选自《每日英语听力》
周末图书馆。
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英语日常学习，必须保持良好的思考习惯。单纯的看，不如写出来，记忆的效果更持久。不仅如此，写能帮助提高注意力，让学习更有效。
每日英语听力，有大量的生词和词组，通过做笔记，不仅知道了单词和词组的含义，还对句子的结构，文章的结构有了更清晰的认识，同时也让知识库变得更丰富。
The first is that family offices could endanger the stability of the financial system. Combining very rich people, opacity and markets can be explosive.
LTCM, a $100bn hedge fund backed by the super-rich, blew up in 1998, almost bringing down Wall Street. Scores of wealthy people fell for a Ponzi scheme run by Bernie Madoff that collapsed in 2008.
Still, as things stand family offices do not look like the next disaster waiting to happen. They have debt equivalent to 17% of their assets, making them among the least leveraged participants in global markets.
On balance, they may even be a stabilising influence. Their funds are usually deployed for decades, making them far less vulnerable to panics than banks and many hedge funds.
The second worry is that family offices could magnify the power of the wealthy over the economy. This is possible: were Bill Gates to invest exclusively in Turkey, he would own 65% of its stockmarket.
But the aim is usually to diversify risk, not concentrate power, by taking capital from the original family business and putting it into a widely spread portfolio. The family-office industry is less concentrated than mainstream asset management, which a few firms such as BlackRock dominate.
Compared with most fund managers, family offices have welcome habits, including a longer-term horizon and an appetite for startups.
It is the third danger that has most bite: that family offices might have privileged access to information, deals and tax schemes, allowing them to outperform ordinary investors.
So far there is little evidence for this. The average family office returned 16% in 2017 and 7% in 2016, according to Campden Wealth, a research firm, slightly lagging behind world stockmarkets.
Nonetheless, tycoons are well connected. Family offices are becoming more complex-a third have at least two branches-making tax wheezes easier.
Hungry brokers and banks are rolling out the red carpet and pitching deals with unlisted firms that are not available to ordinary investors. If all this did lead to an entrenched, unfair advantage, the effect, when compounded over decades, would make wealth inequality disastrously worse.
The answer is vigilance and light. Most regulators, treasuries and tax authorities are beginners when it comes to dealing with family offices, but they need to ensure that rules on insider trading, the equal servicing of clients by dealers and parity of tax treatment are observed.
And they should prod family offices with assets of over, say, $10bn to publish accounts detailing their workings. In a world that is suspicious of privilege, big family offices have an interest in boosting transparency.
In return, they should be free to operate unmolested. They may even have something to teach hordes of flailing asset managers who serve ordinary investors, many of whom may look at their monthly fees and wish that they, too, could ditch the middlemen.
© economist.com
我的笔记：
Family office 家族办公室，性质：起源于19世纪富裕的欧美家族，是为富人家族管理财富的私人机构。目的：为保证富裕家族世代相传，缓解家族矛盾，是税务得到很好的监管，对家族财富进行有效管理。
Combining very rich people, opacity and markets can be explosive. 超级富豪的结合，将会使不透明度和市场井喷。
Blow up 破产
Bring down 拖垮
Collapse 崩塌，破产
The new disaster waiting for happen 潜在发生的新的灾难
be equivalent to 等同于
Leverage 杠杆
The funds are usually deployed for decades. 这些基金通常配置已有几十年
Panics 恐慌
be vulnerable to 因。。。。易受攻击/影响
Magnify …over…. 放大对。。。。的影响
Diversify risk 分散风险
Concentrate power. 集权
Portfolio. 投资组合
Mainstream 主流
Long-term horizon 长期的眼光/视野
Appetite for startups. 对初创公司的兴趣
Most bite 最大的杀伤力
Privileged 有特权的，有特别恩典的
have access to information, deals and tax scheme 获得信息，交易和税收计划的通道
Outperform. 超过，胜过
Lagging behind. 落后的
Tycoon 大亨，巨富
Make tax wheezes easier. 减轻税负
Broker. 券商；经纪人
Make sth worse. 使恶化
Regulators 监管机构
Treasuries and tax authorities 财务和税务当局
Beginner 新手
Insider trading 内幕交易
Prod 敦促，刺激
Publish account detailing their workings. 公布账务明细
Hords of flailing asset manager 摇摇欲坠的资产管理公司
Ditch. 摆脱，丢弃
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