在装卸货物时延误所产生的费用，属于常见情况；但航程受阻（Frustration of Voyage）或扣船（Detention）则是另一层面的法律概念。当船只深陷冲突交火区而无法驶离时，这种情况在历史上并非没有先例，但现代贸易中已经很久没有大规模上演过了。目前市场各方都在紧盯合同条款，逐案推演到底产生了多少损失与成本，以及应当由哪一方来承担责任。 面对这种不可抗力式的外部冲击，商品融资银行的应对逻辑遵循着严格的评估步骤： ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: 危机处理与信用承保流程 accDescr: 银行在危机爆发时评估担保品与客户资本，并结合供应链分散度控制风险 subgraph Evaluation["危机应对评估"] A["评估担保品价值与状态"] --> B["评估客户资本韧性"] B --> C{"承受周期评估"} C -->|"数月 / 数年"| D["协商展期或重组，避免逼债"] end subgraph Underwriting["日常承保准则"] E["供应链分散化原则"] --> F["避免单一区域 100% 依赖"] F --> G["单船受阻不致全盘瘫痪"] end ``` 这种违约通常并非客户自身经营不善所致，而是纯粹的外部外生冲击。如果银行短视地采取强硬手段逼债催缴，虽然客户眼下也许能掏出资本还款，但长远来看无疑会彻底破坏长达数年的客户合作关系。银行更关注的是放水养鱼，通过评估客户的资产负债表与抗风险周期（能扛过数月还是数年），在海峡有望重开的长远预期下寻找最妥善的解决方式。 - **航程受阻（Frustration of Voyage）**：法律上认定因无法预见的外生事件导致合同目的落空、根本无法继续履行，与普通的船只装卸延误滞期费截然不同。 - **供应链多元化约束**：如果借款企业的货源 100% 依赖于某一特定单一产区，银行在前期信用审批时往往会高度警惕甚至直接拒绝，防患于未然。 --- ### `35:00` 不可对冲商品：腰果的漫长供应链与远期合约 在缺乏期货衍生品工具的小众大宗商品领域（例如腰果等坚果市场），大宗商品贸易融资的运作逻辑与原油等流动性市场大相径庭。由于客户无法在期货市场上建立空头头寸来对冲现货敞口，银行必须直接审慎测算其现货价格波动的风险。以腰果（Cashews）为例，其全球供应链极为漫长而奇特： ```mermaid flowchart LR accTitle: 腰果全球中游加工与增值供应链 accDescr: 腰果从西非农场原材料流转至东南亚加工再到零售商的价值分配链路 subgraph Upstream["上游：原材料采集"] A["西非农场<br/>Raw Seed 原籽"] end subgraph Midstream["中游：高技术脱壳与加工"] B["东南亚（越南/印度）<br/>提取可食用果仁<br/>处理漆树酚有毒液体"] end subgraph Downstream["下游：包装与分销"] C["分销商 / 中间商<br/>烘焙、加盐、包装"] --> D["超市零售终端<br/>消费者购买"] end A --> B B --> C ``` 腰果的原籽（Raw Seed）通常采集自西非，外壳与果仁之间包裹着极具刺激性的毒性液体——漆树酚（Urushiol，即毒藤中毒的过敏原）。原籽随后被海运运往越南或印度等东南亚地区，由当地企业凭借技术、环保标准和劳动力成本优势进行破壳加工，提取出可食用的腰果仁，最后再出口转运至欧美零售商或其包装分销商手中。 在这一漫长链路中，产业链的大部分附加值并非留在最初种植的西非农场，而是沉淀在能够高效处理毒性外壳的中游加工环节。由于没有可在交易所平仓结算的期货市场，借款人主要依赖与下游食品厂或中间商签署的实物远期交付合约（Forward Contract）来锁定价格，以此作为向银行融资的风控依据。 - **坚果行业的家族企业属性**：花生与坚果行业（Peanut and Tree Nut Industry）大量由世代传承的家族企业主导，因此业务往往落在商品贸易融资与家族企业综合金融服务的交汇点上。 - **漆树酚（Urushiol）轶事**：对谈中主持人笑称自己正在遭受毒藤皮疹的折磨，恰好与腰果加工必须去除的外壳毒液属于同一种化学物质。 --- ### `38:00` 仓储质押清算与回购协议：商品金融底线 在商品金融的借贷关系中，接管并清算实物担保品属于银行最竭力避免的“灾难情景”，而非日常目的。大众常常开玩笑戏称个人在期货到期时“不得不把 50 桶原油拉回单身公寓”，但在机构层面的担保贷款中，一旦银行被迫实际接管仓单或实物，就意味着贷款人已经实质违约，业务走向失控。 虽然大宗商品融资中存在特定产品（如库存回购协议 Repurchase Agreement），银行会直接买下实物商品所有权并附带未来回售条款以提供库存流动性，但绝大多数标准的抵押信贷业务其核心仍是控制信用风险。银行追求的是借款企业良好运营并按期归还本息，从而避免走到“依靠拍卖变卖担保品止损”的第二条出路。即使真的发生极端违约而不得不处理存货，大宗商品的优势在于其具备高流通性——抵押品通常可以直接在所在地（例如位于休斯敦的储油罐）就地折价挂牌抛售转让。 ### `40:00` 无法对冲的商品与算力期货的金融化潜力 讨论从大宗商品融资的清算现实切入。即便违约发生，银行家也不会真的看到成桶的原油堆在自己办公室门前。Lewis Hart 解释道，在实际操作中，银行通常会就地向业内同行询价并转手处理，虽然这类清盘在 Brown Brothers Harriman 长达 206 年的悠久历史中确实发生过，但银行业务的核心目标恰恰是防患于未然，避免走到接管实物这一步。 随后话题转向当前科技圈与金融界的热门探索：计算能力（算力）期货。市场开始尝试将英伟达 H100 芯片的算力作为标准化合约进行交易，但这种新兴设想能否成功仍未可知。主持人由此提出疑问：纵观金融市场，为何原油和棉花拥有极其活跃的期货，而开心果却没有？什么样的底层资产才具备金融化条件？ Lewis 回顾了期货市场的起源——最初是为了帮助爱荷华州的粮食种植户管理收成价格风险，而非课本里随口一说的概念，也不是为了后来被法律禁止交易的洋葱。他指出，一种底层商品若要演化出成熟的期货市场，关键取决于两大核心特征： 1. **同质性（Homogeneity）**：产品越高度标准化，就越容易被包装进统一的金融合约；越具有异质性（Heterogeneous），标准化阻力就越大。 2. **价格波动性（Volatility）**：如果某种商品缺乏对冲工具且价格上窜下跳，上下游参与者就会产生强烈的套期保值需求。 当前的算力市场与存储芯片（Memory chips）恰好完全吻合高波动的特征。对于运营晶圆厂（Fab）的半导体生产企业而言，当前算力与芯片的高昂价格极为丰厚，他们极度渴望锁定这种超额利润；而对于消耗芯片的科技与消费电子终端客户而言，对冲算力采购成本同样是刚需。尽管算力期货能否真正普及仍有待观察，但各大交易所确实都在投入大量资源研究此类衍生品。 主持人补充道，关于算力繁荣背后的底层实物支撑，铜（Copper）往往是一个被严重低估的瓶颈。舆论普遍关注电力基础设施的短缺，但数据中心扩建带来的庞大电气化改造需求，正直接推动铜消费与铜价屡创历史新高。 ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: 大宗商品金融化与期货衍生品生成条件 accDescr: 分析算力及传统商品是否适合衍生品化的两大评估维度及上下游动机 subgraph Conditions ["大宗商品金融化的两大基石"] H["同质性 (Homogeneity)<br>底层规格标准化"] V["高价格波动性 (Volatility)<br>供需失衡导致价格剧变"] end subgraph MarketDemand ["产业链对冲诉求"] direction TB Fab["生产端 (如芯片晶圆厂)<br>锁定历史高位利润"] Consumer["消费端 (如数据中心/电子厂商)<br>对冲算力与芯片成本上涨"] end Conditions --> MarketDemand MarketDemand --> Futures["生成算力期货合约<br>(如 H100 算力交易衍生品)"] ``` --- ### `43:20` 供应链上游视野：货运市场、通胀传导与对冲可行性 作为大宗商品融资机构，银行在日常运作中虽然秉持“不对未来价格走势作预测”的价格中立哲学，但因其深处能源、金属和农产品供应链的最上游，往往能先于宏观经济指标察觉到转折。例如在 2020 年新冠疫情爆发初期，远在官方统计出炉之前，海运运费暴涨、钢铁原料价格飙升并逐级向下游传导的信号，就早已在融资账目中显现。这种最前端的供需异动，最终都会如实反映在 PPI 和 CPI 数据中。 关于“卡车货运运力（Trucking capacity）”等特殊环节是否适合期货化，讨论指出，高波动是否为“永久性市场特征”至关重要：如果仅仅是疫情后一次性的价格再平衡，市场便没有动力去维护一套复杂的期货体系。对于货运领域现有的衍生品探索，Lewis 指出： - **海运运力衍生品**：市场上已经存在干散货（Dry Bulk）和好望角型（Capesize）船合约，以及油轮运力合约，交易员可以做多或做空，但整体流动性相对匮乏，买卖价差（Bid-ask spread）较为宽泛。 - **卡车运输与燃油替代**：卡车运力其实是理想的候选标的，但由于卡车运输最大的可变成本就是柴油消耗，许多运输企业直接通过柴油期货进行交叉套保，二者具有极高的相关性，在很大程度上替代了专用运力合约。 --- ### `45:00` 洋葱期货假说、德州 1015 甜葱与红海危机下的贸易路线重构 谈话随后转向一个轻松却经典的金融话题：若当年被立法禁止交易的洋葱期货重获合法地位，它是否算得上优秀的金融化标的？ Lewis 明确指出，洋葱最大的物理缺陷在于**易腐烂变质（Perishability）**。如果采用实物交割机制，洋葱在仓库中无法长期保存，这对交割仓库的安全性构成了巨大挑战。此外，主持人调侃道，虽然普通洋葱看似同质，但细分起来有紫洋葱、大葱、白洋葱等基准风险（Basis risk）。Joe 顺势安利起自己的“梦中情葱”——由德克萨斯 A&M 大学培育的超级甜葱“Texas 1015”（得名于其推荐播种日期 10 月 15 日），甚至当场通过 Google AI Overview 查证，确认其竟真的是德克萨斯州的官方州蔬菜（State Vegetable），引得全场欢笑。 随后，话题严肃地回到了地缘政治对全球贸易路线的实际重构。由于红海危机与胡塞武装的袭击，曼德海峡与苏伊士运河的航道风险大增，商船被迫大举绕行非洲好望角： - **运输时间剧增**：像上海至北欧这样的大型核心航线，绕道好望角会额外增加 10 至 15 天甚至更久的航程。 - **营运资金占用暴涨**：航行周期的拉长直接推高了在途货物的营运资金占用量，船舶日租金（Day rate）与战争险/航运保险成本也水涨船高。 - **改道与基础设施求变**：例如沙特阿拉伯的化肥不得不从波斯湾侧陆运至红海侧延布港（Yanbu），再装船发往孟加拉国；若霍尔木兹海峡的潜在地缘对立长期化，中东产油国与贸易商势必将展现出更多自救创意，包括修建横跨半岛反向输送的管道，以降低对单一海上咽喉要道（Choke point）的过载依赖。 ### `50:00` 坚果冷知识与亚洲食品加工业的供应链现实 节目的复盘环节在轻松诙谐的闲聊中展开。Tracy Alloway 与 Joe Weisenthal 感叹大宗商品领域的知识面之广，总能让人学到意想不到的冷门细节。Tracy 提到，她刚得知腰果外壳中竟含有与毒藤相同的漆酚（Urushiol），如果在园艺时不慎沾染到皮肤上会极其难受；两人还调侃起行业协会的命名，好奇为什么叫“花生与树坚果协会”（Peanut and Tree Nut Association），难道花生不算“落花生/地果”（Groundnut）吗？随后他们现场检索确认，在亚洲和印度常说的“groundnut oil”其实就是花生油，花生与落花生在植物学分类和日常用语中本就是一回事。 ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: 全球农业大宗商品跨国加工流向 accDescr: 展示农产品在全球生产、运往东亚集中精细加工、再分配至全球消费市场的流动架构 subgraph Origin["全球原材料产地"] A["全球农产品种植<br/>（美洲/非洲等）"] B["野生海鲜捕捞<br/>（如阿拉斯加野生鱼）"] end subgraph Processing["东亚精深加工枢纽"] C["东亚集中加工中心<br/>（去壳、剔骨、分级包装）"] end subgraph Consumer["终端消费市场"] D["全球终端消费市场<br/>（超市、食品零售等）"] end A --> C B --> C C --> D ``` 谈及交易层面，Joe 指出大宗商品行业至今仍保有一种“浪漫且令人兴奋”的特质：面对现实中的供应链阻断，贸易商必须在真实世界里实时调整航线、重新打通新的贸易通道。Tracy 借此提出一个非常值得单独立项的选题——“亚洲食品加工业”。全球农产品虽然分散在世界各地种植与捕捞，但越来越大比例的精细加工环节却高度集中在东亚。 - **漆酚的天然存在**：腰果壳油中天然含有漆酚，加工脱壳若处理不当接触皮肤会引发类似毒藤刺痒的过敏性皮炎。 - **跨半球加工案例**：正如他们在上一季节目中提及的阿拉斯加渔业数据——北美阿拉斯加捕捞的海鱼，往往会被冷冻海运至东亚完成去骨与切片加工，随后再运回欧美市场销售。 --- ### `51:48` 地缘冲击的常态化与大宗商品资金沉淀 主持团队随后将讨论转向嘉宾 Lewis Hart 提到的核心金融风险：地缘政治阻断导致的资本被动锁定。以霍尔木兹海峡或主要航运咽喉的受阻为例，当满载高货值油品或原料的巨轮停滞不前时，巨额贸易融资便沉淀在漂泊的货物中。这种流动性冻结在短期一两个月内或许尚可支撑，但随着阻滞时间不断拖长，对企业资产负债表与银行信贷额度的侵蚀就会演变成毁灭性的流动性危机。 随着危机持续，人们的心理预期也发生了微妙转变。Joe 与 Tracy 回忆，在俄乌战争或红海局势刚刚爆发的前两个月录制节目时，他们甚至会在开场精确报出录音的具体分钟数（如“录制于上午10点30分”），因为形势瞬息万变；然而到了录制当天的5月27日（冲突爆发近整整三个月），这类动荡已经演变为某种“长期存在的背景噪音”。市场参与者逐渐意识到，阻断可能在一年后依然维持现状，原先的突发事件彻底蜕变为难以打破的新常态。 --- ### `53:30` 节目收尾与商业播报 在节目的正式尾声，Tracy Alloway 与 Joe Weisenthal 互致告别并完成了系列收尾鸣谢。Joe 不忘拿大宗商品市场特有的历史梗打趣，提醒听众如果喜欢他们探讨“根本不存在的洋葱期货市场”（源于美国1958年通过的《洋葱期货法案》禁止洋葱期货交易），请务必在播客平台留下好评，并欢迎听众加入 Odd Lots 的 Discord 社群与彭博每日简报讨论。 节目最后接入了商业赞助内容： - **哈特福德保险（The Hartford）**：强调大中型企业在日常经营中，财产损失、法律责任、网络安全和监管合规等多重风险往往交织并发；企业需要将风险缓释打造为持续性机制，依托专业的承保工程和理赔经验在损失扩大前进行有效干预。 - **密歇根州经济发展署（Team Michigan）**：宣传密歇根州在加速企业战略增长、连接初创企业与跨国巨头方面的创新生态系统，呼吁企业关注其在高端人才吸引力与营商环境上的综合优势。 ## Notable quotes > `00:00` 这是个人际关系驱动的业务（relationship business） — Joe Weisenthal > `05:00` 人人都视而不见的最大的 4-5 万亿美元级市场 — Lewis Hart > `06:30` the business of financing motion（为运动中的物体提供融资） — Lewis Hart > `11:15` long physical, short paper（多现货、空纸货） — Lewis Hart > `20:00` 跨越了两个多世纪的积淀已深植于公司的 DNA 之中 — Lewis Hart > `21:28` the talisman of trade finance（贸易融资的护身符） — Lewis Hart > `21:28` 凭指示（to the order of） — Lewis Hart > `25:00` 究竟有多少营运资本（working capital）被实打实地锁死在了海峡里？ — Lewis Hart > `27:30` Is my collateral okay?（我的抵押品是否安好） — Lewis Hart ## Mentioned Tracy Alloway, Joe Weisenthal, Lewis Hart, Brown Brothers Harriman (BBH), Lloyd Blankfein, J. Aron, Bloomberg Marine Tracker, Peanut and Tree Nut Association, Basel IV, Nvidia H100, Texas 1015 甜葱, 德克萨斯 A&M 大学, Google AI Overview, The Hartford, Team Michigan ## Video description <p>We talk about the commodity supply chain all the time. We talk about the ports and the trucks and the ships and all of that. But there's another dimension to moving commodities all around the world, which is actually paying for it. Who funds the oil tanker and what happens when that tanker is, say, stuck in the Strait of Hormuz? Commodity finance underpins production, transportation and storage of a wide variety of the things that make the modern world, but you tend to only hear about it when things go wrong. Today we speak with Lewis Hart, head of corporate advisory and banking at Brown Brothers Harriman. We discuss how the business of commodity finance actually works, how risk is priced, what makes for a good or bad warehouse, and the difference between financing a commodity you can hedge (like oil) versus one where's there's no futures market (like cashews).</p> <p><a href="http://bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots" data-link-cookie="1" data-destination="http://bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots">Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter</a><br>Join the conversation: <a href="https://discord.gg/oddlots" data-destination="https://discord.gg/oddlots">discord.gg/oddlots</a></p><p>See <a href="https://omnystudio.com/listener">omnystudio.com/listener</a> for privacy information.</p> [Source](https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/tracking.swap.fm/track/UVBrz8bN8aM2Xe47PEPu/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/8a94442e-5a74-4fa2-8b8d-ae27003a8d6b/9d19da5c-6eca-418c-9fda-b4590139c80f/audio.mp3?in_playlist=982f5071-765c-403d-969d-ae27003a8d83)

[0:00] Joe Weisenthal: 这是个人际关系驱动的业务（relationship business） [5:00] Lewis Hart: 人人都视而不见的最大的 4-5 万亿美元级市场 [6:30] Lewis Hart: the business of financing motion（为运动中的物体提供融资） [11:15] Lewis Hart: long physical, short paper（多现货、空纸货） [20:00] Lewis Hart: 跨越了两个多世纪的积淀已深植于公司的 DNA 之中 [21:28] Lewis Hart: the talisman of trade finance（贸易融资的护身符） [21:28] Lewis Hart: 凭指示（to the order of） [25:00] Lewis Hart: 究竟有多少营运资本（working capital）被实打实地锁死在了海峡里？ [27:30] Lewis Hart: Is my collateral okay?（我的抵押品是否安好）

[5:00] Lewis Hart: biggest $20 trillion market that no one talks about. [14:15] Lewis Hart: character [20:00] Lewis Hart: to the order of [45:10] Lewis Hart: One thing I'd worry about with onions is perishability... putting onions in a warehouse, if you had a physical settlement process, could be a little dangerous... because you can only store them for so long.

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Learn more at the Hartford dot com slash risk mitigation. Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. Hello and welcome to another episode of the All Thoughts podcast. I'm Tracy Allaway. And I'm Joe Weisenthal. Joe I think I told you this before but way back when I was starting in financial journalism I really wanted to be a commodities reporter I get it It seems fun It seems real Seems like one of the few areas of finance that like not just a screen You know what I saying Where there no physicality. Yeah. Right. Yeah. But also like, you know, everyone's like, this is a relationship business. But I feel like commodities, you know, everyone in finance has that. Right. Do your banker impression. This is a relationship. But right. But everyone says that in finance. this is a relationship business but actually commodities seems to be one of those areas where actually that's a real thing and not just a cliche and stuff so i get it it seems to be very idiosyncratic where like one load of whatever commodity might not be completely fungible with the same commodity yeah because we call it commodities right and yet and yet um but you know so i had this like romantic idea in my head of what a commodities reporter actually does which is like, I don't know, go on ships and travel alongside like huge things of coal and metal and aluminum and stuff like that, which is probably not realistic. One aspect of commodities that I never really appreciated was how much financialization there actually is in the market and that there are so many different players in the market We sort of touched on it before with the Strait of Hormuz situation where you know you have the insurers and then you have the reinsurers and you have like insurers for the freight and for the whole and for like liability. And it just seems so complicated. You have a very similar situation on the financing side. And it struck me that we have never actually done a commodity financing episode. No. And I'm really interested in this because, again, like one of these things, you always hear about capital efficiency, right? This is very important. And so, okay, here's like, let's say we do not know, I don't know what the cost of moving so and so many kilograms of copper from one place to another is. Whatever that cost is, I probably don't want to tie up all of my capital at it. I probably want to put down a fraction of the thing, borrow the rest, et cetera, then pay off that loan when the ship gets there, et cetera, so that I'm as liquid as possible at any given moment. This is just like, I'm sort of like, this is my first principles. I don't know anything about this space, but I assume that there are a lot of calculations like this within the process of procuring, mining, delivering commodities. Absolutely. So today we are going to learn about commodity finance. We're also going to try to get a [5:00] world right now, given some of the disruptions that we've seen. And I'm glad to say we do, in fact, have the perfect guest. We're going to be speaking with Lewis Hart. He is, of course, the head of corporate advisory and banking at Brown Brothers Harriman, so someone who lives and breathes commodity finance. Thanks, Tracy. Thanks, Joe. It's great to be here. Would you say you know more about commodity finance or 90s hip hop and R&B? Oh, that's a tough one. Very close. Very close. Showing that out of nowhere, he's a big hip-hop guy. Tracy knows me well. Tracy knows me well. You should go back and talk about that. No, we shouldn't. Okay, what's commodity finance? What exactly are we trying to achieve here? It's a good question. And the way I think of it, it's like the biggest $20 trillion market that no one talks about. So you think about global trade. About $20 trillion of global trade in goods goes through trade finance programs. Commodity finance is a specialized subset of trade finance and it's about four or five trillion dollars Okay, so as a huge market it sort of surprises me sometimes that it doesn't get more headlines But it not that glamorous It kind of boring and so when things go well It doesn really create the drama that headlines are seeking Sure Well this is the I mean to be fair this is the case with almost anything, which is that you never hear about anything when things are going well and that including any types of finance. And hopefully, you know, ideally you would never hear about any finance because warehouse shipment successfully makes it. Right. It wouldn't make for it. To be honest, as a journalist, I wouldn't cry for it. Client pays receivable on time. Yeah, client pays receivable on time. When I think about finance generally, I think about like, who is a consumer of financial services and what services are they actually, I guess, purchasing or when do people find the need for finance, right? So a homeowner occasionally needs financials or a home buyer suddenly needs, is a purchaser of the financial services through a mortgage, right? Yeah, et cetera. What is a canonical or modal example of a consumer of commodity finance? Sure. Well, it's really the business of financing motion. And so the classic example would be a commodity merchant. Commodity merchant kind of evokes a lot of history, right? You think back to Renaissance Italy and the Medicis and all the merchants that kind of pioneered global trade in those days and actually goes back even farther You can go back to even the BC and see trade finance happening. But the typical consumer is a physical merchant and they may be in the energy space, they may be in the metal space, or they may be in the agricultural space. Their job is not to speculate on prices. Contrary to popular belief, you think commodity trader, most people think speculation. That's actually not what they do. They are essentially supply chain managers. That's their role. And they are the largest consumers of commodity finance. And what are they purchasing? They're purchasing, you said it well at the beginning, shiploads of copper cathode, containers of coffee, green coffee, unroasted coffee in burlap bags. No, but like, so when I get a mortgage, I am purchasing the ability to have a minimal monthly payment that's spread out over 30 years. Yeah. So that is what, when I like enter it, when I interface with the bank or whatever, a mortgage broker, I am purchasing the ability to not destroy all my liquidity when I buy a house. So what are they setting aside the commodity that they purchasing what are they purchasing from the bank Yeah So essentially the basic product is a line of credit a secured line of credit And that line of credit kind of like a credit card can be used to buy eligible commodities So it's a line of credit that's self-liquidating, meaning once you make the loan, you know what the client's buying and you know what the source of repayment is. That's very different than other types of lending that take much longer to repay. So it's very short-term, It's self-liquidating and it's secured by inventory. And then when the inventory is sold, it's secured by the account receivable that results from the sale of the inventory. The receivable gets paid and then it keeps happening again and again. It revolves up and down. The big variable that is always tricky is what's the price of that commodity at the time of the loan? And these structures are designed to give clients flexibility to buy the copper, whether it's $6 a pound, $4 a pound, $7 a pound. It's hard to predict these capital needs. And that's most lenders like fixed amounts. This is a floating dollar amount, which is kind of a unique part of it, where the value of the loan changes as the price of the commodity changes. Oh, that's interesting. Wait, okay. So why did they need that flexibility? Yeah. [10:00] Yeah, explain that further. Yes. So good question. So think about a client who's buying a pound of coffee, right? Think about your local coffee shop here. That coffee bean traveled 2,000 miles from somewhere likely in South America. It went through a whole process of milling and exporting. It went on a ship. It ended up at a roaster in the U.S. and finally made its way to a retail shop in Manhattan. There's a ton of capital involved there. that client likely agreed to buy that coffee several months in advance. The time when they actually fix the contract and pay is when the coffee ships typically. And at that point, we don't know if the price is going to be $3 a pound, $2 a pound, $1 a pound. And so the capital needs, you kind of can figure them out within a band, but sometimes things happen that actually change what you thought. And so the unique thing about a commodity lender is they're marking to market that inventory. So if you pledged me a pound of copper, I'll lend you 75 cents, 80 cents, maybe more of the value of that copper whether it a pound a pound or a pound Where does the commodity futures market play into this Because when we talking about the unpredictable nature of, we don't know, the price of commodities fluctuate. You can lock in prices in many commodities and not all. And I want to get into that, non-financialized commodities. But to some extent, doesn't the futures market solve part of the problem of the variability of the pricing? In one sense, it solves the price risk. So one of the key risks in commodity finance is the price risk. So if I'm lending against copper and the price goes down, I better be careful, right? My capital could be impaired. So you use the futures market, the derivatives market to hedge that price risk. So we like to say our clients are typically long physical, meaning they own the inventory and they're short paper, they're short futures contracts. That works really well. But when prices go up, that means they have to post margin calls. So if I have a $3 a pound copper shipment and the price goes to $3.50 while it's on the water coming from Chile to Georgia, that client says I need to borrow more money to keep my hedge open And until the ship arrives and the client pays for the copper that hedge is on and you don know what that margin call is going to be This is what happened with like nickel a few years ago, where you had entities that were long nickel and still got destroyed by the margin calls that they experienced, even though they were on some level on there. They were on the right side of the trade. They were on the right side, yeah. This is a slight tangent, but you brought up coffee just then. I think both of us read Lloyd Blankfein's book in preparation for having him on the podcast. And he was talking about how when he was at J. Aaron, they had the huge warehouses of coffee beans. And apparently they smelled really bad because they would like rot, I guess, or like they're beef bugs. Seems unoptimal. Yeah. What are you doing? Is that true? Do coffee beans actually smell bad in large mouths? I mean, I like the smell. I've walked through many coffee warehouses. There are a lot of them in New Orleans. There are a lot of them in New Jersey. They're basically burlap bags full of green coffee unroasted. Yeah, that should smell good, right? It smells pretty good. So I'm not sure about that story, but the good warehouses store them well. They don't really degrade that quickly. They have a pretty good shelf life and they can last for a pretty long time before they start to decay But you have to keep moisture away There are things you have to do to secure the quality of them And the good warehouses are expert at handling those bags of coffee. Okay, so this is actually a serious question then. When you're doing due diligence for a loan, what are the factors that you're taking into account? Would you look at something like the quality of the warehouse that commodities are going to be stored in? Absolutely. You would look at, you would have location eligibility requirements. So you'd say, I will lend against coffee that's in this warehouse, this warehouse, or this warehouse, but not coffee that's in this warehouse for whatever reason. So that's a big part of your diligence. That's one risk. The bigger risks are really what we touched on, price risk. Counterparty risk is the second one. International risk, which I'm sure we'll talk about. Where is the good that you're financing? Hopefully it's moving. Sometimes it may not be. Not at the moment. Yeah, exactly. In some cases, it may not be. And the biggest one I think that Brown Brothers Harriman particularly focuses on is the management, the owners of the business. What are their motivations? What's their reputation? What's their character? We have something we call the five C's of credit. It's kind of an old adage. And those are character, collateral, capital, collateral. [15:00] conditions. And the most important one we think is character, the character of the borrower, which really comes out when markets get volatile, how people behave. And you started saying accurately, this is a super relationship focused business. Character is really the most important thing in the business when you boil it all down. So just to be clear here, when we're talking about, okay, a client comes and whatever they have a need for some coffee or whatever, Or the other side, is this coming off of Braun Brothers Harriman's balance sheet? Are you a middleman for this or is it your own balance sheet or both? Historically, this market was dominated by banks. There was sort of a group of banks, particularly European banks, that dominated. I would say in the last 10 years, many of those banks have actually stepped away from the market for a variety of reasons. And as a result, there are not that many in the US who really specialize in this. We're one of them. but there are plenty of European banks that really understand this business. And what we've seen is you're seeing more and more interest in this asset class from institutional investors So they like short floating rates inflation protection uncorrelated to the broader equity markets There some really attractive features in this It historically been a very small group of banks but it starting to expand into the institutional investor world. So are you reselling that risk in many cases? We're typically holding the majority of it, but we will syndicate risk out to other investors from time to time as well. And we have some partners that we work with. We have different banks that will essentially buy risk from Brown Brothers. But we're always holding a significant portion of the risk on our balance sheet. difference. 4imprint offers thousands of options, from on-trend apparel and premium drinkware to tech, totes, and giveaways, so you can find the right fit for any audience, purpose, or budget. You can customize it all your logo your message your look and many items come with no setup charge to help you save And if you really watching the bottom line you find standout choices at every price point so you can make a real impact while staying on budget Plus you get expert help fast turnaround times and their 360-degree guarantee, so you can be 4imprint certain your order will arrive on time and look exactly right. Whatever your goal, 4imprint makes it easy to find your perfect promo match. Explore the possibilities today at 4imprint.com. 4imprint. 4certain. Support for the show comes from Public.com. If you're actively involved in your portfolio, you probably catch yourself repeating the same actions. Buying the dip, manually sweeping idle cash, putting on a hedge. On Public, you can now create AI agents that handle all these tasks on your behalf. Just describe what you want to do in plain English. Like, if the VIX hits 25, buy a put option on the S&P 500. Or, if my cash balance goes above $20,000, move the excess into my direct index. You approve the workflow and your agent handles the rest. Monitoring the market, watching for your conditions, and executing your strategies exactly as defined. An investing platform driven by your intent, not just your clicks. You can also get full read and write access to your account via the public API Go to public slash market and fund your account in five minutes or less That public slash market Paid for by Public Investing Brokered services by Open to the Public Investing, Inc., member FINRA and SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors, LLC, SEC Registered Advisor. Complete disclosures available at public.com slash disclosures. Let's talk about health care for a second. It doesn't always work the way people expect it to. If you've ever waited on a prescription refill or had a hard time getting the care you needed, you know the feeling. The system should just work better for everyone. That's exactly what the people at Optum are trying to do every day. They're a health care company linking patient care and pharmacy services and using data and technology to drive the whole system so care is connected, not complicated for patients and providers. Things like making it easier to get care that looks at the whole person, from primary care doctors to mental health support and even in-home care, and then using technology to make sure they all work together. Technology designed to help doctors spend less time on busy work and more time with their patients. And those prescriptions? Optum is working to bring costs down, save patients money, and make it easier to get refills. Little by little, Optum is helping make healthcare work as one for every day. [20:00] one. Head to business.optum.com to see how. How come the banks have exited the business? Is that just like a 2008 regulatory capital story or something else? It's definitely a Basel story to some extent. I think as Basel 4 has kind of taken hold, you see more and more capital requirements that make it harder to issue letters of credit and things like that. So that's definitely part of it. I think another big part of it is just the administrative intensity of running this business. If you think about tracking all this collateral as it's moving around the world, you need people. Now, over time, digitization is going to take hold here, but you still need know-how, you need people. And it's not easy to kind of run this business every day if you don't have the right people. We're fortunate to have a very experienced team that knows how to do this. We started 206 years ago in this business. So we've literally been doing it for over two centuries. And that's a big part, I think, of why we've stayed committed. It's kind of the DNA of our firm. I think you know over time you seeing some banks coming back into it But you also saw in the energy space in particular first of all big problems in 2015 during the correction banks lost some money And then you had ESG pressures particularly around European banks that caused some to say, you know, I don't really want to be in the business of financing this commodity or that commodity. I'm going to shift my resources more to the renewable sector, for example. So those are all the factors that I think have contributed to it. But there is a group of banks globally that has stayed committed to this business through kind of thick and thin and knows how to do it, has produced good returns, very low losses over time. You know, you mentioned tracking commodities and shipments. How do you do that exactly? And is it different to what I can do? Maps Go. Yeah, Maps Go is pretty cool. I was looking up something the other day. It was a it was a cargo of fertilizer leaving Saudi Arabia. It was pretty easy to see like where the ship had left from and where it was going and whether it was on time. So what, what exactly are you doing? So, you know, the, the bill of lading is like, I call it the talisman of trade finance. It's this really cool document. It a title document when it negotiable So there are four words to the order of that when those four words are printed on a bill of lading that means that whoever to the order of the word after that they essentially control those goods. Those bills of lading have numbers and you can type those numbers into, for example, Bloomberg Terminal has the Marine Tracker app. We look at that. So we're using public source data to really track that collateral when it's necessary. You typically don't need to do that unless it's something's going wrong because ships tend to go where you think they're going to go. But that is a tool with technology that makes it much easier to actually track your collateral while it's on the water. Once it goes into a warehouse, you typically get a warehouse receipt, which also can be a title document. Very important if it has those four important words. And in that case, you're often talking to the warehouse directly. So you may say, the client may say, I'd like to release these five bags of coffee or one cappuccino to sell to this roaster. Is that okay? And our team is actually saying, yes, please release those. But that on trust what we call a trust receipt And then they have to give us an account receivable to replace that within a certain number of days Interesting OK so obviously in the backdrop of this conversation is the closure of the Strait of Hormuz And we'll get to that in a second. But it does raise the question I sort of hinted at in the beginning. We all know that oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz and there's a futures market for it that allows some ability to reduce volatility or take out concerns. pistachios also flow through the Strait of Hormuz. As far as I can tell, there's no pistachio futures. I just looked it up on the terminal. And I'm curious, first of all, A, do you do commodity finance for commodities that don't have hedging instruments? So one of my colleagues, this may shock you, is on the board of the Peanut Tree Nut Association. Is it actually called the Peanut Tree Nut? It's called the Peanut Tree Nut Association. It's a big trade organization, and we happen to finance or tree nuts hence the name has to be segregated you need peanuts and the title it's very very important very specific so we we actually are active in lots of non-hedgable commodities like cashews is a good example pine nuts pistachios less so okay but um but all kinds of non-hedgable commodities that would probably surprise you how how does that change the [25:00] calculus of commodity finance when that instrument doesn't exist? Yeah. So thinking about what's happening in the strait, first of all, we're not the largest player in the Middle East. I think more of the European banks, but certainly we're watching it closely. And I think what the media is really focused on is kind of the oil side of the story. So you keep hearing 20% of global oil is trapped, the largest disruption in the history of the oil market. Those are all true. You see lots of activity in the price, although it's mostly in the front month, the front of the curve, not the back of the curve. What I think we're interested in actually in the lens of a commodity banker versus the lens of sort of an oil research analyst is how much capital is actually trapped, right? Because our business relies on turning over your balance sheet. The commodity merchant and the commodity banker, the fundamental principle is that self-liquidating nature. So you buy it, you sell it, you collect, and then you do it again. It's velocity of money. It's the velocity of the turnover. And right now, there is a lot of capital that's stuck in the straight And I see lots of different reports Is it something like 1 commercial vessels some number like that I think that what the Pentagon said recently That a lot of working capital So doing some rough math, that's tens of billions of dollars. Maybe it's more than 100 billion, but it's a massive number. And when all that gets trapped and you have potentially margin calls related to hedges on those inventories, that can really strain your liquidity if you don't have the right financing structure behind you. And that's why in these situations, you need a bank that understands your business. So if you were going to load an Afromax, which is like typically 700,000 barrels of oil, that's the capacity of an Afromax vessel. Before February 28th, the cost of that might be $40 million, $45 million. Today, it's more like $70, $75 million. And so overnight, the cost of your single shipment went up a significant amount. And how do you finance that? Back to the earlier point, you need a bank that can be flexible enough to write a line of credit that allows you to do financing under a certain guideline So how are the banks actually handling this at the moment Because on the one hand like okay the cost of actually shipping stuff has gone up On the other hand the value of the underlying collateral, you know, assuming it's oil or maybe steel or something like that has also gone up. But on the other hand, as you point out, balance sheets are probably a little more restricted if you have these huge sums that are already tied up because the ships aren't actually moving. Yeah. So I think going back to COVID and then Russia, Ukraine, first you had this huge supply chain disruption. We all remember images of container ships off the coast of Long Beach. Two years later, we had the Russian invasion of Ukraine and this huge disruption in natural gas flows from Russia to Europe. People didn't forget about those things. So companies went out and raised more capital so that they were ready for the next exogenous event. So I think when you say companies, commodity merchants, commodity merchants in this case, yeah, commodity merchants specifically went out as a result of the volatility in those two events, raised more capital. So they're coming into this crisis well-funded. And so, so far things are working okay, actually. There not evidence that things are breaking If this lasts for months and months and months you know who knows where it goes But right now the system is functioning well actually The banks are supportive The commodity merchants are dealing with the liquidity needs. They have enough liquidity. We haven't heard of any major issues yet, but it's a matter of time. And if the strait doesn't open sooner than later, then I think you could see big strains because there's so much trap capital there. What actually happens mechanically if I've financed a particular shipment and it is now hypothetically stuck in the Strait of Hormuz? What conditions start to kick in? Yeah. So I think putting, if you're channeling your inner commodity banker, the first thing you're looking at is, is my collateral okay? So if it's a shipment of oil, is the crew okay? Is the ship in the right place? Is it going to be at risk of being in a war zone and having impairment? Once you sort of get over that, you're looking at the insurance, making sure the insurance coverage is there. You're looking at what does the charter contract say between the merchant and the ship operator, and that's going to govern sort of [30:00] who pays for this detention, voyage frustration. They're different terms, but all those are going to be governed. Is voyage frustration an actual term? Yes, frustration of voyage. And so this is, you know, demurrage is a common term. That's when the merchant is slow to load a vessel or slow to discharge a vessel. This is something a little different because this is essentially a war zone. The ships can't leave. And so it has happened historically, but it hasn't happened in a long time. And I know everyone is sort of looking at the contract, figuring out what the losses and costs are, and then figuring out who's responsible for what. It's not a single answer. It's case by case. But first you're looking at the collateral. Then you're looking at, does my client have enough capital to withstand this? How many months, days, you know, hopefully years could they withstand if this actually never opened? Whether you planning a big tech event launching a new campaign or just stocking up on team gear finding the right promotional product Thank you Thank you. involved in your portfolio, you probably catch yourself repeating the same actions. Buying the dip, manually sweeping idle cash, putting on a hedge. On public, you can now create AI agents that handle all these tasks on your behalf Just describe what you want to do in plain English like if the VIX hits 25 buy a put option on the S 500 Or if my cash balance goes above move the excess into my direct index You approve of the workflow and your agent handles the rest. Monitoring the market, watching for your conditions, and executing your strategies exactly as defined. An investing platform driven by your intent, not just your clicks. You can also get full read and write access to your account via the public API. Go to public.com slash market and fund your account in five minutes or less. That's public.com slash market. Paid for by Public Investing. Brokered services by Open to the Public Investing, Inc., member FINRA and SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors, LLC, SEC Registered Advisor. Complete disclosures available at public.com slash disclosures. Let's talk about health care for a second. It doesn't always work the way people expect it to. If you've ever waited on a prescription refill or had a hard time getting the care you needed, you know the feeling. The system should just work better for everyone. That's exactly what the people at Optum are trying to do every day. They a health care company linking patient care and pharmacy services and using data and technology to drive the whole system so care is connected not complicated for patients and providers Things like making it easier to get care that looks at the whole person from primary care doctors to mental health support and even in care and then using technology to make sure they all work together. Technology designed to help doctors spend less time on busy work and more time with their patients. And those prescriptions? Optum is working to bring costs down, save patients money, and make it easier to get refills. Little by little, Optum is helping make healthcare work as one for everyone. Head to business.optum.com to see how. Do you do like, you know, what would be the equivalent of workouts with clients? I mean, you know, here is clearly something that's not their fault. It's an exogenous shock and so forth. You probably would like to have that client be with you five years from now when hopefully the straights open in five years and so forth. And so do you have like, okay, like here's your money, some owe us, but this would be really stupid to put the screws to now to collect that. Maybe they have the capital could make the payment, but it would be very unwise in the long term to put the screws to the client to get that payment back, given that life is long and so forth. Yeah, we operate under the principle that you don't put all your eggs in one basket. So supply. [35:00] Their diversification is a really important part of commodity risk underwriting. And that means if a client has 100% of their supply coming from one region, you might get a little anxious about that credit and say, maybe not for us. So typically, there's enough diversification that a single ship or series of ships that are stuck in one place doesn't cause the company to kind of seize up. You know, there may be some of that out there, but we're not seeing that with our clients. I'm sorry, I want to just go back to something because I didn't understand. So you mentioned your colleague who's on the Peanut Tree Nut Association. Yes, yes. From the perspective of Brown Brothers Harriman, how does commodity banking or finance work differently for some of these more niche commodities where the client does not have the ability to go short to contrast the physical? Yeah. So you're always in non-hedgeable commodities, you're also measuring price risk. Yeah. Typically in something like cashews as an example cashew supply chain is super interesting by the way It starts typically in West Africa It comes in something called raw seed It then gets shipped to Southeast Asia Vietnam India and they extract this kernel And the kernel is what you eat. And there's actually toxic liquid in between the shell and the kernel. Long story, but it's sort of a fun supply chain. And then it gets exported in edible form, typically from places like Vietnam. And so it's a very long supply chain. And typically what you're relying on there because the price does move a lot is a forward contract and that forward contract may not be financially settled as it is in the futures market it may be i've sold this all to xyz buyer at abc price some maker of like sweets or something like that think about if you like cashews if you go to your local grocery store it's probably whoever sits in between your local grocery store and our client that is packaging and salting and all those things. So I was looking up the toxic liquid that comes from cashews and it's urish oil. I'm not sure I'm pronouncing that right, but the stuff that comes from poison ivy, which I am currently suffering from. So this is, yeah, this is interesting to me. That really interesting to know But it interesting too Like I remember when we were in Alaska we were talking about some of the fishing that happens out there how much fish goes to Asia for processing And it's really interesting to think from just like these pure commodity standpoints, how I imagine a lot of the value added to the supply chain is not actually accruing to the original origin of the commodity, but rather the entity that can do processing most efficiently through some combination of technology, environmental standards, labor costs and so forth. I imagine a lot of the value added in a, say, cashew comes there. Yeah. Yeah, I'd say a lot of the value is happening kind of in the midstream, to your point, in between the upstream, which would be the farm, for example, in West Africa, and the client at the end, the retailer. So that's definitely true. Interesting fact about the peanut tree nut market is that it's also full. I want to keep saying that. It's full of family businesses. And the other thing we do a lot of is work with family businesses. So you sort of look at this intersection of commodity trade finance family business And in the middle of those two overlapping circles is the peanut tree nut industry Got it Just going back to collateral you know one of the tropes or jokes that often gets brought up in commodities markets, it's like I put on a physical oil trade and like, oh, no, now I'm going to actually settle and take delivery of like 50 barrels of oil in my studio apartment or something like that. If you're in commodity finance, is taking delivery of actual collateral, like, is it a disaster for you the way it is for other investors? Or is it kind of, that's what it's there for? These are all collateralized loans. Usually you wouldn't take delivery if you didn't intend to. So usually it means something went wrong. There are certain products where you actually buy the commodity physically with a contract to sell it back in the future. It's a form of inventory financing called a repurchase agreement. But typically, your goal is to manage the credit so it's a good company that doesn't default on the loan, and therefore you avoid having to get out of the loan the second way, which is liquidating the collateral. So you try to avoid that at all costs. If you had to, the good news is you can typically sell it in the location where it exists. So if it's in a tank in Houston and it's [40:00] barrels of oil, you kind of say to someone else, hey, can I sell you this? It's sitting here and they'll quote you a price. So it's not as dramatic as actually arriving at our doorstep. And we try to avoid having to do that. That's part of our job. Something has gone wrong if we're doing that. But it has happened before over our 206-year history. Once again, going back to unhedgable commodities, and I ask this for a different reason, is one of the things, and it's sort of commodity-ish, one of the things that's very hot right now, or a lot of people are hoping that compute futures are going to be a thing, and that people will trade capacity of an H100 NVIDIA chip in the way, and there are some nascent efforts, and I don't know if this is going to take off. But I'm curious, like, if there are any intuitions that we can build based on existing markets of what types of commodities lend themselves to financialization that way. So we don't have, we have oil futures and we have cotton futures, we don't have pistachio futures. Is there anything that we can look at and say, yes, this type of market lends itself to financialization on an exchange whereas this one doesn So as in our minds we can help try to predict whether this will logically apply to something like compute futures Yeah So if you look at the origin of the futures market, it was really designed to help farmers manage their price risk. So think of a grain farmer in Iowa planting. This is what they teach you in the textbook. The farmer and the hedge and all that. Not the onion farmer. But if you look at the properties of the commodities, I think it's a few things. One is how homogenous is the product. So the more heterogeneous the product is, the harder it is to standardize into a financial contract. Two is volatility. If there's no futures market and it's moving all over the place, there's going to be a lot of demand from a producer, from an end user for a futures market. So actually memory chips and compute are extremely volatile right now. We've been thinking a lot about whether that's a good candidate for a futures contract. And if you're a fab that's producing chips right now, you love the price you're getting, right? I mean, maybe you've sold some of it forward below the market, but as you're kind of rolling your contracts, it's very profitable, right? And could you lock that in On the other side if you an electronics consumer of chips you love to be able to hedge that price and hedge your consumption So I actually think it a great candidate for the futures market whether it takes off You know, I'm not sure, but I know some of the exchanges are spending a lot of time on this. Yeah. So I don't know when this particular episode is coming out. We're recording on May 27th, but very soon at our live show, we will have an episode dedicated to, you know, hearing from one company that is trying to create a compute exchange and futures market, basically. So that'll be interesting. Yeah, I'm very interested in this question. I think part of the big story with compute, by the way, that's under followed is copper. So I think everyone talks about power, you know, and power is really important. And there needs to be lots of power capacity in order to build the AI revolution. Copper is as important. And you see copper prices at record highs, largely because of how much copper data centers are consuming because of all the electrical capacity that needs to be in that infrastructure. Do commodity financiers do they have good insight into like trends in commodity prices just by virtue of being able to see like actual supply and demand on the ground In general our philosophy is we don know where the price is going So we try to be price agnostic but you can't help but notice trends, see things early. And one example would be in 2020 when COVID hit, you just saw freight prices skyrocketing. I think well before the market, you saw things like steel going up quickly and those prices being passed down the supply chain. So you definitely can see things that kind of feed into like the PPI, ultimately the CPI. When you live upstream, the way we do in kind of these metal energy ag supply chains, you often see things first and before they actually get transmitted into the economic data. Now it's just one side of it. So it may not be conclusive, but it certainly provides us with lots of interesting information. There's not a trucking future trucking capacity futures market, but it occurs to me like, okay, here is a situation in which you have this sort of idiosyncratic moment. And then it probably wouldn't have made sense. I don't know. Actually, trucking like, is it in your mind? Like, could that eventually be a candidate for? Yeah, because you have these explosions of price. And so in the explosion [45:00] price moment, probably everyone's like, oh, I wish I could hedge this, right? But then you don't really know, is this a permanent fixture or is this just a post-COVID thing where there was a one-time price readjustment? Because if it's a one-time price readjustment, you don't really need a futures market. And we don't really know from memory, is this a one-time price readjustment or is this a new permanent fixture of the memory landscape? But answering that question would be an important part of whether it's worth it to build out a futures market. But I'm just curious, In the post-COVID environment, were there people kicking around the idea of freight futures or something like that? Yeah, and there are. Because it's like the sort of awakes to this volatility. There's not super liquid, but there are tanker contracts you can buy. Yeah, I just noticed this. Cape size, but it looks like there's almost no liquid. Yeah, the bid ask is pretty wide, but people do try to make markets. So dry bulk freight, you can go long or short. Trucking, I think, is a good candidate for it. I think because trucking in a lot of ways follows the diesel market, because the biggest kind of variable cost of trucking is diesel consumption. So there's already an instrument to hedge that. A little bit. It's not perfect, but it's pretty highly correlated. Tracy hinted at this. Were onion futures to be legalized with onions themselves So you mentioned Now we just doing hypothetical you mentioned there are two conditions that the high price volatility and homogeneity of the underlying commodity yes would onions meet the can't meet the conditions such that were they to be legalized they would be a good candidate for uh financialization well one thing i'd worry about with onions is perishability. Yeah, right. You know? So I think putting onions in a warehouse, if you had a physical settlement process, could be a little dangerous, you know, because you can only store them for so long. Yeah. But onions, they are pretty homogenous, as far as I know. I mean, maybe I'm missing like a specific... Well, purple onions, green onions, white onions. So there's some basis rest. You know what my favorite onion is? Yeah. The Texas 1015. Do you know what that is? No. I've never heard of that. What is that? It's a type of yellow onion that I think was created at Texas A&M University. It's really sweet and tasty. Sounds fake. No, no. It sounds like Texas A&M propaganda. Believe me, I would be the last person to advocate for Texas A&M propaganda. Now, look up Texas 1015. It's a really nice onion. And I got big onion growing plans Oh my God It the official state vegetable of the state of Texas according to Google AI overview So I have no idea if that true No way I going to have to Yeah no they good They good All right. Well, we're learning all sorts of things in this conversation. I just want to go back to the idea of seeing some trends before they kind of burst into the public consciousness. So one of the reasons I was tracking a ship last week was because it was going with its payload of fertilizer, it was going from Saudi Arabia's Yambou port to Bangladesh. So basically, they had trucked a bunch of fertilizer from the Gulf side of Saudi Arabia over to the African side of Saudi Arabia, and we're going round. Are you seeing any new trade routes being established as a result of what's going on in the Strait of War? Yeah, totally. Great question. I think we saw that starting actually with the Houthi issue in the Red Sea. And if you think about voyages, for example, from Shanghai to Northern Europe, take that route, which is a pretty big route. They used to go through the Suez Canal. Suez Canal kind of closes because ships are not comfortable taking that risk Suddenly they now routing around the Cape of Good Hope and back to my point on kind of this age of bottlenecks and disruption that adding you know 10 15 maybe more in terms of shipping days which adds to the working capital requirement, adds to the cost, the day rate on the ship, the insurance. So absolutely seeing a lot of that. And I would guess if the Strait of Hormuz conflict continues for a lot longer, there's going to be a lot of creativity in terms of how to discharge cargoes from those ships, get them to safer ground, and then export them in some other way. I would imagine if I were Saudi Arabia, I'd be thinking about building pipelines, going the other direction. I'm sure that's happening all over the Middle East to try to avoid the strait. Even if it does subside, I think people are still going to want to find alternatives because we've realized how reliant we are on this one choke point. All right, Lewis Hart, thank you so much for coming on All Thoughts. That was so much fun. Thank you. It was great to be here. That was a lot of fun. That was really interesting. Learned about the onion question was good. [50:00] Joe, I always enjoy those commodity discussions. I feel like I learn a lot of things like that Urshal is also found in cashews. I had no idea. And it sucks when it gets on your skin because you've been gardening. I also learned that there's a peanut tree nut association. I learned about that. Why didn't they call it like ground nut tree nut association? Are there just like not enough popular ground nuts? Is peanut a ground nut? That's what I thought. I have no idea. Doesn't it grow on like... I have no idea. No, I love that conversation. I guess, you know, as you said, there's a sort of romantic, exciting element of commodities that's very real. I mean, and it still exists. The fact that you're having to reroute trade flows in real time. So you're seeing new trade routes established. You know what I want to do an episode on is Asian food processing. because it's really interesting to think about commodities are grown all over the world or agricultural commodities in particular are grown all around the world but essentially where more and more of our food come from east asia even though we don think of east asia as being a big agricultural powerhouse per se Well the Alaska fish stat blew my mind when we heard it last year Also okay so I just Googled this I feel like we've been doing a lot of searches during this conversation. That's actually a sign of a good episode. But apparently peanut is just another word for groundnut. I always thought peanut was a type of groundnut, but it turns out they're just interchangeable terms. Yeah, so in Asia and India, they'll talk about groundnut oil, which is just peanut oil. We're learning a lot. There you go. And one other thing I wanted to say is, you know, it's becoming a cliche at this point, but Lewis was talking about the idea of all this capital tied up in the Strait of Hormuz, right? And like, it's okay now, but in a few months, but the longer it goes on, like the more problematic it becomes. And this seems to be like the overriding theme of this entire shock, right? You know, it's interesting. Yes. Absolutely, because we're recording this May 27th, so tomorrow will have been the three-month start of the war. Yeah. I don't know when this episode is coming out. But it's also interesting to think that a couple months ago, when we were doing commodity episodes we would say the exact time of the episode like oh we recording this at 1030 Right But now it just feels like this is just this interminable thing that part of the background. We're actually so deep into it that it's just like, yeah, it's probably going to be closed a year from now, too. And it just feels like it has this feeling of permanence that now it suddenly becomes, yeah, I suppose things could change by the time this episode comes out. But it almost feels like it probably won't. We've definitely stopped doing the minute by minute timestamp. Okay, shall we leave it there? Let's leave it there. This has been another episode of the All Thoughts podcast. I'm Tracy Alloway. You can follow me at Tracy Alloway. And I'm Jill Weisenthal. You can follow me at The Stalwart. Follow our producers, Kerman Rodriguez at Kerman Armand, Dashiell Bennett at Dashbot, Kale Brooks at Kale Brooks, and Kevin Lozano at Kevin Lloyd Lozano. And for more OddLots content, go to Bloomberg.com slash OddLots. We have a daily newsletter and all of our episodes. And you can chat about all these topics 24-7 in our Discord, discord.gg slash oddlots. 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