作者：巴菲特
来源：Heisup（ID：HEISUP001）
巴菲特最经典的一次演讲，盛传投资大佬段永平曾说「 建议你看下巴菲特1998年在 Florida university 的那个演讲。
可以多看几次,看到明白为止哈。
这个演讲我听了不下10次,非常值得仔细听 」。
巴菲特在这次演讲中，用朴实、幽默，甚至有些戏谑的口吻，向当时佛罗里达大学的MBA传授自己在投资与人生上的经验，非常值得一听。
01
巴菲特的经验和智慧
与自己认可的人和公司为伍，保持长期主义，时间会赠予丰厚的回馈
把喜欢和热爱放到决定是否做一件事的第一位，不要牺牲自己来追求所谓的成功
认清自己的能力边界，不投资看不懂的公司，关注有核心竞争力的公司
不要试图理解所有公司，就算只理解一部分公司，也可以有非常可观的收益
对于有投资能力的人，发现少数认可的公司就足够了，不要再盲目多元化投资
投资业务能被理解，管理层正直且有能力，能预见未来十年发展状况的公司
区分清楚真正重要和不重要的因素，公司层面比宏观层面更加重要，也更可知
最佳的投资往往不是计算出来，而是情绪主导，这时你对公司产品有强烈信心
一家公司是大盘股还是小盘股不重要，重要的依然是你是否认可这家公司
当股市下跌时，更加仔细研究已经可能买入的公司，因为这时可能出现买入价格
在浮躁的市场保持冷静，固定留给自己一些时间和空间去做思考
不要贪婪，任何事情都有失败的可能性，留出容错空间
吸收教训不可避免，但要尽可能地多从别人的错误中吸取教训
02
中英双语演讲文稿
I would like to say a few words primarily and then the highlight for me will be getting your questions. I want to talk about what is on your mind.
我想先讲几句话，之后对我来说最精彩的部分就是回答你们的问题。我想谈谈你们关心的事情。
I would like to talk for just one minute to the students about your future when you leave here. Because you will learn a tremendous amount about investments, you all have the ability to do well; you all have the IQ to do well. You all have the energy and initiative to do well or you wouldn't be here. Most of you will succeed in meeting your aspirations.
我想花一分钟时间和同学们谈谈你们毕业后的未来。因为你们在这里会学到大量关于投资的知识，你们都有能力做好；你们都有足够的智商做好这件事。你们都有精力和主动性去做好，否则你们也不会坐在这里。你们中的大多数人都会实现自己的抱负。
But in determining whether you succeed there is more to it than intellect and energy. I would like to talk just a second about that. In fact, there was a guy, Pete Kiewit in Omaha, who used to say, he looked for three things in hiring people: integrity, intelligence and energy. And he said if the person did not have the first two, the later two would kill him, because if they don't have integrity, you want them dumb and lazy.
但在决定你们是否成功的因素中，除了智力和精力，还有其他方面。我想简单说一下这一点。事实上，在奥马哈有个人叫皮特·基威特，他过去常说，他在招人时会看三点：诚信、智慧和精力。他说如果一个人没有前两点，后两点会害了他，因为如果他们没有诚信，你宁愿他们又笨又懒。
We want to talk about the first two because we know you have the last two. You are all second-year MBA students, so you have gotten to know your classmates. Think for a moment that I granted you the right--you can buy 10% of one of your classmate’s earnings for the rest of their lifetime. You can't pick someone with a rich father; you have to pick someone who is going to do it on his or her own merit. And I gave you an hour to think about it.
我们想谈谈前两点，因为我们知道你们具备后两点。你们都是MBA二年级的学生，所以你们对同学们都有了一定了解。现在设想一下，我赋予你们一项权利——你们可以买下某个同学未来余生10%的收入。但你们不能挑选有富爸爸的人，必须挑选要靠自身实力取得成就的人。我给你们一个小时来思考这个问题。
Will you give them an IQ test and pick the one with the highest IQ? I doubt it. Will you pick the one with the best grades? The most energetic? You will start looking for qualitative factors, in addition to (the quantitative) because everyone has enough brains and energy. You would probably pick the one you responded the best to, the one who has the leadership qualities, the one who is able to get other people to carry out their interests. That would be the person who is generous, honest and who gave credit to other people for their own ideas. All types of qualities. Whomever you admire the most in the class. Then I would throw in a hooker. In addition to this person you had to go short one of your classmates.
你会给他们做智商测试，然后挑选智商最高的人吗？我对此表示怀疑。你会挑选成绩最好的人吗？还是最有活力的人？你会开始寻找除（量化指标）之外的定性因素，因为每个人都有足够的智力和精力。你可能会选择那个与你最合得来、具备领导才能、能让别人为其实现利益的人。这个人会很慷慨、诚实，并且会认可他人的想法。各种各样的品质。也就是你在班上最钦佩的人。然后我再给你出个难题。除了选这个人，你还得做空你的一个同学。 （注：原文中 “Then I would throw in a hooker.” 表述可能有误，结合语境推测可能是 “Then I would throw in a hitch.” ，hitch有“意外障碍、难题”的意思 ，译文按推测含义翻译。如果原词无误，“hooker”常见释义为“妓女”，但在此处语义不通，需根据实际情况进一步确认。 ）
That is more fun. Who do I want to go short? You wouldn't pick the person with the lowest IQ, you would think about the person who turned you off, the person who is egotistical, who is greedy, who cuts corners, who is slightly dishonest.
这就更有意思了。你会选择做空谁呢？你不会挑选智商最低的人，而是会想到那个让你反感的人，那个自负、贪婪、偷工减料、有点不诚实的人。
As you look at those qualities on the left and right hand side, there is one interesting thing about them, it is not the ability to throw a football 60 yards, it is not the ability the run the 100 yard dash in 9.3 seconds, it is not being the best looking person in the class, they are all qualities that if you really want to have the ones on the left hand side, you can have them.
当你审视左右两边的这些品质时，会发现一个有趣的现象：这些品质不是能把橄榄球扔出60码远的能力，不是能在9.3秒内跑完100码的速度，也不是班上颜值最高的长相。如果你真的想要拥有左边的那些品质，你是可以做到的。
They are qualities of behavior, temperament, character that are achievable, they are not forbidden to anybody in this group. And if you look at the qualities on the right hand side the ones that turn you off in other people, there is not a quality there that you have to have. You can get rid of it. You can get rid of it a lot easier at your age than at my age, because most behaviors are habitual. The chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken. There is no question about it. I see people with these self- destructive behavior patterns at my age or even twenty years younger and they really are entrapped by them.
这些都是行为、气质和性格方面的品质，是可以培养出来的，在座的每个人都有机会拥有。再看看右边那些让你讨厌别人的品质，没有一个是你必须具备的。你可以摒弃这些品质。在你们这个年纪摒弃它们，比在我这个年纪要容易得多，因为大多数行为都是习惯养成的。习惯的枷锁很轻，轻到你察觉不到，直到重得无法打破。这一点毫无疑问。我见过和我年纪相仿甚至比我小20岁的人，被这些自我毁灭的行为模式困住。
They go around and do things that turn off other people right and left. They don't need to be that way but by a certain point they get so they can hardly change it. But at your age you can have any habits, any patterns of behavior that you wish. It is simply a question of which you decide.
他们四处行事，总是让身边的人反感。他们本不必如此，但到了一定程度，就很难改变了。但在你们这个年纪，你们可以养成任何你们想要的习惯和行为模式，这仅仅取决于你们的选择。
If you did this… Ben Graham looked around at the people he admired and Ben Franklin did this before him. Ben Graham did this in his low teens and he looked around at the people he admired and he said, "I want to be admired, so why don't I behave like them?" And he found out that there was nothing impossible about behaving like them. Similarly he did the same thing on the reverse side in terms of getting rid of those qualities. I would suggest is that if you write those qualities down and think about them a while and make them habitual, you will be the one you want to buy 10% of when you are all through. And the beauty of it is that you already own 100% of yourself and you are stuck with it. So you might as well be that person, that somebody else.
如果你这么做……本·格雷厄姆会观察身边那些他敬佩的人，在他之前，本·富兰克林也这么做过。本·格雷厄姆在十几岁的时候就这样做了，他观察身边那些他敬佩的人，然后说：“我希望受到别人的敬佩，那我为什么不像他们那样行事呢？”他发现，像他们那样行事并非不可能。同样，在摒弃那些不良品质方面，他也采取了相同的做法。我建议你们把这些品质写下来，思考一会儿，让它们成为习惯，这样等你们完成学业后，就会成为那个你愿意购买其10%未来收入的人。美妙之处在于，你已经完全属于自己，而且无法改变这一点。所以，你不妨成为那个人，成为让别人欣赏的人。
Well that is a short little sermon. So let's get on with what you are interested in. Let's start with questions………..
好了，这就是一段简短的教诲。那么，我们来聊聊你们感兴趣的内容吧。现在开始提问……
Question: What about Japan? Your thoughts about Japan?
问题：日本的情况如何？你对日本有什么看法？
Buffett: My thoughts about Japan? I am not a macro guy. Now I say to myself Berkshire Hathaway can borrow money in Japan for 10 years at one percent. One percent! I say gee, I took Graham's class 45 years ago and I have been working hard at this all my life maybe I can earn more than 1% annually, it doesn't seem impossible. I wouldn't want to get involved in currency risk, so it would have to be Yen-denominated. I would have to be in Japanese Real Estate or Japanese companies or something of the sort and all I have to do is beat one percent. That is all the money is going to cost me and I can get it for 10 years. So far I haven't found anything. It is kind of interesting. The Japanese businesses earn very low returns on equity - 4% to 5% - 6% on equity and it is very hard to earn a lot as an investor when the business you are in doesn't earn very much money.
巴菲特：我对日本的看法？我不是一个关注宏观经济的人。现在我心里想，伯克希尔·哈撒韦可以在日本以1%的年利率借到10年期的贷款。1%！我心想，我45年前上了格雷厄姆的课，并且一生都在努力钻研投资，或许我每年能赚到超过1%的收益，这似乎并非不可能。但我不想涉足汇率风险，所以借款必须是日元计价的。我得投资日本房地产、日本公司之类的，而我要做的就是收益超过1%。这就是这笔钱的成本，而且我能借10年。到目前为止，我还没找到合适的投资项目。这有点意思。日本企业的股权回报率非常低——只有4% - 5% - 6%，当你投资的企业赚不了多少钱时，作为投资者也很难获得丰厚回报。
Now some people do it. In fact, I have a friend, Walter Schloss, who worked at Graham at the same time I did. And it was the first way I went at stocks to buy stocks selling way below working capital. A very cheap, quantitative approach to stocks. I call it the cigar butt approach to investing. You walk down the street and you look around for a cigar butt someplace. Finally you see one and it is soggy and kind of repulsive, but there is one puff left in it. So you pick it up and the puff is free--it is a cigar butt stock. You get one free puff on it and then you throw it away and try another one. It is not elegant. But it works. Those are low return businesses.
现在有些人就是这么做的。事实上，我有个朋友叫沃尔特·施洛斯，我在格雷厄姆公司工作时，他也在那里。我最初投资股票的方法就是购买股价远低于营运资本的股票。这是一种非常廉价的、基于量化的股票投资方法。我把它称为“捡烟蒂式”投资法。你走在街上，四处寻找烟蒂。最后你看到一个，它又湿又脏，有点让人厌恶，但里面还有一口可抽。于是你把它捡起来，这一口是免费的——这就是一支“烟蒂股”。你免费抽了一口，然后把它扔掉，再去找下一个。这种方法并不高雅，但很有效。这些都是低回报的企业。
But time is the friend of the wonderful business; it is the enemy of the lousy business. If you are in a lousy business for a long time, you will get a lousy result even if you buy it cheap. If you are in a wonderful business for a long time, even if you pay a little bit too much going in you will get a wonderful result if you stay in a long time.
但时间是优质企业的朋友，是糟糕企业的敌人。如果你长期投身于一家糟糕的企业，即便买入成本很低，最终结果也会很糟糕。而如果你长期投资一家优质企业，即便初始买入价格略高，只要长期持有，也会收获出色的回报。
I find very few wonderful businesses in Japan at present. They may change the culture in some way so that management gets more share holder responsive over there and stock returns are higher. At the present time you will find a lot of low return businesses and that was true even when the Japanese economy was booming. It is amazing; they had an incredible market without incredible companies. They were incredible in terms of doing a lot of business, but they were not incredible in terms of the return on equity that they achieved and that has finally caught up with them. So we have so far done nothing there. But as long as money is 1% there, we will keep looking.
目前，我在日本几乎找不到什么优质企业。他们或许会在某些方面改变企业文化，让管理层对股东的回应更积极，进而提高股票回报率。当下，日本有许多低回报的企业，即便在日本经济繁荣时期也是如此。这很不可思议，他们曾经拥有一个令人难以置信的市场，却没有与之匹配的卓越公司。他们在开展大量业务方面表现出色，但在股权回报率方面却不尽人意，而这最终还是对他们产生了影响。所以到目前为止，我们在日本没有任何投资。但只要日本的资金成本维持在1%，我们就会继续寻找机会。
Question: You were rumored to be one of the rescue buyers of Long Term Capital, what was the play there, what did you see?
问题：有传言称你是长期资本管理公司（Long Term Capital）的拯救性买家之一，当时是怎么回事，你看到了什么情况呢？
Buffett: The Fortune Magazine that has Rupert Murdoch on the cover. It tells the whole story of our involvement; it is kind of an interesting story. I got the really serious call about LTCM on a Friday afternoon that things were getting serious. I know those people most of them pretty well--most of them at Salomon when I was there. And the place was imploding and the FED was sending people up that weekend. Between that Friday and the following Wed. when the NY Fed, in effect, orchestrated a rescue effort but without any Federal money involved. I was quite active but I was having a terrible time reaching anybody.
巴菲特：就是那期封面人物是鲁珀特·默多克的《财富》杂志。它讲述了我们参与（长期资本管理公司事件）的整个过程，这是个挺有意思的故事。在一个周五的下午，我接到了关于长期资本管理公司（LTCM）的非常严肃的电话，说情况变得很严重了。我和那里的大多数人都很熟——我在所罗门公司（Salomon）的时候，他们中的大多数人也在那里。当时那家公司（长期资本管理公司）正面临崩溃，那个周末美联储还派人过去了。从那个周五到接下来的周三，纽约联邦储备银行实际上精心策划了一场救援行动，但没有动用任何联邦资金。我当时非常积极地参与其中，但联系上任何人都让我费了好大劲。
We put in a bid on Wednesday morning. I talked to Bill McDonough at the NY Fed. We made a bid for 250 million for the net assets but we would have put in 3 and 3/4 billion on top of that. $3 billion from Berkshire, $700 mil. from AIG and $300 million. from Goldman Sachs. And we submitted that but we put a very short time limit on that because when you are bidding on 100 billion worth of securities that are moving around, you don't want to leave a fixed price bid out there for very long.
我们在周三上午提交了一份报价。我和纽约联邦储备银行的比尔·麦克多诺谈过。我们出价2.5亿美元收购其净资产，但除此之外我们还会额外投入37.5亿美元。其中伯克希尔哈撒韦公司出资30亿美元，美国国际集团（AIG）出资7亿美元，高盛集团出资3亿美元。我们提交了报价，但设定了非常短的时限，因为当你对价值1000亿美元且价格不断波动的证券进行出价时，你不会希望让一个固定价格的报价长时间有效。
In the end the bankers made the deal, but it was an interesting period. The whole LTCM is really fascinating because if you take Larry Hillenbrand, Eric Rosenfeld, John Meriwether and the two Nobel prize winners. If you take the 16 of them, they have about as high an IQ as any 16 people working together in one business in the country, including Microsoft. An incredible amount of intellect in one room. Now you combine that with the fact that those people had extensive experience in the field they were operating in. These were not a bunch of guys who had made their money selling men’s clothing and all of a sudden went into the securities business. They had in aggregate, the 16, had 300 or 400 years of experience doing exactly what they were doing and then you throw in the third factor that most of them had most of their very substantial net worth’s in the businesses. Hundreds and hundreds of millions of their own money up (at risk), super high intellect and working in a field that they knew. Essentially they went broke. That to me is absolutely fascinating.
最终，银行家们达成了交易，但那真是一段有趣的时期。整个长期资本管理公司（LTCM）的事件确实很引人深思，因为如果你想想拉里·希伦布兰德、埃里克·罗森菲尔德、约翰·梅里韦瑟以及那两位诺贝尔奖得主。把他们这16个人放在一起，他们的智商总和大概比美国任何一个行业里一同共事的16个人都要高，包括微软公司的员工。同一间办公室里汇聚了极其强大的智力资源。 现在，再结合这样一个事实，即这些人在他们所从事的领域有着丰富的经验。他们可不是一群靠卖男装赚了钱，然后突然转行进入证券行业的人。总的来说，这16个人在他们所从事的业务上，有着三四百年的经验积累。然后还有第三个因素，他们中的大多数人把自己相当可观的净资产都投入到了公司业务中。他们投入了数亿美元的自有资金（面临风险），拥有超高的智商，并且在自己熟悉的领域工作。但基本上，他们最后还是破产了。这一点对我来说，绝对是非常值得探究的。
If I ever write a book it will be called, Why Smart People Do Dumb Things. My partner says it should be autobiographical. But this might be an interesting illustration. They are perfectly decent guys. I respect them and they helped me out when I had problems at Salomon. They are not bad people at all.
如果我要写一本书，书名就叫《为什么聪明人会做蠢事》。我的搭档说这本书应该写成自传。但长期资本管理公司这件事或许就是个很有意思的例证。他们都是非常不错的人。我尊重他们，而且我在所罗门公司遇到麻烦的时候，他们还帮过我。他们压根儿就不是坏人。
But to make money they didn’t have and didn’t need, they risked what they did have and what they did need. That is just plain foolish; it doesn’t matter what your IQ is. If you risk something that is important to you for something that is unimportant to you it just doesn’t make sense. I don’t care if the odds you succeed are 99 to 1 or 1000 to 1 that you succeed. If you hand me a gun with a million chambers with one bullet in a chamber and put it up to your temple and I am paid to pull the trigger, it doesn’t matter how much I would be paid. I would not pull the trigger. You can name any sum you want, but it doesn’t do anything for me on the upside and I think the downside is fairly clear. Yet people do it financially very much without thinking.
但是，为了赚取他们本没有且也不需要的钱，他们拿自己所拥有且确实需要的东西去冒险。这简直太愚蠢了，不管你的智商有多高都是如此。如果你为了一些对你来说不重要的东西，而去拿对你来说重要的东西冒险，那真的毫无道理。不管你成功的几率是99比1，还是1000比1，我都不在乎。如果你递给我一把有一百万个弹膛的枪，其中一个弹膛里有一颗子弹，然后把枪抵在你的太阳穴上，还说只要我扣动扳机就给我钱，不管给我多少钱，我都不会扣动扳机。你可以说出任何你想要的金额，但这对我来说没有任何好处，而且我觉得后果是相当明显的。然而，人们在金融领域常常不假思索地就做出这样的冒险行为。
There was a lousy book with a great title written by Walter Gutman—You Only Have to Get Rich Once. Now that seems pretty fundamental. If you have $100 million at the beginning of the year and you will make 10% if you are unleveraged and 20% if you are leveraged 99 times out of a 100, what difference if at the end of the year, you have $110 million or $120 million? It makes no difference. If you die at the end of the year, the guy who makes up the story may make a typo, he may have said 110 even though you had a 120. You have gained nothing at all. It makes absolutely no difference. It makes no difference to your family or anybody else.
沃尔特·古特曼写过一本糟糕的书，却有着很棒的书名——《你只需富一次》。这道理似乎相当基本。如果你年初有1亿美元，在不使用杠杆的情况下能获得10%的收益，而在100次里有99次使用99倍杠杆的情况下能获得20%的收益，那么到了年底，你拥有1.1亿美元还是1.2亿美元又有什么区别呢？根本没什么区别。如果你在年底去世了，撰写关于你的事迹的人可能会打错字，也许你有1.2亿美元，可他却写成了1.1亿美元。你根本没有多得到什么。这绝对没有任何差别。这对你的家人或者其他任何人来说都没有差别。
The downside, especially if you are managing other people’s money, is not only losing all your money, but it is disgrace, humiliation and facing friends whose money you have lost. Yet 16 guys with very high IQs entered into that game. I think it is madness. It is produced by an over reliance to some extent on things. Those guys would tell me back at Salomon; a six Sigma event wouldn’t touch us. But they were wrong. History does not tell you of future things happening. They had a great reliance on mathematics. They thought that the Beta of the stock told you something about the risk of the stock. It doesn’t tell you a damn thing about the risk of the stock in my view.
不利的一面在于，尤其是当你在管理别人的钱时，不仅会赔光所有的钱，还会身败名裂、颜面扫地，而且还要面对那些被你赔了钱的朋友们。然而，16个高智商的人却参与了那样的游戏。我认为这简直是疯狂之举。在某种程度上，这是由于过度依赖某些东西导致的。那些人在我还在所罗门公司的时候就曾对我说：六西格玛事件不会降临到我们头上。但他们错了。历史并不能告诉你未来会发生什么事情。他们过于依赖数学了。他们认为股票的贝塔系数能说明这只股票的风险情况。但在我看来，它对于股票的风险根本说明不了任何问题。
Sigma’s do not tell you about the risk of going broke in my view and maybe now in their view too. But I don’t like to use them as an example. The same thing in a different way could happen to any of us, where we really have a blind spot about something that is crucial, because we know a whole lot of something else. It is like Henry Kauffman said, “The ones who are going broke in this situation are of two types, the ones who know nothing and the ones who know everything.” It is sad in a way.
在我看来，西格玛值并不能告诉你破产的风险，或许现在他们也这么认为了。但我并不想以他们为例。类似的事情换种方式也可能发生在我们任何人身上，我们在某些关键问题上确实存在盲点，因为我们对其他很多方面了解得太多了。就像亨利·考夫曼说的那样：“在这种情况下破产的人有两种，一种是什么都不懂的人，另一种是自以为什么都懂的人。”从某种程度上来说，这挺可悲的。
I urge you. We basically never borrow money. I never borrowed money even when I had $10,000 basically, what difference did it make. I was having fun as I went along it didn’t matter whether I had $10,000 or $100,000 or $1,000,000 unless I had a medical emergency come along.
我要告诫你们。我们基本上从不借钱。甚至在我只有大概一万美元的时候，我也从不借钱，这又有什么关系呢。在人生的道路上我过得很开心，不管我拥有一万美元、十万美元还是一百万美元都无所谓，除非遇到了突发的重大医疗状况。
I was going to do the same things when I had a little bit of money as when I had a lot of money. If you think of the difference between me and you, we wear the same clothes basically (SunTrust gives me mine), we eat similar food—we all go to McDonald’s or better yet, Dairy Queen, and we live in a house that is warm in winter and cool in summer. We watch the Nebraska (football) game on big screen TV. You see it the same way I see it. We do everything the same—our lives are not that different. The only thing we do is we travel differently. What can I do that you can’t do?
当我钱不多的时候和当我有很多钱的时候，我打算做的事情是一样的。如果你想想我和你们之间的差别，基本上我们穿的衣服是一样的（太阳信托银行会给我提供衣服），我们吃的食物也差不多——我们都会去麦当劳，或者更好一点，去冰雪皇后（Dairy Queen），而且我们都住在冬暖夏凉的房子里。我们会在大屏幕电视上看内布拉斯加州（橄榄球）比赛。你看到的和我看到的是一样的。我们做的所有事情都一样——我们的生活并没有那么大的不同。唯一的区别就是我们出行的方式不同。有什么我能做而你们不能做的事情呢？
I get to work in a job that I love, but I have always worked at a job that I loved. I loved it just as much when I thought it was a big deal to make $1,000. I urge you to work in jobs that you love. I think you are out of your mind if you keep taking jobs that you don’t like because you think it will look good on your resume. I was with a fellow at Harvard the other day who was taking me over to talk. He was 28 and he was telling me all that he had done in life, which was terrific. And then I said, “What will you do next?” “Well,” he said, “Maybe after I get my MBA I will go to work for a consulting firm because it will look good on my resume.” I said, “Look, you are 28 and you have been doing all these things, you have a resume 10 times than anybody I have ever seen. Isn’t that a little like saving up sex for your old age?
我得以从事一份自己热爱的工作，但其实我一直都在做自己喜欢的工作。当我觉得能挣到1000美元是件了不起的大事时，我就非常热爱自己的工作了。我劝你们去从事自己热爱的工作。要是你一直做着自己不喜欢的工作，仅仅是因为你觉得这在简历上会好看些，那我觉得你真是疯了。前几天我在哈佛和一个年轻人在一起，他当时带我去聊天。他28岁，跟我讲了他人生中做过的所有事情，都非常了不起。然后我问他：“那你接下来打算做什么呢？”他说：“嗯，也许等我拿到工商管理硕士学位后，我会去一家咨询公司工作，因为这在我的简历上会很好看。”我说：“听着，你才28岁，已经做了这么多事情，你的简历比我见过的任何人的都要丰富10倍。这难道不有点像把性生活都留到年老时才去享受吗？ ”
There comes a time when you ought to start doing what you want. Take a job that you love. You will jump out of bed in the morning. When I first got out of Columbia Business School, I wanted to go to work for Graham immediately for nothing. He thought I was over-priced. But I kept pestering him. I sold securities for three years and I kept writing him and finally I went to work for him for a couple of years. It was a great experience. But I always worked in a job that I loved doing. You really should take a job that if you were independently wealthy that would be the job you would take. You will learn something, you will be excited about, and you will jump out of bed. You can’t miss. You may try something else later on, but you will get way more out of it and I don’t care what the starting salary is.
总有那么一个时刻，你应该开始去做自己想做的事情。找一份你热爱的工作。这样你每天早上都会迫不及待地从床上跳起来。我刚从哥伦比亚商学院毕业的时候，就想立刻无偿为格雷厄姆工作。他觉得我“要价”太高（能力与期望不匹配）。但我一直缠着他。我卖了三年证券，还一直给他写信，最后终于去为他工作了几年。那是一段很棒的经历。但我一直都在做自己喜欢的工作。你真的应该找一份工作，一份即使你已经财富自由也依然会选择去做的工作。你会学到东西，会对这份工作充满热情，而且每天都会迫不及待地起床。这样做你不会有任何损失。你以后或许还会尝试其他的事情，但你会从这份工作中收获更多，而且我不在乎这份工作的起薪是多少。
When you get out of here take a job you love, not a job you think will look good on your resume. You ought to find something you like.
当你离开这里后，找一份你热爱的工作，而不是一份你认为在简历上看起来会很不错的工作。你应该找到自己喜欢的事情去做。
If you think you will be happier getting 2x instead of 1x, you are probably making a mistake. You will get in trouble if you think making 10x or 20x will make you happier because then you will borrow money when you shouldn’t or cut corners on things. It just doesn’t make sense and you won’t like it when you look back.
如果你认为得到两倍（的财富等）会比得到一倍更幸福，那你很可能犯了一个错误。如果你觉得赚到十倍或二十倍的钱会让你更幸福，那你就会陷入麻烦，因为那样的话，你可能会在不该借钱的时候去借钱，或者在一些事情上走捷径。这根本毫无道理，而且当你回首往事时，你不会喜欢自己当时的所作所为。
Question: What makes a company something that you like?
问题：是什么让一家公司成为你喜欢的公司？
Buffett: I like businesses that I can understand. Let’s start with that. That narrows it down by 90%. There are all types of things I don’t understand, but fortunately, there is enough I do understand. You have this big wide world out there and almost every company is publicly owned. So you have all American business practically available to you. So it makes sense to go with things you can understand.
巴菲特：我喜欢那些我能够理解的企业。咱们就从这一点说起。这就把范围缩小了90%。有各种各样我不理解的东西，但幸运的是，也有足够多我能理解的东西。外面有广阔的世界，而且几乎每家公司都是公开上市的。所以实际上所有美国企业都在你的选择范围之内。因此，选择那些你能够理解的企业是有道理的。
I can understand this, anyone can understand this (Buffett holds up a bottle of CocaCola). Since 1886, it is a simple business, but it is not an easy business—I don’t want an easy business for competitors. I want a business with a moat around it. I want a very valuable castle in the middle and then I want the Duke who is in charge of that castle to be very honest and hard working and able. Then I want a moat around that castle. The moat can be various things: The moat around our auto insurance business, Geico, is low cost.
我能理解这个，任何人都能理解这个（巴菲特举起一瓶可口可乐）。自1886年以来，这是一门简单的生意，但它不是一门容易的生意——我可不希望对竞争对手来说这是一门容易的生意。我想要一家周围有护城河的企业。我想要在中间有一座非常有价值的城堡，然后我希望掌管那座城堡的公爵非常诚实、勤奋且有能力。接着我还想要那座城堡周围有一条护城河。这条护城河可以是各种各样的东西：我们的汽车保险公司政府雇员保险公司（Geico）的护城河就是低成本。
People have to buy auto insurance so everyone is going to have one auto insurance policy per car basically. I can’t sell them 20, but they have to buy one. I can sell them 1. What are they going to buy it on? (based on what criteria?) They (customers) will buy based on service and cost. Most people will assume the service is identical among companies or close enough. So they will do it on cost. So I have to be a low cost producer--that is my moat. To the extent that my costs are further below the other guy, I have thrown a couple of sharks into the moat. All the time you have this wonderful castle, there are people out there who are going to attack it and try to take it away from you. I want a castle I can understand, but I want a castle with a moat around it.
人们必须购买汽车保险，所以基本上每个人每辆车都得买一份汽车保险保单。我没法卖给他们20份，但他们必须买一份。我只能卖给他们一份。那他们会基于什么来购买呢？（依据什么标准呢？）他们（客户）会基于服务和价格来购买。大多数人会认为各公司之间的服务是相同的，或者相差不大。所以他们会依据价格来做决定。因此，我必须成为低成本的供应商——这就是我的护城河。我的成本比其他公司低得越多，就相当于我往护城河里多扔了几条鲨鱼。你一直拥有这座很棒的城堡，而外面总有人会来攻打它，试图把它从你手中夺走。我想要一座我能理解的城堡，但我更想要一座周围有护城河环绕的城堡。
Kodak 柯达
30 years ago, Eastman Kodak’s moat was just as wide as Coca-Cola’s moat. I mean if you were going to take a picture of your six-month old baby and you want to look at that picture 20 years from now or 50 years from now. And you are never going to get a chance—you are not a professional photographer—so you can evaluate what is going to look good 20 or 50 years ago. What is in your mind about that photography company (Share of Mind) is what counts. Because they are promising you that the picture you take today is going to be terrific 20 to 50 years from now about something that is very important to you. Well, Kodak had that in spades 30 years ago, they owned that. They had what I call share of mind. Forget about share of market, share of mind. They had something—that little yellow box—that said Kodak is the best. That is priceless. They have lost some of that. They haven’t lost it all.
30年前，伊士曼柯达公司的护城河和可口可乐公司的护城河一样宽广。我的意思是，如果你要给六个月大的宝宝拍张照片，并且希望在20年后或者50年后还能看看这张照片。而你又绝不是专业摄影师，没有机会去评判这张照片在20年或50年后看起来效果如何。在这种情况下，你对这家摄影公司的印象（心智占有率）才是关键所在。因为他们向你承诺，你今天拍摄的照片，在20年到50年后依然会很棒，而照片里记录的是对你来说非常重要的东西。嗯，30年前的柯达在这方面优势极为明显，他们占据着这一领域。他们拥有我所说的心智占有率。先别提市场占有率，我说的是心智占有率。他们有那样一个东西——那个黄色的小盒子——上面写着“柯达是最棒的”。这是无价之宝。他们已经失去了一部分这样的优势，但还没有完全丧失。
It is not due to George Fisher. George is doing a great job, but they let that moat narrow. They let Fuji come and start narrowing the moat in various ways. They let them get into the Olympics and take away that special aspect that only Kodak was fit to photograph the Olympics. So Fuji gets there and immediately in people’s minds, Fuji becomes more into parity with Kodak.
这并非乔治·费舍尔的过错。乔治干得很出色，但他们让柯达的护城河变窄了。他们任由富士公司进入市场，并开始以各种方式侵蚀这条护城河。他们让富士获得了奥运会的相关权益，失去了那种只有柯达才适合拍摄奥运会的特殊地位。于是富士进入了这个领域，而且很快在人们的认知里，富士在一定程度上与柯达平起平坐了。
You haven’t seen that with Coke; Coke’s moat is wider now than it was 30 years ago. You can’t see the moat day by day but every time the infrastructure that gets built in some country that isn’t yet profitable for Coke that will be 20 years from now. The moat is widening a little bit. Things are, all the time, changing a little in one direction or the other. Ten years from now, you will see the difference. Our managers of the businesses we run, I have one message to them, and we want to widen the moat. We want to throw crocs, sharks and gators—I guess—into the moat to keep away competitors. That comes about through service, through quality of product, it comes about through cost, some times through patents, and/or real estate location. So that is the business I am looking for.
这种情况在可口可乐身上可没有出现；如今可口可乐的护城河比30年前更宽了。你不可能每天都察觉到这条护城河的变化，但每当在某个国家建设起那些目前对可口可乐来说还无法盈利、但20年后可能盈利的基础设施时，可口可乐的护城河就在一点点变宽。事情总是在这样或那样地发生着细微的变化。十年之后，你就能看到其中的差异。对于我们所经营业务的管理者们，我只有一个要求，那就是我们要拓宽护城河。我们要往护城河里投放鳄鱼、鲨鱼，还有短吻鳄——我想是这些——来抵御竞争对手。这可以通过优质的服务、高质量的产品来实现，也可以通过控制成本来达成，有时候还可以依靠专利，或者是绝佳的地理位置。这就是我所追求的企业模式。
Now what kind of businesses am I going to find like that? Well, I am going to find them in simple products because I am not going to be able to figure what the moat is going to look like for Oracle, Lotus or Microsoft, ten years from now. Gates is the best businessman I have ever run into and they have a hell of a position, but I really don’t know what that business is going to look like ten years from now. I certainly don’t know what his competitors will look like ten years from now. I know what the chewing business will look like ten years from now. The Internet is not going to change how we chew gum and nothing much else is going to change how we chew gum. There will lots of new products. Is Spearmint or Juicy Fruit going to evaporate? It isn’t going to happen. You give me a billion dollars and tell me to go into the chewing gum business and try to make a real dent in Wrigley’s. I can’t do it. That is how I think about businesses. I say to myself, give me a billion dollars and how much can I hurt the guy? Give me $10 billion dollars and how much can I hurt Coca-Cola around the world? I can’t do it. Those are good businesses.
那么，我要到哪里去找到这样的企业呢？嗯，我会在简单产品领域去寻找，因为我无法想象十年之后，甲骨文、莲花软件公司或者微软的护城河会是什么样子。盖茨是我见过的最出色的商人，他们的企业也占据着极其有利的地位，但我真的不知道十年后这些企业会发展成什么样子。我当然无从知晓十年之后，他的竞争对手会是什么样子，我也不知道。但我知道十年之后口香糖行业会是什么样子。互联网改变不了我们嚼口香糖的方式，其他东西也很难改变我们嚼口香糖的习惯。未来会有很多新产品出现。绿箭口香糖或者果味口香糖会消失吗？那是不可能的。你给我十亿美元，让我进入口香糖行业，试着对箭牌公司造成实质性的冲击，我做不到。我就是这样思考企业的。我会对自己说，给我十亿美元，我能对那个企业造成多大的伤害呢？给我一百亿美元，我又能在全球范围内对可口可乐造成多大的伤害呢？我做不到。这些都是优秀的企业。
Now give me some money and tell me to hurt somebody in some other fields, and I can figure out how to do it.
现在给我一些钱，然后让我去在其他某些领域中打击某个企业，那我就能想出该怎么做。
So I want a simple business, easy to understand, great economics now, honest and able management, and then I can see about in a general way where they will be ten (10) years from now. If I can’t see where they will be ten years from now, I don’t want to buy it. Basically, I don’t want to buy any stock where if they close the NYSE tomorrow for five years, I won’t be happy owning it. I buy a farm and I don’t get a quote on it for five years and I am happy if the farm does OK. I buy an apartment house and don’t get a quote on it for five years, I am happy if the apartment house produces the returns that I expect. People buy a stock and they look at the price next morning and they decide to see if they are doing well or not doing well. It is crazy. They are buying a piece of the business. That is what Graham—the most fundamental part of what he taught me.
所以我想要的是一家简单的企业，易于理解，目前有着良好的经济效益，拥有诚实且有能力的管理团队，而且大体上我能预见它十年后的发展状况。如果我无法预见它十年后的样子，我就不会买入它。基本上来说，如果纽约证券交易所明天关闭五年，而我持有某只股票却会因此不开心的话，我就不会去买这只股票。我买了一个农场，五年内都没有它的报价，但如果这个农场经营状况良好，我就会很高兴。我买了一栋公寓楼，五年内没有它的报价，但如果这栋公寓楼能带来我预期的收益，我也会很开心。人们买了一只股票，第二天早上就盯着股价，然后据此判断自己做得好不好。这太疯狂了。他们买的可是企业的一部分啊。这就是格雷厄姆所教给我的最核心的内容。
You are not buying a stock, you are buying part ownership in a business. You will do well if the business does well, if you didn’t pay a totally silly price. That is what it is all about. You ought to buy businesses you understand. Just like if you buy farms, you ought to buy farms you understand. It is not complicated.
你买的不是股票，而是一家企业的部分所有权。如果这家企业经营得好，而且你当初买入的价格也并非愚蠢至极，那么你就会获得不错的收益。事情的本质就是如此。你应该买入那些你了解的企业。这就如同你购买农场一样，你应该购买那些你了解的农场。这并不复杂。
Incidentally, by the way, in calling this Graham-Buffett, this is pure Graham. I was very fortunate. I picked up his book (The Intelligent Investor) when I was nineteen; I got interested in stocks when I was 6 or 7. I bought my first stock when I was eleven. But I was playing around with all this stuff—I had charts and volume and I was making all types of technical calculations and everything. Then I picked up a little book that said you are not just buying some little ticker symbol, that bounces around every day, you are buying part of a business. Soon as I started thinking about it that way, everything else followed. It is very simple. So we buy businesses we think we can understand. There is no one here who can’t understand Coke…………..
顺便说一下，之所以把这称为格雷厄姆-巴菲特投资理念，其实这完全源自格雷厄姆。我非常幸运。我19岁的时候读到了他的书（《聪明的投资者》）；我六七岁的时候就对股票产生了兴趣。我11岁时买了自己的第一支股票。但在那之前我一直是瞎折腾——我有股价走势图、成交量数据，还做着各种技术分析之类的事情。然后我读到了一本小册子，上面说你不只是在买一个每天上下波动的股票代码，你买的是一家企业的一部分。一旦我开始从这个角度去思考，其他的一切也就顺理成章了。这非常简单。所以我们买入那些我们认为自己能够理解的企业。在座的各位没有人理解不了可口可乐公司……
If I was teaching a class at business school, on the final exam I would pass out the information on an Internet company and ask each student to value it. Anybody that gave me an answer, I’d flunk (Laughter).
如果我在商学院授课，在期末考试时，我会给学生们发放关于一家互联网公司的资料，然后让每个学生对它进行估值。要是有人给我一个（关于该公司估值的）答案，我就会让他不及格。（笑声）
I don’t know how to do it. But people do it all the time; it is more exciting. If you look at it like you are going to the races--that is a different thing--but if you are investing…. Investing is putting out money to be sure of getting more back later at an appropriate rate. And to do that you have to understand what you are doing at any time. You have to understand the business. You can understand some businesses but not all businesses.
我可不知道该如何去给互联网公司估值。但人们却总是在这么做，而且他们觉得这更刺激。如果你把这当成是去赛马场赌马——那就是另一回事了——但如果你是在做投资……投资是投入资金，目的是确保日后能以合适的回报率获得更多的回报。要做到这一点，你在任何时候都必须清楚自己在做什么。你必须了解相关的企业。你能够了解某些企业，但不可能了解所有的企业。
Question: You covered half of it which is trying to understand a business and buying a business. You also alluded to getting a return on the amount of capital invested in the business. How do you determine what is the proper price to pay for the business?
问题：你已经谈到了其中的一半，即努力去了解一家企业并买入这家企业。你也间接提到了投入到企业中的资金要获得回报。那么你如何确定为一家企业支付怎样的价格才是合适的呢？
Buffett: It is a tough thing to decide but I don’t want to buy into any business I am not terribly sure of. So if I am terribly sure of it, it probably won’t offer incredible returns. Why should something that is essentially a cinch to do well, offer you 40% a year? We don’t have huge returns in mind, but we do have in mind not losing anything. We bought See’s Candy in 1972, See’s Candy was then selling 16 m. pounds of candy at a $1.95 a pound and it was making 2 bits a pound or $4 million pre-tax. We paid $25 million for it—6.25 x pretax or about 10x after tax. It took no capital to speak of. When we looked at that business—basically, my partner, Charlie, and I—we needed to decide if there was some untapped pricing power there. Where that $1.95 box of candy could sell for $2 to $2.25. If it could sell for $2.25 or another $0.30 per pound that was $4.8 on 16 million pounds. Which on a $25 million purchase price was fine. We never hired a consultant in our lives; our idea of consulting was to go out and buy a box of candy and eat it.
巴菲特：这是个很难做的决定，但我不想买入任何我没有十足把握的企业。所以，如果我对某家企业有十足把握，它可能也不会带来令人难以置信的高回报。为什么一件基本上肯定会经营得很好的事情，却要给你每年40%的回报率呢？我们没想过要获得巨额回报，但我们确实想着不要有任何损失。我们在1972年收购了喜诗糖果公司。当时喜诗糖果每年销售1600万磅糖果，每磅售价1.95美元，每磅能赚20美分，也就是税前利润400万美元。我们花了2500万美元收购它，相当于税前利润的6.25倍，或者说税后利润的10倍左右。而且经营这家企业基本不需要投入什么资金。当我和我的合伙人查理审视这家企业时，我们需要判断它是否存在尚未挖掘的定价能力。也就是那盒售价1.95美元的糖果能否卖到2美元到2.25美元。如果它能卖到2.25美元，也就是每磅再提高0.3美元，那么1600万磅糖果就能多赚480万美元。对于2500万美元的收购价格来说，这是很不错的。我们这辈子从来没有雇用过顾问；我们所谓的咨询方式就是出去买一盒糖果，然后把它吃掉。
What we did know was that they had share of mind in California. There was something special. Every person in Ca. has something in mind about See’s Candy and overwhelmingly it was favorable. They had taken a box on Valentine’s Day to some girl and she had kissed him. If she slapped him, we would have no business. As long as she kisses him, that is what we want in their minds. See’s Candy means getting kissed. If we can get that in the minds of people, we can raise prices. I bought it in 1972, and every year I have raised prices on Dec. 26th, the day after Christmas, because we sell a lot on Christmas. In fact, we will make $60 million this year. We will make $2 per pound on 30 million pounds. Same business, same formulas, same everything--$60 million bucks and it still doesn’t take any capital.
我们当时确实知道的是，喜诗糖果在加利福尼亚州拥有较高的心智占有率。它有着一些特别之处。加利福尼亚州的每个人对喜诗糖果都有一定的印象，而且绝大多数都是好印象。有人曾在情人节时送了一盒喜诗糖果给某个女孩，然后那个女孩吻了他。要是女孩扇了他一巴掌，那我们的生意可就没戏了。只要女孩吻了他，这就是我们希望在人们心中留下的印象。喜诗糖果意味着会得到亲吻。如果我们能让人们有这样的想法，我们就能提高价格。我在1972年收购了这家公司，从那以后每年的12月26日，也就是圣诞节后的第二天，我都会提高价格，因为我们在圣诞节期间的销量很大。事实上，今年我们将盈利6000万美元。我们销售3000万磅糖果，每磅能赚2美元。同样的生意，同样的配方，一切都没变，却能赚6000万美元，而且依然不需要投入什么资金。
And we make more money 10 years from now. But of that $60 million, we make $55 million in the three weeks before Christmas. And our company song is: “What a friend we have in Jesus.” (Laughter). It is a good business. Think about it a little. Most people do not buy boxed chocolate to consume themselves, they buy them as gifts— somebody’s birthday or more likely it is a holiday. Valentine’s Day is the single biggest day of the year. Christmas is the biggest season by far. Women buy for Christmas and they plan ahead and buy over a two or three week period. Men buy on Valentine’s Day. They are driving home; we run ads on the Radio. Guilt, guilt, guilt—guys are veering off the highway right and left. They won’t dare go home without a box of Chocolates by the time we get through with them on our radio ads. So that Valentine’s Day is the biggest day.
而且十年后我们还能赚更多的钱。在这6000万美元的利润中，有5500万美元是在圣诞节前的三周内赚来的。我们公司的歌是：“主耶稣是我们多么好的朋友。”（笑声）这是一桩好生意。稍微思考一下就明白了。大多数人买盒装巧克力并不是为了自己吃，而是买来当礼物——比如给别人过生日，或者更常见的是在节假日时送。情人节是一年中最重要的单个日子。而圣诞节则是到目前为止最重要的节日季。女性会为了过圣诞节买巧克力，她们会提前计划，然后在两三个星期的时间里购买。男性则在情人节买巧克力。他们在开车回家的路上，而我们在电台播放广告。负罪感，负罪感，满满的负罪感——男人们纷纷偏离高速公路（去买巧克力）。在我们电台广告的“攻势”下，他们可不敢不带上一盒巧克力就回家。所以情人节是最重要的日子。
Can you imagine going home on Valentine’s Day—our See’s Candy is now $11 a pound thanks to my brilliance. And let’s say there is candy available at $6 a pound. Do you really want to walk in on Valentine’s Day and hand—she has all these positive images of See’s Candy over the years—and say, “Honey, this year I took the low bid.” And hand her a box of candy. It just isn’t going to work. So in a sense, there is untapped pricing power—it is not price dependent.
你能想象在情人节那天回家的情景吗？多亏了我的英明决策，我们的喜诗糖果现在每磅售价11美元。假设现在有每磅售价6美元的糖果。你真的想在情人节这天走进家门，要知道这么多年来她对喜诗糖果一直有着美好的印象，然后说：“亲爱的，今年我选了个便宜的。”接着递给她一盒糖果吗？这根本行不通。所以从某种意义上说，喜诗糖果还有尚未挖掘的定价潜力——它并不依赖于价格（来吸引消费者购买）。
Think of Disney. Disney is selling Home Videos for $16.95 or $18.95 or whatever. All over the world—people, and we will speak particularly about Mothers in this case, have something in their mind about Disney. Everyone in this room, when you say Disney, has something in their mind about Disney. When I say Universal Pictures, if I say \(20th\) Century Fox, you don’t have anything special in your mind. Now if I say Disney, you have something special in your mind. That is true around the world.
想想迪士尼吧。迪士尼的家庭录像带售价为16.95美元、18.95美元或者其他价格。在全世界范围内——就拿人们来说吧，在这种情况下我们尤其要说的是母亲们，她们对迪士尼都有着一定的印象。在座的每一个人，当听到“迪士尼”这个词的时候，脑海中都会浮现出一些与迪士尼相关的东西。当我说环球影业，或者说20世纪福克斯的时候，你们的脑海中不会有什么特别的印象。但现在要是我说迪士尼，你们的脑海中就会有特别的想法。这在全世界都是如此。
Now picture yourself with a couple of young kids, whom you want to put away for a couple of hours every day and get some peace of mind. You know if you get one video, they will watch it twenty times. So you go to the video store or wherever to buy the video. Are you going to sit there and premier 10 different videos and watch them each for an hour and a half to decide which one your kid should watch? No. Let’s say there is one there for $16.95 and the Disney one for $17.95—you know if you take the Disney video that you are going to be OK. So you buy it. You don’t have to make a quality decision on something you don’t want to spend the time to do. So you can get a little bit more money if you are Disney and you will sell a lot more videos. It makes it a wonderful business. It makes it very tough for the other guy.
现在，想象一下你自己带着几个年幼的孩子，你每天都想让他们自己待上几个小时，好让自己能清净一会儿。你知道，如果你买了一盘录像带，孩子们会看上二十遍。于是你去音像店或者别的什么地方买录像带。你会坐在那儿先预览十盘不同的录像带，每盘都看一个半小时，然后再决定让你的孩子看哪一盘吗？不会的。比如说，店里有一盘卖16.95美元，而迪士尼的那盘卖17.95美元——你知道要是买了迪士尼的那盘，就不会有问题。所以你就买了它。对于一件你不想花时间去仔细甄别的事情，你没必要去做关于其质量的抉择。所以，如果你是迪士尼，你就能多卖点儿钱，而且还能卖出更多的录像带。这就使得这成为了一桩很棒的生意。而这也让其他同行很难与之竞争。
How would you try to create a brand—Dreamworks is trying—that competes with Disney around the world and replaces the concept that people have in their minds about Disney with something that says, Universal Pictures? So a mother is going to walk in and pick out a Universal Pictures video in preference to a Disney. It is not going to happen.
你要如何努力打造一个品牌呢——就像梦工厂正在尝试的那样——使其能在全球范围内与迪士尼竞争，并把人们脑海中有关迪士尼的概念，替换为类似环球影业这样的概念呢？这样一来，一位母亲走进商店时，会优先挑选环球影业的录像带，而不是迪士尼的。但这种情况是不会发生的。
Coca-Cola is associated with people being happy around the world. Everyplace – Disneyland, the World Cup, the Olympics—where people are happy. Happiness and Coke go together. Now you give me—I don’t care how much money—and tell me that I am going to do that with RC Cola around the world and have five billion people have a favorable image in their mind about RC Cola. You can’t get it done. You can fool around, you can do what you want to do. You can have price discounts on weekends. But you are not going to touch it. That is what you want to have in a business. That is the moat. You want that moat to widen.
在全世界范围内，可口可乐都与人们的快乐联系在一起。在每一个地方——迪士尼乐园、世界杯、奥运会——这些人们感到快乐的场合，快乐总是和可口可乐相伴相随。现在，你给我钱——我不在乎有多少——然后让我在全球范围内对RC可乐（美国一种可乐品牌）也做到这一点，让50亿人心中都对RC可乐怀有好感。这是办不到的。你可以折腾，可以为所欲为，你可以在周末搞价格优惠活动。但你就是无法做到和可口可乐一样。这就是你希望一家企业所具备的特质。这就是护城河。你希望这条护城河不断变宽。
If you are See’s Candy, you want to do everything in the world to make sure that the experience basically of giving that gift leads to a favorable reaction. It means what is in the box, it means the person who sells it to you, because all of our business is done when we are terribly busy. People come in during theose weeks before Chirstmas, Valentine’s Day and there are long lines. So at five o’clock in the afternoon some woman is selling someone the last box candy and that person has been waiting in line for maybe 20 or 30 customers. And if the salesperson smiles at that last customer, our moat has widened and if she snarls at ‘em, our moat has narrowed. We can’t see it, but it is going on everyday. But it is the key to it. It is the total part of the product delivery. It is having everything associated with it say, See’s Candy and something pleasant happening. That is what business is all about.
如果你是喜诗糖果公司，你就会想尽一切办法，确保赠送这份礼物所带来的体验基本上能引发积极的反应。这涉及到盒子里装的是什么，也关乎把糖果卖给你的那个人，因为我们所有的生意都在非常忙碌的时候进行。人们会在圣诞节前的那几周以及情人节期间光顾，店里常常排着长队。所以，在下午五点钟的时候，有位女售货员在把最后一盒糖果卖给某位顾客，而这位顾客可能已经等了前面二三十位顾客了。如果售货员对最后这位顾客微笑，我们的护城河就变宽了；要是她对顾客凶巴巴的，我们的护城河就变窄了。我们看不到这种变化，但它每天都在发生。而这就是关键所在。这是产品交付过程中不可或缺的一部分。与喜诗糖果相关的一切都意味着，只要提到喜诗糖果，就会联想到一些令人愉快的事情发生。这就是生意的真谛所在。
Question: If I have every bought a company where the numbers told me not to. How much is quantitative and how much is qualitative?
问题：我是否曾收购过一家数据显示不该收购的公司？在决策过程中，定量因素和定性因素各占多大比重？
Buffett: The best buys have been when the numbers almost tell you not to. Because then you feel so strongly about the product. And not just the fact you are getting a used cigar butt cheap. Then it is compelling. I owned a windmill company at one time. Windmills are cigar butts, believe me. I bought it very cheap, I bought it at a third of working capital. And we made money out of it, but there is no repetitive money to be made on it. There is a one-time profit in something like that. And it is just not the thing to be doing. I went through that phase. I bought streetcar companies and all kinds of things. In terms of the qualitative, I probably understand the qualitative the moment I get the phone call. Almost every business we have bought has taken five or ten minutes in terms of analysis. We bought two businesses this year.
巴菲特：最划算的收购往往是那种从数据上看几乎不应该去做的收购。因为那时你会对该公司的产品有着强烈的信心。这可不只是因为你能廉价买到一个“雪茄烟蒂”（指那些看似廉价但价值有限、没有发展潜力的公司）。那样的收购才是有吸引力的。我曾经拥有过一家风车公司。相信我，风车公司就是“雪茄烟蒂”式的企业。我以很低的价格买下了它，价格只有其营运资金的三分之一。我们从这家公司赚了钱，但没办法持续从它身上赚钱。这类公司只能带来一次性的利润。这可不是值得去做的事情。我经历过那个阶段。我买过有轨电车公司以及各种各样的公司。至于定性分析方面，可能在我接到电话的那一刻就对其定性有所了解了。几乎我们收购的每一家公司，从分析的角度来说，都只花了五到十分钟的时间。今年我们就收购了两家公司。
General Re is a $18 billion deal. I have never been to their home office. I hope it is there. (Laughter) “There could be a few guys there saying what numbers should we send Buffett this month?” I could see them going once a month and saying we have $20 billion in the bank instead of $18 billion. I have never been there.
通用再保险公司（General Re）那笔交易涉及金额达180亿美元。我从来没去过他们的总部办公室。我希望它确实在那儿。（笑声）“说不定那儿有几个人在商量这个月该给巴菲特送什么样的数据呢？”我能想象他们每个月来这么一次，然后虚报说银行里有200亿美元，而不是实际的180亿美元。可我从来就没去过那儿。
Before I bought Executive Jet, which is fractional ownership of jets, before I bought it, I had never been there. I bought my family a quarter interest in the program three years earlier. And I have seen the service and it seems to develop well. And I got the numbers. But if you don’t know enough to know about the business instantly, you won’t know enough in a month or in two months. You have to have sort of the background of understanding and knowing what you do or don’t understand. That is the key. It is defining your circle of competence.
在我收购“行政喷气机公司”（该公司提供飞机的部分产权服务）之前，我从没去过那儿。三年前，我给家人在该公司的项目中买了四分之一的产权份额。我体验过他们的服务，而且看起来发展得很不错。我也拿到了相关数据。但如果你没有足够的能力立刻了解这家公司的业务，那么给你一个月或者两个月的时间，你也还是了解不够。你必须具备一定的背景知识，能明白自己理解什么、不理解什么。这才是关键所在。这就是界定你自己的能力圈。
Everybody has got a different circle of competence. The important thing is not how big the circle is, the important thing is the size of the circle; the important thing is staying inside the circle. And if that circle only has 30 companies in it out of 1000s on the big board, as long as you know which 30 they are, you will be OK. And you should know those businesses well enough so you don’t need to read lots of work. Now I did a lot of work in the earlier years just getting familiar with businesses and the way I would do that is use what Phil Fisher would call, the “Scuttlebutt Approach.” I would go out and talk to customers, suppliers, and maybe ex-employees in some cases. Everybody. Everytime I was interested in an industry, say it was coal, I would go around and see every coal company. I would ask every CEO, “If you could only buy stock in one coal company that was not your own, which one would it be and why? You piece those things together, you learn about the business after awhile.
每个人都有不同的能力圈。重要的不是能力圈有多大，重要的不是能力圈的规模大小；重要的是要待在能力圈之内。如果在证券交易所上市的数千家公司中，你的能力圈里只有30家公司，只要你清楚这30家公司是哪些，那你就没问题。而且你应该对这些公司足够了解，这样你就不需要做大量的研究工作。在早年的时候，我确实做了大量的工作来熟悉各类公司，而我采用的方法就是菲利普·费雪所说的“闲聊调查法”。我会走出去，与客户、供应商交谈，在某些情况下，可能还会和前雇员交流。和所有相关的人交流。每当我对某个行业感兴趣时，比如说煤炭行业，我就会四处走访，去考察每一家煤炭公司。我会问每一位首席执行官：“如果你只能购买一家非自己公司的煤炭企业的股票，你会选哪一家，为什么？”你把这些信息拼凑起来，过一段时间后，你就会了解这个行业了。
Funny, you get very similar answers as long as you ask about competitors. If you had a silver bullet and you could put it through the head of one competitor, which competitor and why? You will find who the best guy is in the industry. So there are a lot of things you can learn about a business. I have done that in the past on the business I felt I could understand so I don’t have to do that anymore. The nice thing about investing is that you don’t have to learn anything new. You can do it if you want to, but if you learn Wrigley’s chewing gum forty years ago, you still understand Wrigley’s chewing gum. There are not a lot of great insights to get of the sort as you go along. So you do get a database in your head.
很有意思的是，只要你询问有关竞争对手的问题，得到的答案往往非常相似。如果你有一颗“银子弹”（杀手锏），可以用它来对付一个竞争对手，你会选哪个竞争对手，又为什么呢？通过这样的问题，你就会发现这个行业里谁才是最厉害的角色。所以，有很多方法你可以了解一家企业。过去，对于那些我觉得自己能够理解的企业，我就是这么做的，所以现在我不必再那样做了。投资这件事的美妙之处在于，你不必去学习任何新东西。如果你想学习新东西，当然也可以去学，但如果你在四十年前就了解了箭牌口香糖公司，那么现在你依然了解箭牌口香糖公司。在这个过程中，你并不需要获得很多那种高深莫测的见解。所以，你的脑海中确实会形成一个信息库。
I had a guy, Frank Rooney, who ran Melville for many years; his father-in-law died and had owned H.H. Brown, a shoe company. And he put it up with Goldman Sachs. But he was playing golf with a friend of mine here in Florida and he mentioned it to this friend, so my friend said “Why don’t you call Warren?” He called me after the match and in five minutes I basically had a deal.
我认识一个人，弗兰克·鲁尼，他经营梅尔维尔公司很多年。他的岳父去世了，生前拥有一家名为H.H. 布朗的鞋业公司。他通过高盛公司准备出售这家公司。当时他在佛罗里达和我的一个朋友一起打高尔夫球，他跟我这个朋友提到了这件事，于是我的朋友就说：“你为什么不给沃伦打个电话呢？”打完球后他就给我打了电话，五分钟内我基本上就敲定了一桩交易。
But I knew Frank, and I knew the business. I sort of knew the basic economics of the shoe business, so I could buy it. Quantitatively, I have to decide what the price is. But, you know, that is either yes or no. I don’t fool a lot around with negotiations. If they name a price that makes sense to me, I buy it. If they don’t, I was happy the day before, so I will be happy the day after without owning it.
但我了解弗兰克，也了解这个行业。我大致清楚制鞋业的基本经济状况，所以我能买下这家公司。从定量分析的角度来看，我得确定价格是否合适。不过，你知道的，这无非就是买或者不买的问题。我不太喜欢在谈判上过多纠缠。如果他们提出的价格我觉得合理，我就买下来。如果价格不合适，反正我在这之前的日子过得也很开心，那么即便不买下这家公司，之后的日子我也照样开心。
Question: The Asian Crisis and how it affects a company like Coke that recently announced their earnings would be lower in the fourth quarter.
问题：亚洲金融危机以及它对像可口可乐这样的公司有何影响，该公司最近宣布其第四季度收益将会下降。
Buffett: Well, basically I love it, but because the market for Coca-Cola products will grow far faster over the next twenty years internationally than it will in the United States. It will grow in the U.S. on a per capita basis. The fact that it will be a tough period for who knows—three months or three years—but it won’t be tough for twenty years. People will still be going to be working productively around the world and they are going to find this is a bargain product in terms of a portion of their working day that they have to give up in order to have one of these, better yet, five of them a day like I do.
巴菲特：嗯，基本上我对此持乐观态度，因为在未来二十年里，可口可乐产品在国际市场的增长速度将远远超过在美国市场的增长速度。在美国，从人均角度来看，它也会有所增长。虽然谁也不知道会有一段艰难时期持续多久——可能是三个月，也可能是三年——但不会艰难二十年之久。世界各地的人们仍将高效地工作，而且他们会发现，就为了能喝上一瓶可口可乐（要是能像我一样一天喝上五瓶就更好了）而需要付出的那部分工作时间而言，这是一种很划算的商品。
This is a product that in 1936 when I first bought 6 of those for a quarter and sold them for a nickel each. It was in a 6.5 oz bottle and you paid a two cents deposit on the bottle. That was a 6.5 oz. bottle for a nickel at that time; it is now a 12 oz. can which if you buy it on Weekends or if you buy it in bigger quantities, so much money doesn’t go to packaging—you essentially can buy the 12 ozs. for not much more than 20 cents. So you are paying not much more than twice the per oz. price of 1936. This is a product that has gotten cheaper and cheaper relative to people’s earning power over the years. And which people love. And in 200 countries, you have the per capita consumption use going up every year for a product that is over 100 years old that dominates the market. That is...
