中国艺术品投资收益:离岸与在岸市场的特征和互动

文物艺术品既是一个国家的历史印记和文化瑰宝,也是情感资产和动产。本文基于2000-2017年全球艺术品核心市场--北京、香港、纽约和伦敦核心拍卖行中国书画的微观数据,使用特征价格法构建全球中国艺术品市场价格指数,展示全球中国艺术品拍卖市场发展的全貌,同时创新性地使用重复交易数据探讨离岸和在岸中国艺术品市场投资特征和互动关系。研究表明:北京和香港市场作为中国艺术品最大的在岸和离岸拍卖市场价格相互联动,走势基本一致;艺术品财务收益和精神回报是艺术品投资收藏和消费的主要原因,不同市场间财务收益和风险分散的差异是艺术品市场资产配置和资金流动的动力;纽约和伦敦市场中国艺术品投资收益率低于北京和香港,香港是全球中国艺术品投资收益率最高的地区,重复交易中的北京-香港交易策略占优,离岸香港市场得天独厚的环境优势使香港中国艺术品市场未来发展前景可期。

Chinese Art as an Investment: Characteristics and Interactions in Offshore and Onshore Markets

Summary: In the past 20 years, Chinese art markets have become among the most important art auction markets globally. Since 2009, the turnover of Chinese art markets has been comparable in magnitude to those of the United States and the United Kingdom. According to statistics from the China Association of Auctioneers (CAA), the total turnover of Chinese art in mainland China and overseas regions accounted for 36% of the total global art auction turnover in 2017. The driving forces behind Chinese art markets' development are the abundant supply of Chinese cultural resources, rapid economic growth, and the growing wealth of collectors and investors. As art is an asset class and a consumption good, it derives both financial returns and aesthetic value. In addition, because artworks are not standardized assets and art markets are not transparent, risks and returns can both be very high. Amid the rise of China's wealthy population, art is often used as an asset allocation tool. Since the beginning of the 20^th century, many Chinese cultural relics have flowed abroad, usually to prosperous areas. Chinese onshore art markets are mainly concentrated in Beijing, and the offshore markets are concentrated in Hong Kong, New York and London. Chinese art has attracted the attention of international investors, and overseas auction houses have increased the number of Chinese art auctions. The overseas offshore market has become an important source of Chinese art auctions. Due to differences in Eastern and Western tastes, however, painting and calligraphy are the major categories in mainland China, while antiquesantiques, porcelain and jade artworks are more popular overseas.This paper investigates the performances and characteristics of major offshore and onshore Chinese art markets, including the major art auction markets in Beijing, Hong Kong, New York and London. This paper applies the Artron AMMA database of global Chinese art auction observations from 2000 to 2017 and computes global Chinese art price indices for Beijing, Hong Kong, New York and London. A hedonic model is used to construct these indices, which cover over 300,000 auction observations of Chinese paintings and calligraphies in major auction markets. The results show that the Beijing and Hong Kong markets are the two largest onshore and offshore art auction markets, and they have similar price trends.In addition, repeat sales are used to investigate the flows of Chinese art in offshore and onshore markets. Returns in the New York and London markets are lower than those in Beijing and Hong Kong; investors received the highest returns when their artworks were bought in Beijing and later sold in Hong Kong. The premiums in Hong Kong attract investors and collectors to this region, the largest offshore Chinese art market. Hong Kong's mature and safe investment environment contributes to the prosperous art market.The main contributions of this paper are as follows: (1) Based on auction observations of the world's major Chinese art markets, a hedonic pricing model is used to construct onshore and offshore art price indices to offer a more complete picture of Chinese art auction markets. (2) In addition, this paper compares characteristics of Chinese art across offshore and onshore markets in Beijing, Hong Kong, New York and London. (3) This paper also uses repeat sales sample to investigate the motivations and preferences of Chinese buyers. (4) Lastly, it offers a new perspective on the dynamics of offshore and onshore markets.The paper is organized as follows. After an introductory first section, the second section reviews the literature. The third section introduces the methodology and data sources. The fourth section analyzes the price indices and returns of Chinese art. In the fifth section, the connection between offshore and onshore art markets is explored. The sixth section concludes.