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2020下半年翻译考试二级笔译模拟题
美国的百万富翁都住在哪里?
About 5.8 percent of the population – 7.2 million households – qualify as millionaires, meaning that they have at least $1 million laying around, excluding their real estate holdings, retirement plans and business partnerships.
Kiplinger, publisher of business forecasts and personal finance advice, partnered with Phoenix Marketing International to figure out how many millionaires live in 933 urban areas with populations of at least 50,000 residents.
The Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk area of Connecticut takes the top spot. About 9 percent of its residents – 31,506 of the people who live there – can call themselves millionaires.
Not only is this part of Connecticut close to New York City, but the enclave is also home to a number of hedge funds and prominent companies, including Priceline’s parent company, and the Xerox Corporation. These attributes are enough to give this tony Connecticut locality an edge over Silicon Valley.
The California regions of San Jose, Sunnyvale and Santa Clara, which includes Silicon Valley, comes in second with 61,264 millionaire households – 9 percent of all households. The area is home to some of the biggest tech companies in the world, and Google, Apple and Facebook are nearby.
The nation’s capital slides into the third spot. Washington, D.C., and its suburbs draw highly educated Americans looking for influential jobs. The 206,361 millionaire households in the region account for 8.9 percent of D.C.’s 2.3 million households.
2020下半年翻译考试二级笔译模拟题
美墨达成新贸易协定
U.S. President Donald Trump says the United States and Mexico have reached a trade agreement, leaving Canada as the odd man out in efforts to revise or replace the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
Speaking Monday from the White House, Trump said the new deal will be called the United States-Mexico Trade Agreement.
Trump spoke to reporters as he spoke on the telephone to Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto. Trump called it a big day for trade and a big day for the country. Trump said: “This is something that is very special for our manufacturers and for our farmers, from both countries, for all of the people that work for jobs. It is also great trade, and it makes it a much more fair bill, and we are very, very excited about it. We have worked long and hard, your representatives have been terrific, my representatives have been fantastic too. They have gotten along very well, and they have worked late into the night for months. It is an extremely complex bill, and it is something that I think will be talked about for many years to come.”
The Mexican leader expressed hope to “renew, modernize and update” NAFTA while Trump’s rhetoric indicated he sees that 24-year-old three-nation deal as dead.
Canada, an original member of NAFTA, is not part of this deal. Trump said the United States would start negotiating with Canada very shortly.
Trump said under the deal, Mexico has agreed to immediately begin purchasing as many U.S. agricultural products as possible. The White House is also expected to formally notify Congress by the end of this week of its intention to sign a new trade agreement within 90 days.
美墨达成新贸易协定
美国总统特朗普说，美国和墨西哥已经达成了一项贸易协定，这使加拿大在修订或取代《北美自由贸易协定》(NAFTA)的努力中成了局外人。
特朗普周一在白宫发表讲话说，这项新协议将被称为《美墨贸易协定》。
特朗普在与墨西哥总统奥夫拉多尔通电话时对记者发表了讲话。特朗普称这对贸易和对国家来说都大日子。特朗普总统说：“这对我们两国的制造商和农民以及所有为之工作的人来来说都是非常特别的。这也是一项伟大的贸易，它成为一个更公平的议案，我们非常非常兴奋。我们工作了很长时间，也很努力，你们的代表人员棒极了，我的代表人员也棒极了。他们相处得很好，几个月来一直工作到深夜。这是一项极其复杂的议案，我认为在未来许多年里人们都会谈论它。”
墨西哥总统表示希望“延长、现代化和更新”《北美自由贸易协定》，而特朗普的言辞表明，他认为这项有24年历史的三国协议已经死了。
作为《北美自由贸易协定》的原始成员国，加拿大未参与这项新协议。特朗普说，美国将很快与加拿大开始谈判。
特朗普说，根据这项协议，墨西哥同意立即开始购买尽可能多的美国农产品。预计白宫还将在本周末正式通知国会行政当局计划在90天内签署一项新的贸易协定。
2020下半年翻译考试二级笔译模拟题
Robo-Advisers: Does Not Compute
The growth of firms selling computer generated financial advice is slowing
Given the many mistakes that human investors are prone to – selling after a market tumble, trading too often, believing they can beat the stockmarket – dealing with money is perhaps best left to computers. That is the premise behind a host of firms selling computer-generated financial advice, which assist savers tired of paying for pricey human counsel. The low cost of these “robo-advisers” had helped them grow rapidly, to the horror of conventional money-managers. But growth in assets under management (AUM) at the biggest outfits has sagged recently, and with it the upstarts’ prospects.
It used to be only those with hundreds of thousands of dollars to invest, if not millions, who could afford advice about where to put their money. Humans charge 1-3% of their clients’ portfolios every year, simply to rebalance among asset classes every so often and do clever things to minimise taxes. Robo-advisers, led by Wealthfront, a Californian outfit, and Betterment, based in New York, do much the same, but for a mere 0.25% or so a year.
Largely because they squash fees, robo-services do a good job for anyone bar the very rich with complex financial arrangements. A basic questionnaire – age, salary, investment aims and the like – helps establish risk appetite. Money is then allocated to low-cost funds provided by third parties. For those who believe, correctly, that fees and human error are the main pitfalls of investing, the approach is hard to beat.
Other features include snazzy smartphone apps (customers tend to be on the younger side), transparent pricing and low or no minimum investment. Wealthfront describes itself as the Charles Schwab of the millennial generation, widening access to investing by cutting costs, just as the discount stockbroker has done for baby-boomers since the 1970s.
But being very cheap means Betterment and Wealthfront need lots of assets to turn a profit. Their AUM of roughly $2.9 billion each, accumulated largely in the past two years, delivers revenues of $7m or so a year. That is not enough to sustain around 100 staff each as well as hefty marketing budgets. Total costs are likely to be $40m-50m a year, according to one fintech grandee (neither firm discloses the data).
Scale is vital, as every new client brings fresh revenue at little extra cost. AUM in the tens of billions of dollars, if not hundreds, will be needed to break even. The two firms’ venture-capital backers, which have poured over $100m into each, expect initial losses. But even they will hope for profits in years, not decades.
Last year the two firms’ AUM grew by over 10% a month, so doubling every seven months. Growth has since fallen to less than 5%. Wealthfront used to trumpet its AUM, but now reveals it only in regulatory filings. In August it was $2.6 billion; assuming it is now $2.9 billion (it says only that it is less than $3 billion), it will take a year and a half to double at its recent rate of growth. Betterment is faring only slightly better.
Adam Nash, Wealthfront’s boss, says AUM is a misleading measure, as it is affected by asset-price swings, such as the stockmarket slide of the late summer (largely reversed since). It might be that volatility has spooked potential investors. Both firms say customers are joining in big numbers, and that AUM will grow with their savings.
Competition from incumbent wealth managers will have hurt the robotic duo. Vanguard (which puts together many of the funds Betterment and Wealthfront recommend to clients) and Schwab have both recently launched robo-advisory services. These have grown quickly – Schwab’s now has $4.1 billion in AUM – if only by poaching existing customers. Robo-purists decry potential conflicts of interest.
In dollar terms, both Betterment and Wealthfront are still attracting over $100m a month – it is the second $100m that is proving elusive. Yet fintech firms usually count on their custom growing at exponential, not arithmetic, rates. If AUM growth does not pick up, both firms will have to raise prices, expand their offerings or put themselves up for sale. In August BlackRock, a giant asset manager, bought FutureAdvisor, a smaller robo-rival. That robots of the sort devised by Betterment and Wealthfront will direct an ever-larger chunk of investors’ cash seems inevitable. Whether such products can be sold profitably by startups remains in doubt.
机器人顾问：“算”不起来
一些公司销售计算机生成的理财建议，它们的增长正在减缓
考虑到人类投资者容易犯许多错误，比如在市场暴跌后卖出、交易太过频繁、相信自己能跑赢股市等等，把钱的事留给计算机处理可能是最好的选择。由此出现了一批公司，它们销售计算机生成的理财建议，为厌倦了付高价给人类顾问的理财客户提供帮助。由于“机器人顾问”成本低廉，这类公司发展迅速，让传统的财富管理公司惊恐不已。但是，最大型机构的资产管理规模增速近来已经下降，后起之秀的前景也随之黯淡。
在过去，即便不是百万富翁，也得是手头有几十万美元的人才能请得起理财顾问。人类顾问每年收取相当于客户资产组合1%至3%的费用，所做的只是偶尔重新配置各资产类别、用聪明的法子交最少的税。以加州机构Wealthfront和总部位于纽约的公司Betterment为首的机器人顾问公司所做的事大致相同，但每年只收取总资产0.25% 左右的费用。
机器人服务主要因为压低了管理费，所以对于任何人来说都算干得不错，除了那些需要复杂财务安排的巨富们。一份基本的问卷包括年龄、收入、投资目标等问题，就可以帮助确定客户的风险偏好，然后把资金配置到第三方提供的低成本基金上。有些人相信费用和人为错误是投资的主要隐患，这是正确的，对于他们来说，其他方式很难与机器人顾问匹敌。
其他的特色包括新潮的智能手机应用(客户倾向于年轻化)、定价透明，以及起投门槛很低或者完全没有。Wealthfront形容自己是千禧一代的嘉信理财(Charles Schwab)，通过削减成本降低投资门槛，正如20世纪70年代折扣经纪人为婴儿潮一代所做的一样。
但是，收费很低意味着Betterment和Wealthfront需要管理大量资产才能盈利。这两家公司的资产管理规模各为约29亿美元，大部分是过去两年中积累的，一年产生700万美元左右的收入。这不足以负担每家公司约100名员工的人力成本，还有高昂的营销预算。据一位金融技术达人说，总成本可能达一年四千万到五千万美元(两家公司均未公布数据)。
规模至关重要，因为每一位新客户会带来新收入，而产生的额外成本极低。若要收支平衡，即便不要数千亿美元，也需要数百亿美元的资产管理规模。这两家公司的风险投资人已向每家投入超过1亿美元，并做好了初期会亏损的准备。但即便如此，他们也希望在几年内就能盈利，而不是几十年。
去年这两家公司的资产管理规模每月增长超过10%，每7个月翻一番。之后增长率降至5%以下。Wealthfront以前常大肆宣扬自己的资产管理规模，但现在只在给监管部门的备案中才会透露。8月其资产管理规模为26亿美元;假设现在是29亿美元(公司只说不到30亿美元)，按照最近的增长速度，翻番需要一年半的时间。Betterment的发展也只是稍好一点。
Wealthfront的老板亚当·纳什(Adam Nash)称资产管理规模是一个有误导性的指标，因为它受到资产价格波动的影响，比如夏末的股市下跌(之后已基本反弹)。可能是波动性吓坏了潜在的投资者。两家公司都说现在有大量新客户加入，而资产管理规模将随着他们的积蓄增加而扩大。
来自传统财富管理公司的竞争将伤害到这两家机器人公司。领航集团(Vanguard)(集合了Betterment和Wealthfront推荐给客户的多支基金)和嘉信最近都推出了机器人咨询服务。仅仅通过迁徙现有客户，它们的业务已在迅猛增长：嘉信目前的资产管理规模为41亿美元。机器人纯化论者强烈反对潜在的利益冲突。
以美元计，Betterment和Wealthfront每月仍在吸引超过1亿美元，但第二个1亿美元才是困难所在。然而，金融技术公司通常都指望它们的客户以指数级而非算术级增长。如果资产管理规模的增速不回升，两家公司都将不得不提高价格、拓宽产品服务或寻求买家。8月，资产管理巨头贝莱德集团(BlackRock)收购了一家较小的机器人对手FutureAdvisor。看来可以肯定的是，由Betterment和Wealthfront发明的这些机器人顾问将管理投资者资金中越来越大的一块。但创业公司能否在这类产品上盈利则仍旧存疑。
2020下半年翻译考试二级笔译模拟题
达芬奇珍品以创纪录价格拍卖成交
A 500-year-old masterpiece by Leonardo da Vinci that once sold for a mere $60 smashed the world’s record for an art auction Wednesday.
有500年历史、曾经仅以60美元成交的一幅达芬奇画作星期三在一个艺术品拍卖会上以创世界纪录的高价售出。
“Salvator Mundi,” which depicts Christ raising his hand in a blessing, sold for $450 million at Christie’s Auction House in New York.考生如果怕自己错过考试成绩查询的话，可以 免费预约短信提醒，届时会以短信的方式提醒大家报名和考试时间。
在纽约佳士得拍卖公司的拍卖会上，耶稣举手祝福的《救世主》达芬奇画作以4亿5千万美元的价格成交。
The buyer who was not identified, made his bid by telephone, sending the audience into a frenzy as the price climbed higher and higher.
买家通过电话参加拍卖会，没有透露身份。一路升高的叫价令参加拍卖会的人瞠目结舌。
The seller is Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev.
卖家是俄罗斯亿万富翁雷博诺夫列夫。
Only about 20 da Vinci works are known to exist and “Salvator Mundi” is the only one in private hands. The others are in museums or part of large public collections.
据信全世界只有大约20幅达芬奇的真迹作品。《救世主》是唯一在私人手中的达芬奇作品，其它作品都在博物馆或公共机构收藏。
Art experts believe da Vinci painted “Salvator Mundi” in about 1500. It was once owned by England’s King Charles I. It disappeared, resurfaced, and, at one time, was bought for just $60 by a collector who mistook it for a copy.
艺术专家认为，达芬奇大约在1500年创作了这幅《救世主》。这幅画曾被英国国王查理一世收藏，一度隐没，后来重新出现。一位收藏者曾认为它是赝品，以60美元的价格收购。
It took more than 50 years for art experts to restore it and authenticate it as a genuine da Vinci, although others still doubt it is the real thing.
艺术专家用了50多年的时间修复这幅画，并认定它是达芬奇的真迹。不过，仍有人怀疑它不是真品。
Until Wednesday, the highest price paid for a painting at auction was $179 million for Pablo Picasso’s “The Women of Algiers” in 2015.
星期三的拍卖会之前，画作的最高拍卖价是毕加索的《阿尔及尔女人》，2015年以1亿7900万美元拍卖成交。