The cash holdings of some private firms are eroding, leaving little for return-smoothing financial engineers to play with.

一些私人公司的现金持有量正在减少，几乎没有留给平滑回报的金融工程师发挥作用。

As once-placid investors in Japan become more assertive they may press the company to do something with its large cash holdings of around $8bn.

随着曾经平静的日本投资者变得更加自信，他们可能会敦促该公司对其持有的约 80 亿美元现金采取行动。

In order to stave off disaster, the Treasury spent much of the past six months running down its cash holdings, eventually reaching the point where it had almost nothing left.

为了避免灾难，财政部在过去6个月的大部分时间里都在减少现金持有量，最终达到了现金几乎所剩无几的地步。