对于郑洁文来说，23岁的她任职于广州市一家广告公司，中国经济的放缓并非抽象概念。原本作为平面模特，两年前她开始工作时，月收入为3万元（约4,230美元）。去年起，由于其所在公司的新业务量下滑，她的薪水逐渐减少，最终在二月份遭受了大幅削减，导致工资仅剩下之前的一半。对此，“我感到非常震惊。” 她对CNN表示。
郑立即采取行动与她的新薪资匹配，这意味着她不再能够购买Louis Vuitton、Chanel或Prada等品牌商品。社交媒体数据显示，在过去两年内，对中国仿制品的搜索次数激增了三倍，直至2024年。Mintel的一名上海负责人Laurel Gu指出，“明显的”经济放缓使得消费者转向高质低价的复刻品市场。
如今，郑和她的朋友们在有限预算下购买“pingti”商品——即所谓的仿制品，这些商品通常品质上乘且价格低廉，有时甚至与原品牌设计有别，提供更多的颜色或质感。随着中国消费者的信心接近历史低点，这类产品类别需求飞速增长。
例如，Lululemon的Align瑜伽裤在官方网站售价750元（约106美元），但各大电商平台如Tmall上同样品质、价格更便宜的类似款式比比皆是，最低甚至只需5美元。中国的消费者对于仿制品的热情不仅仅影响着品牌如Louis Vuitton。今年上半年，LVMH集团在中国市场的销售下滑了10%，该地区排除日本。
这股潮流在整体消费和零售销售表现疲软时更加突出，而此前的预期就已经很低。夏季一系列经济数据显示异常疲弱，使经济学家担心中国可能无法达到3月公布的5%年度经济增长目标。周二，中国人民银行宣布了一系列举措以刺激增长，包括降低关键贷款利率，并减少银行业需持有的准备金比率，此举将释放约1.42万亿元资金用于借贷。香港和内地股市对此迅速反弹，港交所指数及上证综指分别上涨了4%。
保守的消费者态度自新冠疫情后中国边境开放一年半以来持续存在。投资银行摩根大通的研究指出，在7月份消费者信心指数从6月的86.2略微降至86.0，仅略高于去年11月的历史低点85.5（该指数范围为0至200，100代表中立）。受股市下跌、资本外流和薪资增长迟缓等因素影响，消费者们选择节省开支。
例如，一名来自中国西南部重庆的姓新的小学数学教师告诉CNN，她此前是雅诗兰黛夜间修护精华液的忠实粉丝。然而今年面对20%以上的严重工资削减（原因归咎于学校预算因经济挑战而紧张），她转向了更实惠的选择。她发现了一款性价比极高且含有同样关键成分的复刻品，售价仅为14元人民币，而雅诗兰黛版本则为720元人民币。
“为什么要选择仿制品？当然是因为薪资缩水！” 她调侃道。郑和姓新的情况都感到幸运的是仍拥有工作。最新数据显示，18至24岁非学生群体的失业率在8月份上升到了18.8%，这是自该数据今年1月被重新引入以来的最高水平。
中央银行行长潘功胜在周二宣布下调关键借贷利率七天逆回购利率，从1.7%降至1.5%，并减少银行储备金比率一半个百分点。此举将释放约1万亿元人民币用于新增贷款。此外，他还透露了对现有房贷的减息政策，并将第二次购房人的首付比例从25%降至15%，旨在支持疲软的房地产行业。这一行业曾占到经济活动的30%，于2019年开始冷却，在两年后的政府限制开发商借款后跌入低谷。
导致房价急剧下跌，消费者信心丧失的原因正在造成价格下调近30%（根据平台贝壳基于25个大城市的样本研究显示）。彭博经济学家指出，中国家庭因房地产下滑遭受巨大财富流失，“估计达18万亿美元”。若与中国每人每年约6万美元的家庭年收入相比，这几乎是中国人均国内生产总值的五倍。
在广州自营业务的一位33岁企业家Nicole Hal对CNN表示，她对中国经济的信心不足导致其削减支出，尽管她今年与丈夫预计总收入至少为400万元（57万美元）。她说：“我已经停止购买奢侈品和昂贵护肤产品，包括昂贵衣物。我也不再外出就餐，而改为每周至少自己烹饪四天。” 这一消费减少的“恶性循环”导致了系列悲观经济数据的出现，并促使多个投资银行将中国增长预测下调至低于官方设定的5%目标。
为了弥补房地产行业下滑造成的缺口，中国政府主要依赖于制造业扩张和电动汽车产业的发展。但其向海外出口过剩产能的策略正在引起全球反对，尤其是在欧洲的电动车制造商中。摩根大通在9月13日的一份报告中指出，“在中国，疲软的国内需求与强大的制造业增长推动了商品贸易盈余达到极高水平。”如果中国继续出口其盈余，预计将会面临更多贸易伙伴的关税。
以上就是优化后的中文翻译内容。
新闻来源：www.cnn.com
原文地址：Goodbye Louis Vuitton. China’s Gen Z leans into ‘dupe economy’ as growth prospects stall
新闻日期：2024-09-24
原文摘要：
China’s economic slowdown isn’t an abstract concept for Zheng Jiewen, 23, who works full time at an ad agency in the southern megacity of Guangzhou. Mainly a print model, Zheng used to rake in 30,000 yuan ($4,230) a month when she began working two years ago. But, starting last year, when new business at the company she worked for started to decline, her salary was reduced incrementally, culminating in a major cut in February that slashed her earnings to just half of her previous pay. “I was extremely shocked,” she told CNN. She said she immediately brought down her spending to match her new salary. That meant no more Louis Vuitton, Chanel or Prada, formerly her go-to brands. The “obvious” economic slowdown has resulted in social media searches for dupes tripling from 2022 to 2024, said Laurel Gu, a Shanghai-based director of Mintel, a market research firm. These days, she and her friends are spending their more limited funds on so-called “pingti” products, high-quality replicas of branded goods known in English as dupes. Some are virtually indistinguishable from the real thing, while others are inspired by the original design and offer more colors or textures. The popularity of this product category is soaring as consumer confidence in China nears a historic low, according to analysts. Gu said that unlike 10 years ago when Chinese shoppers, the world’s top luxury spenders, were clamoring for Western goods from famous brands, consumers are now increasingly turning to more affordable alternatives, a trend that is becoming “the new mainstream.” Dupes can be considerably cheaper than their branded rivals. A pair of Lululemon’s (LULU) Align yoga pants costs 750 yuan ($106) on its official Chinese website. By contrast, a search of popular e-commerce sites including Tmall yields dozens of other options, often using Lulu in their store names, touting similar leggings for as little as $5 and claiming to be of comparable quality. China’s growing love for dupes isn’t just a problem for established brands such as Louis Vuitton. Sales at its luxury powerhouse owner, LVMH, dropped 10% in the first six months of this year in its Asia region, which excludes Japan, compared to 2023. That market is dominated by China. The pingti trend is contributing to overall lackluster consumption and retail sales, which missed what were already-low expectations last month. A slew of economic data over the summer has been so weak that economists are concerned China may miss its 5% target growth rate announced in March. On Tuesday, China’s central bank unveiled a fresh package of measures to revive growth by cutting its main interest rate and reducing the amount of cash that banks need to hold in reserve, which would free up money for lending. Stock markets in Hong Kong and mainland China have rallied strongly in response, with the Hang Seng index and the Shanghai Composite each closing 4% higher. Cautious consumers A year and a half after China reopened its borders following the Covid-19 pandemic, consumer confidence is still struggling to recover, economists at investment bank Nomura wrote in a research note earlier this month. Its consumer confidence index dipped to 86.0 in July from 86.2 in June, they said, only slightly above the historical low of 85.5 hit in November 2022, when the country was still mired in pandemic woes. (The index measures consumer confidence on a scale of zero to 200, with 100 indicating a neutral stance.) Shoppers are sitting on the sidelines due to a combination of falling stock prices, capital flight and “tepid” wage growth, the economists said. According to CNN’s interviews with consumers in different parts of China, though, holding on to your existing salary is already considered a win. An elementary math teacher from Chongqing, southwestern China, who gave her name as Xinxin told CNN that she was previously a loyal fan of Estée Lauder’s Advanced Night Repair serum. But after a “brutal” pay cut of over 20% this year, which she attributed to “fiscal issues” in her school district caused by economic challenges, she turned to budget-friendly alternatives. She found one with the same key ingredients priced at a massive discount of about 100 yuan (about $14) for 20 milliliters (just over half an ounce), compared to Estée Lauder’s 720 yuan ($100) for 30 milliliters (one ounce). “Why dupe? Pay cut, of course!” she quipped. Xinxin and Zheng, the model, consider themselves lucky to have jobs. On Friday, China revealed that the unemployment rate for people aged 18 to 24, excluding students, rose to 18.8% in August. It was the highest level since the figure was reintroduced in January. China stopped releasing the metric for several months after it hit consecutive record highs last summer. A precipitous fall On Tuesday, central bank governor Pan Gongsheng sought to address widespread concern about stalling growth by announcing cuts to one of its key lending rates, the seven-day reverse repo rate, from 1.7% to 1.5%. It also cut the reserve requirement ratio for banks by half a percentage point, which would free up about one trillion yuan ($142 billion) for new lending. He additionally revealed cuts to existing mortgages and lowered the minimum mortgage downpayment from 25% to 15% for second-time homebuyers to support the ailing property sector, which many economists believe is the root cause of China’s numerous economic woes. The real estate sector once accounted for as much as 30% of economic activity. It began to cool in 2019 and fell into a deep trough about two years later, after a government-led clampdown on developers’ borrowing. The resulting crisis has resulted in a precipitous fall in real estate prices and loss of confidence among consumers. Individuals and companies have been trying to preserve their wealth by selling assets and cutting consumption, as well as investment. Prices of existing homes are down nearly 30% from 2021, Nomura said, citing research from Beike, a platform that tracks housing transactions, based on a sample of 25 large cities. “Unlike the huge positive wealth effect seen in the US post-Covid, Chinese households have suffered a massive loss of wealth from the housing slump, amounting to an estimated $18 trillion,” Barclays economists wrote in a September 12 research note. To put that in perspective, they said, it’s as if each three-person household in China has lost around $60,000, an amount that is almost five times China’s per capita gross domestic product. Nicole Hal, a 33-year-old self-employed businesswoman in Guangzhou, told CNN that her lack of confidence in the country’s economy has led her to slash spending, even though she expects to make at least four million yuan this year ($570,000) together with her husband. “I’ve stopped buying luxury goods and expensive skin care products, including expensive clothes. I stopped eating out, instead I cook myself at least four days a week,” she said. That “vicious cycle” of reduced consumption, which has contributed to a slew of pessimistic economic data, has prompted a number of investment banks to cut their estimates for Chinese growth below its official 5% target. To make up for the shortfall caused by the property sector, Chinese leaders have been largely focused on promoting expansion of manufacturing, including in its electric vehicles (EV) sector. But its strategy of exporting excess capacity to overseas markets has been causing global pushback, especially among EV makers in Europe. “In China, weak domestic demand and strong manufacturing growth have pushed the goods trade surplus to extremely high levels,” economists at Goldman Sachs wrote in a September 13 report, adding that Beijing is likely to face further tariffs from trading partners if it continues to export its surplus.
