If Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservative Party wins a clear victory in the U.K. general election on May 7, the country within a few years could undergo its most momentous change since the end of the British Empire more than a generation ago: withdrawal from the European Union. For this reason, the outcome of the election is more important than usual — and much harder to predict.
If he remains prime minister, Cameron has pledged that by the end of 2017 he will call a referendum on whether Britons want to leave the EU, after first negotiating with member states for return of various much-desired powers to the U.K., including the right to limit immigration from other欧洲联盟countries。If he doesn’t get what he wants — and most Europe watchers think he won’t, given German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s opposition to immigration curbs — analysts believe chances are high Britain will vote for an exit.
“I think the market is being incredibly complacent about this,” says Tom Elliott, London-based international investment strategist at deVere Group, a Zurich-headquartered financial consulting firm with $10 billion under advisement and management. “If we leave, the EU’s main countries will make it very unpleasant for us.”
Elliott predicts the EU would impose tariffs on goods made in Britain, and that Germany and France would use European legislation to grab international financial business from London. This would hurt the economy and British corporations by hitting investment, he says; businesses in particular want access to European markets.
艾略特展望进一步前进，从U.K中看到Europhile Scots。第二次独立公投后（去年苏格兰勉强拒绝独立），威尔士和北爱尔兰可能遵循西装。他警告称，结果将是一个来自欧洲的国家，尽管他们对经济增长和企业收入的贡献，但是尽管他们的贡献。“将剩下的是什么，这将是一个不喜欢外国人的奇怪小讨厌的国家，不喜欢现代世界，”他说。
其他分析师对U.K.退出的后果并不是那么令人难以如此。他们确实相信金融市场如果保守派表现得足够好以形成强大的政府，金融市场将很快反应。David Page, London-based senior economist with France’s €623 billion ($659 billion) AXA Investment Managers, sees the British pound falling to as low as $1.40 right after the vote, compared with about $1.50 as of early March, with the FTSE 100 index dropping between 5 and 10 percent.
但保守派有多可能获胜？
这取决于胜利的意思。直到3月初的民意调查表明，在领导者Ed Miliband下，劳动党将在U.K.议会的主导房间中获得650个席位的最大份额。这主要是因为保守派的前景被反欧盟U.K.独立党称为独立党，通过首先在去年的U.K.选举举行欧洲议会时震惊了政治世界。
然而，在一些调查中，保守派最近跨越劳动力。选民在家庭收入中恢复的康复可能进一步帮助：伦敦财政研究所最近宣布，今年的生活水平将返回到2008年级巨额衰退前的何处。
Still, opinion polls rule out an absolute majority for the Conservatives or any other party. Most pundits expect that whatever party wins the most seats will have to form a coalition government — similar to the current Conservative–Liberal Democrat alliance — or a minority administration. In this case, the biggest party would limp along in a weak government, perhaps with allies but without the majority of seats.
AXA IM的页面指出，即使保守派赢得了最多的席位，联盟主导或少数民族政府的数学也可能使党为确保欧盟公投的议会批准来实现困难。他估计，即使他们是政府的一部分，许多Eureophille自由民主党，也可能是一些反叛保守派，也会拒绝公投法案。
所以苏格兰民族主义者也会。Following the resurgence in support since the “no” vote last year, which raised the Scottish National Party’s profile, they’re now expected to win the bulk of Scotland’s 59 seats in Parliament — possibly enough to give them an effective veto on any major U.K. policies the party doesn’t like.
Regardless of which party performs best, the political gridlock that may take hold in Britain after the election worries many investors. “Markets abhor uncertainty,” says Bill O’Neill, head of the U.K. investment office at $2 trillion UBS Wealth Management in London. “The key thing for them is to see a functioning government with a coherent program in place after the normal vicissitudes of building a coalition.”
提出违反直觉,但intriguin页g point of view: A bit of gridlock may not be a bad thing. A weak Conservative-led government wouldn’t be able to put the U.K. on the road out of the EU, he reckons. A weak Labour-led government would find it harder to pass measures harmful to corporate earnings, such as an increase in the minimum wage, which would hit the retail sector.
“在某种程度上，少数民族政府，作为保守派或劳动领导，可能实际上是最具市场友好的结果，因为它将阻止迁移到政治极端，”页面说。