1988-02-29 Warren Buffett.Controlled Company and Allocate Capital
In making both control purchases and stock purchases, we try to buy not only good businesses, but ones run by high-grade, talented and likeable managers. If we make a mistake about the managers we link up with, the controlled company offers a certain advantage because we have the power to effect change. In practice, however, this advantage is somewhat illusory: Management changes, like marital changes, are painful, time-consuming and chancy. In any event, at our three marketable-but permanent holdings, this point is moot: With Tom Murphy and Dan Burke at Cap Cities, Bill Snyder and Lou Simpson at GEICO, and Kay Graham and Dick Simmons at The Washington Post, we simply couldn’t be in better hands.
无论是做控股收购还是买入股票，我们都力求不仅买好企业，还要买那些由高素质、有才华、而且可亲的管理者经营的企业。如果我们在“与谁结盟”这件事上看走了眼，控股公司有一个表面上的优势：我们有权力推动变革。但在实践中，这个优势多少有点“虚幻”：更换管理层就像更换婚姻一样——痛苦、耗时、而且充满不确定性。无论如何，在我们那三项“可交易但永久持有”的投资上，这一点根本不构成问题：Cap Cities 有 Tom Murphy 和 Dan Burke，GEICO 有 Bill Snyder 和 Lou Simpson，The Washington Post 有 Kay Graham 和 Dick Simmons——我们不可能处在更好的托付之下。
控股公司在资本配置和税收上有优势，但是在人事变革和管理上的优势是“虚幻”的。
I would say that the controlled company offers two main advantages. First, when we control a company we get to allocate capital, whereas we are likely to have little or nothing to say about this process with marketable holdings. This point can be important because the heads of many companies are not skilled in capital allocation. Their inadequacy is not surprising. Most bosses rise to the top because they have excelled in an area such as marketing, production, engineering, administration or, sometimes, institutional politics.
我会说，控股公司有两项主要优势。第一，当我们控股一家企业时，我们可以进行资本配置；而在可交易持股中，我们很可能对资本配置几乎没有发言权。这一点很重要，因为很多公司的负责人并不擅长资本配置。他们的不擅长并不奇怪：多数老板之所以爬到顶端，是因为他们在某个领域表现出色，比如市场营销、生产、工程、行政管理——有时甚至是机构政治。
局部泛化的缺陷，或者说不能产生更简洁、更统一的知识结构终归是有麻烦的，不能有效保存已经到手的胜利果实。
Once they become CEOs, they face new responsibilities. They now must make capital allocation decisions, a critical job that they may have never tackled and that is not easily mastered. To stretch the point, it’s as if the final step for a highly-talented musician was not to perform at Carnegie Hall but, instead, to be named Chairman of the Federal Reserve.
一旦他们成为 CEO，就要面对新的责任：他们必须做资本配置决策——这是一项关键工作，可能是他们从未真正处理过、而且也不容易掌握的工作。把话说得夸张一点：就好像一个极有天赋的音乐家，职业生涯的最后一步不是在 Carnegie Hall 演出，而是被任命为美联储主席。
The lack of skill that many CEOs have at capital allocation is no small matter: After ten years on the job, a CEO whose company annually retains earnings equal to 10% of net worth will have been responsible for the deployment of more than 60% of all the capital at work in the business.
许多 CEO 在资本配置上的欠缺，绝不是小事：在任十年后，如果一家公司每年留存的利润相当于净资产的10%，那么这位 CEO 其实已经对公司运用的全部资本中超过60%的那部分资本的“去向”负过责任了。
CEOs who recognize their lack of capital-allocation skills (which not all do) will often try to compensate by turning to their staffs, management consultants, or investment bankers. Charlie and I have frequently observed the consequences of such “help.” On balance, we feel it is more likely to accentuate the capital-allocation problem than to solve it.
那些意识到自己不擅长资本配置的 CEO（并不是人人都意识到）往往会试图用“求助”来弥补：转向内部幕僚、管理咨询公司或投资银行。Charlie 和我经常观察到这种“帮助”带来的后果。总体上，我们觉得：它更可能放大资本配置的问题，而不是解决问题。
In the end, plenty of unintelligent capital allocation takes place in corporate America. (That’s why you hear so much about “restructuring.”) Berkshire, however, has been fortunate. At the companies that are our major non-controlled holdings, capital has generally been well-deployed and, in some cases, brilliantly so.
归根结底，美国企业界发生了大量不聪明的资本配置。（这就是为什么你总听到那么多“重组”。）不过，Berkshire 很幸运。在我们那些重要的非控股持股公司里，资本总体上被配置得很好，有些情况下甚至堪称精彩。
The second advantage of a controlled company over a marketable security has to do with taxes. Berkshire, as a corporate holder, absorbs some significant tax costs through the ownership of partial positions that we do not when our ownership is 80%, or greater. Such tax disadvantages have long been with us, but changes in the tax code caused them to increase significantly during the past year. As a consequence, a given business result can now deliver Berkshire financial results that are as much as 50% better if they come from an 80%-or-greater holding rather than from a lesser holding.
控股公司相对于可交易证券的第二个优势，与税收有关。作为公司股东，Berkshire 持有非控股（即持股低于80%）的股权时，会承担一些显著的税负成本；而当我们的持股达到或超过80%时，就不会承受这些成本（或会大幅减轻）。这种税收劣势早就存在，但税法的变化使它在过去一年显著加重。因此，同样的经营成果，如果来自持股80%或以上的控股企业，而不是来自较小持股的企业，如今可能给 Berkshire 带来高出多达50%的财务结果。
80%以上的控股没有股息税但还是有资本利得税；如果是外国公司持股，股息有预扣税但没有资本利得税。
The disadvantages of owning marketable securities are sometimes offset by a huge advantage: Occasionally the stock market offers us the chance to buy non-controlling pieces of extraordinary businesses at truly ridiculous prices—dramatically below those commanded in negotiated transactions that transfer control. For example, we purchased our Washington Post stock in 1973 at $5.63 per share, and per-share operating earnings in 1987 after taxes were $10.30. Similarly, Our GEICO stock was purchased in 1976, 1979 and 1980 at an average of $6.67 per share, and after-tax operating earnings per share last year were $9.01. In cases such as these, Mr. Market has proven to be a mighty good friend.
持有可流通证券的劣势，有时会被一个巨大的优势抵消：股市偶尔会给我们机会，让我们以荒谬的价格买到非控股的、极其卓越企业的一部分——价格大幅低于通过谈判交易获得控制权时所需要支付的价格。比如，我们在1973年以每股5.63美元买入 Washington Post；而该公司1987年每股税后经营利润是10.30美元。同样，我们的 GEICO 股票在1976、1979和1980年买入，平均成本为每股6.67美元；而该公司去年每股税后经营利润是9.01美元。在这样的案例里，Mr. Market 的确证明了自己是个非常好的朋友。
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