1997-08-17 Warren Buffett and Jeff Raikes discuss Microsoft investment

Refer To：《Warren Buffett and Jeff Raikes discuss Microsoft investment》。

husky m: Jeff Raikes

To: Warren Buffett, Berkshire

Subject: Go Huskers!

Date: Sunday, August 17, 1997 9:37 PM

Warren, I apologize in advance for this being a long note. I do hope you find it interesting and be certain I don’t expect a long reply (or any reply at all for that matter). Perhaps sometime well get a few minutes where I can get your reaction to the thoughts on business below.

沃伦，提前为这封长信向您致歉。我希望您会觉得有趣，并且请放心，我并不期待收到长回复（事实上，任何回复都不必勉强）。或许哪天我们能抽几分钟谈谈下面这些关于商业的想法，听听您的看法。

Go Huskers!

“冲吧，海斯克队！”

We’re looking forward to seeing you in a few weeks for the Husker game. Please let me know if there Is anything I can do to make your stay in Washington more enjoyable (and a little more Husker-oriented!), and I will also check with BillG on the plans and how I might help.

几周后在海斯克队比赛上见面，我们非常期待。若我能为您在华盛顿的行程增添乐趣（甚至让它更具海斯克氛围！），请告诉我。我也会和比尔·盖茨核对计划，看看能如何帮忙。

I’m sad to say I’m very pessimistic about our prospects. You’ve probably noted that Washington is very highly ranked this year. They have Huard, arguably one of the top 2or 3 pro-style quarterbacks in the country – and only a sophomore. And they have an outstanding defence.

遗憾的是，我对我们的前景十分悲观。您或许注意到华盛顿大学今年排名极高。他们拥有胡尔德——毫无疑问全美前二三的职业型四分卫，而且只是大二学生——同时防守也非常出色。

In the meantime, the Huskers are replacing eight starters on defense, and the spring game showed that Frost still can’t throw the ball well enough. Without a balanced attack on offense. we1I have difficulty against their speed. And Huard has the potential to pick apart our secondary – we’ll need an outstanding plan on pass rush, equivalent to the “Philadelphia Blitz” employed at the Nebraska vs. Florida Fiesta Bowl championship game.

与此同时，海斯克队防守端要替换八名首发，而春季赛暴露出弗罗斯特的传球仍不够好。若进攻无法平衡，我们在速度上将被对方压制。而胡尔德极可能肢解我们的二线防守——我们需要一套出色的冲传方案，类似当年内布拉斯加对阵佛罗里达的嘉年华碗冠军赛中的“费城闪击”。

I hope you’re hearing better news from fall practice. People here know I’m a huge Husker fan – I can’t tell you how painful it would be for me to go through two more losses to the Huskies.

希望您从秋季训练那边听到更好的消息。大家都知道我是海斯克的铁杆粉丝——若再连输华盛顿两场，我会有多痛苦真是难以言表。

The Making of An American Capitalist…

《美国资本家的炼成》……

Tricia and I took the kids to Disney World, followed by a short vacation to Nantucket and Cuttyhunk (a small Island off Martha’s Vineyard). I spent part of the vacation reading Lowenstein’s book (The Making of an American Capitalist} – and really enjoyed it! On the way from Cuttyhunk to Boston/Logan airport, we drove down Cove Road in New Bedford trying to find the Berkshire-Hathaway mill. While I saw a few old mills, I’m not really sure which might have been the one – I was looking for the dock tower. Or perhaps it has been torn down.

我和特里希亚带孩子去了迪士尼乐园，随后到楠塔基特和卡蒂亨克（马萨诸塞葡萄藤岛外的一座小岛）度了短假。假期里我读了洛文斯坦的《美国资本家的炼成》，非常喜欢！离开卡蒂亨克前往波士顿洛根机场的路上，我们在新贝德福德的科夫路兜圈，想找到伯克希尔-哈撒韦的旧纺织厂。我看到几座老厂房，但不确定哪座是它——我在找那座带码头塔的建筑，或许已被拆掉了。

The book got me thinking about your golf tournament, the after-dinner “Talk with Warren, and the inevitable question – why don’t you invest in Microsoft or high technology? The Lowenstein book provided some stimulus to ponder the question, and I thought it would be fun to share some thoughts with you on the subject. But I should emphasize my intent in doing so is not to try to change your viewpoint (though I hope it doesn’t reinforce your view!). I just view this as a fun discussion or intellectual exercise. While many people would see our business as complicated or hard to understand, I am absolutely convinced an astute investor can learn our business in only 3 to 4 hours (and probably less than two hours if BillG explained It!).

这本书让我想到您的高尔夫赛、晚宴后的“沃伦访谈”以及那个不可避免的问题——为何您不投资微软或高科技？洛文斯坦的书促使我思考这个问题，我觉得把我的一些看法分享给您会很有趣。不过我要强调，我并非想改变您的观点（但也希望不要让您更坚定原先看法！）。这只是一次有趣的讨论或智力练习。虽然许多人觉得我们的业务复杂难懂，但我确信敏锐的投资者只需三四小时就能掌握（若由比尔·盖茨解释，可能不到两小时！）。

In some respects I see the business characteristics of Coca Cola or See’s Candy as being very similar to Microsoft. I think you would love the simplicity of the operating system business. E.g. in FY96 there were 50 million PC’s sold In the world, and about 80% of them were licensed for a Microsoft operating system. Although I would never write down the analogy of a “toll bridge”, people outside our company might describe this business in that way. Those 40 million licenses averaged about \$45 per for a total of about \$1.88 In revenue. By the way, the remaining 1OM PC’s were largely running Microsoft operating systems we didn’t get paid for them. This problem – piracy – if reduced, is one of the key upsides to our business.

在某些方面，我认为微软的业务特性与可口可乐或喜诗糖果非常相似。我想您会喜欢操作系统业务的简洁性。例如 1996 财年全球销售了 5,000 万台 PC，其中约 80% 授权了微软操作系统。虽然我不会把它写成“收费桥梁”的比喻，但公司外的人可能会这么形容。那 4,000 万份授权平均每份约 45 美元，总收入约 18.8 亿美元。顺带一提，其余 1,000 万台 PC 也大多运行微软系统，但我们没收到钱——这是盗版问题。如果盗版减少，将是业务一大正面因素。

In FY2000, there will be about 100M PC’s sold. We think we can reduce piracy to 10% and license 90% or 90M of the PC’s. But we also have pricing discretion – I think l heard this term used In conjunction with your pricing decisions on See’s Candy. We will be transitioning the world to a new version of our operating system, Windows NT. Today, we get more than \$100 per system for NT, but only on a small percentage of the PC’s. But NT will be on closer to 70% of the PC’s sold in FY2000. We can achieve average license revenue of \$80. So 90M licenses at \$80 per license totals about \$7.2B, up from just under \$2B in 3 to 4 years. And since there are effectively no COGs and a WW sales force of only 100·150 people this is a 90%+ margin business. There is an R\&D charge to the business. but I’m sure the profits are probably as good as the syrup business!

到 2000 财年，PC 销量将约为 1 亿台。我们认为可将盗版率降至 10%，让 90% 即 9,000 万台获得授权。同时我们有定价自由——我想您在喜诗糖果的定价决策中用过这个词。全球将过渡到新版操作系统 Windows NT。目前，我们在少数 PC 上每份 NT 收费超过 100 美元，而到 2000 财年，NT 将装在约 70% 的 PC 上，平均授权收入可达 80 美元。9,000 万份授权乘以 80 美元即 72 亿美元，较 3–4 年前不足 20 亿大幅增长。而由于几乎没有生产成本，全球销售团队仅 100–150 人，这是一项毛利率超 90% 的业务。虽有研发费用，但我确信利润堪比糖浆业务！

There is actually upside in the number of PC’s sold. Similar to your analysis of Coca Cola, the penetration of PC’s in International markets leaves a lot of room for growth. In the US, the number of PC’s per 1000 people is around 400 or so, but the number drops off rapidly lo 100 or less in most countries, even in some of the European countries.

PC 销量实际上还有上行空间。就像您分析可口可乐那样，国际市场 PC 渗透率仍有很大提升余地。在美国，每千人约有 400 台 PC，但在多数国家这一数字骤降到 100 台或更少，即便在部分欧洲国家也是如此。

(Unfortunately, I’m not in Seattle now so I don’t have these numbers at my fingertips, but Steve Ballmer can recite them from memory.)

（可惜我现在不在西雅图，手头没有这些数据，不过史蒂夫·鲍尔默能凭记忆背出这些数字。）

The business described above is what we call the OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) business, meaning our revenue comes from the manufacturers of the PC’s. The majority of the rest of the business is called the “finished goods” business. It consists of businesses or individuals buying office productivity software, educational or entertainment software, etc. Again the structure is very simple. A PC is just a razor that needs blades, and we measure our revenue on the basis off per PC, In FY96, nearly 50M PC’s were purchased and Microsoft averaged about \$140 in software revenue per PC or \$7B. This amount is in addition to the OEM royalty business I described above. (Steve Ballmer an recite the number of PCs and \$ per PC to you off the top of his head for just about any country in the world; BillG can probably do the same though he doesn’t spend as much time on that as Steve.)

上述业务称为 OEM（原始设备制造商）业务，收入来源于 PC 制造商。其余大部分收入属于“盒装产品”业务，即企业或个人购买办公软件、教育或娱乐软件等。结构同样简单：PC 就像剃须刀，需要刀片，而我们按每台 PC 衡量收入。1996 财年约售出 5,000 万台 PC，微软每台平均软件收入约 140 美元，计 70 亿美元，这还不含前述 OEM 版税收入。（史蒂夫·鲍尔默几乎能随口说出世界上任何国家 PC 数量和每台收入；比尔·盖茨也能，但他不如史蒂夫花那么多时间在这上面。）

So in some sense that is it. There are a certain number of PC’s that get sold, a growing amount of Microsoft software per PC, the power to – use the brand to sell even more software, some pricing discretion, international market (growth, and the opportunity to grow revenue by further reduction in piracy. Obviously, I’m not going through all the details we’d discuss in a couple hour session, but that is the heart or the business. Of course there is the R\&D invested to build the software, but that is similar to Disney continuing to produce new content, or Nebraska Furniture Mart continuing to keep their format fresh, and an Investment that BillG manages very closely.

所以从某种意义上说，就是这样。每年售出的 PC 数量是一定的，每台 PC 上安装的微软软件不断增加，我们可以借助品牌力量销售更多软件，拥有一定的定价自主权，加上国际市场增长以及通过进一步减少盗版提升收入的机会。当然，这里我没有展开讲那些需要几个小时讨论的细节，但这便是业务的核心。当然，我们还要投入研发来开发软件，但这就像迪士尼持续推出新内容，或 Nebraska Furniture Mart 持续保持业态新鲜一样——这是比尔·盖茨严密管理的一项投资。

Even some of the new “media” businesses are really not that new or different. Take our WebTV acquisition or the Comcast deal. I see articles covering those investments and describing Microsoft as becoming a media company. Toe real goal is to figure out a way to get an operating system” royalty per TV. 1O’s of millions of TV’s per year at \$10-\$20 per 1V is a nice little operating system· business.

即便一些新的“媒体”业务其实也并不那么新或特别。例如我们收购 WebTV 或与 Comcast 的交易。我看到一些文章谈到这些投资，将微软描述成一家媒体公司。但真正的目标是想办法让每台电视都能收取一份“操作系统”版税。每年数千万台电视，每台 10–20 美元，就是一门相当不错的小型操作系统生意。

There is a tremendous strategic synergy between the “finished goods business and the OEM operating system business. E.g. we have about 90% share of office productivity software with Microsoft Office, and that is a great business (about \$5B, also 85%+ operating margin). But also important is the fact that this software is heavily valued by the actual users (operating systems are a bit more invisible to the user), and they resist shifting brands. If we own the key “franchises built on top or the operating system, we dramatically widen the “moat that protects the operating system business. I.e. if J owned the most successful daily newspaper in Buffalo, I wouldn’t want to leave it to my competitor to own the Sunday edition.

“盒装产品”业务与 OEM 操作系统业务之间存在巨大的战略协同。例如，Microsoft Office 在办公软件市场占约 90% 份额，这是一门极佳的生意（约 50 亿美元，运营利润率亦超过 85%）。更重要的是，实际用户非常重视这些软件（操作系统对用户而言相对隐形），因此他们不愿轻易换品牌。如果我们拥有构建在操作系统之上的关键“特许经营”，就能大大加宽保护操作系统业务的“护城河”。就好比若我拥有布法罗最成功的日报，可不想把星期日版留给竞争对手。

Let’s build on this analogy and the strategic synergy between the operating system and the software that runs on it. It helps explain the Investments we are making ln Pete Higgins business (Interactive Media, like MSN, MSNBC, Expedia, Sidewalk, etc.). Again, some newspaper and magazine articles would say that Microsoft es trying to become a media company. But I prefer to view it as Investing In the potential “user franchises” that will help protect our operating systems businesses in the future. We hope to make a lot of money off these franchises, but even more important is that they should protect our Windows royalty per PC, and hopefully our royalty per TV. And success in those businesses will help increase the opportunity for future pricing discretion.

让我们继续沿用这个类比，以及操作系统与其上运行软件之间的战略协同，这有助于解释我们在彼得·希金斯负责的业务（互动媒体，如 MSN、MSNBC、Expedia、Sidewalk 等）中的投资。同样，某些报刊文章会说微软正试图成为一家媒体公司。但我更愿把其视为投资潜在的“用户特许经营”，以在未来保护我们的操作系统业务。我们希望从这些特许经营中赚取丰厚利润，但更重要的是，它们应当能保护我们每台 PC 的 Windows 版税，并有望保护未来每台电视的版税。而且这些业务的成功将提高我们未来的定价自主权。

So I really don’t see our business as being significantly more difficult to understand than the other great businesses you’ve invested in. But there is one potential difference that worries me, and it is a key part of the reason I spent the time to share these thoughts with you. The difference I worry about is the “width of the moat. With Coca Cola, you can feel pretty confident that there won’t be a fast shift in user preferences away from drinking sodas, and in particular Coke. In technology, we may more frequently see “paradigm shifts” where old leaders are displaced by new. Graphical user interface replaces character user interface, the Internet explodes, etc.

因此，我并不认为我们的业务比您投资过的其他优秀企业更难理解。但有一点潜在差异让我担忧，这也是我花时间与您分享这些想法的关键原因——我担心的是“护城河的宽度”。在可口可乐的案例中，用户饮用汽水、尤其是可乐的偏好不会迅速转移，这让人相当放心。而在科技领域，我们更常见到“范式转换”，新领军者取代旧领军者——图形界面替代字符界面、互联网爆发式增长等等。

In the absence of a paradigm shift in technology, market shares seldom change by more than a few points. With a paradigm shift, the shares can rapidly change by dozens of points. I spent my first ten years at Microsoft building Microsoft Office. We were way behind in share most of that time (less than 10%). but the shift to graphical user interface was the paradigm shift that allowed us to displace the old leaders (Lotus 1-2-3 and WordPerfect) and now be at 90% share. Of course, key to this shift in share. was their failure to identify the computing paradigm shift and properly invest in it. They were the leaders and they could have chosen to cannibalize themselves. But they didn’t act fast enough and were scared that investing in the new paradigm would open the door for us – ironically it was their slow pace that opened the door.

若无技术范式转换，市场份额通常只变化几个百分点；可一旦发生范式转换，份额可能在短时间内快速变化几十个百分点。我在微软最初十年都在打造 Microsoft Office。当时我们大部分时间份额远落后（不到 10%），但向图形界面的范式转换让我们得以取代旧领导者（Lotus 1-2-3 和 WordPerfect），现今份额达 90%。造成这种份额转移的关键在于他们未能识别计算范式的变化并进行适当投资。他们本是领头羊，本可选择自我蚕食，但他们行动太慢，担心投资新范式会给我们开门——讽刺的是，正是他们的迟缓真正为我们打开了大门。

I remember one of our very first conversations in 1991. You asked me my view on what happened to IBM. I don’t remember exactly what I said. I think their addiction to the power they had in the previous generations of computing, really blindsided them from the paradigm shift of the PC and client-server computing.

我记得我们在 1991 年的一次最初对话。您询问我对 IBM 遭遇的看法。我已记不清当时具体回答。我认为他们沉溺于上一代计算所拥有的权力，这让他们对 PC 和客户端-服务器计算的范式转换视而不见。

In technology, the moats may be narrower. It is amazing how fast the Internet exploded. Or how quickly Java gained notoriety. We have some great moats, but even so, 18 months ago analyst were questioning whether we could move quickly enough. (Obviously, that turned out to be a great time’ to buy Microsoft!)

在科技领域，护城河可能更窄。互联网爆发速度惊人，Java 声名鹊起亦极迅速。我们虽拥有一些出色的护城河，但即便如此，18 个月前分析师还质疑我们是否足够敏捷。（显然，那成为了买入微软的绝佳时机！）

I am very confident about our business for the next 5 to 10 years. But I will admit it is easier to be confident about Coke’s business for the next 10 years. In short, I’ve long had this sneaking suspicion that it is not that you don’t understand this business. (In fact, BillG has probably already explained all of the above to you and I apologize for boring you with this, but it was tun and good for me to write it down.) My view is that you don’t Invest in technology or Microsoft because you see the moats as narrower; too much risk and the potential for a fast paradigm shift that would too quickly undermine your equity position.

我对未来 5-10 年我们的业务非常有信心，但我也承认，要对未来 10 年的可口可乐业务保持同样信心更容易。简而言之，我一直隐约觉得，您之所以不投资这门业务，并非因为您不了解它。（事实上，比尔·盖茨也许早已向您解释过全部内容，若我让您感到无聊，请见谅，但写下这些对我受益匪浅。）在我看来，您不投资科技或微软，是因为您认为护城河更窄；风险更大，范式可能迅速变化，过快地侵蚀您的权益。

Since Microsoft is the business I understand (i.e. I have a narrow circle of competence!) and I subscribe to your views on Investments. WelI over 90% of my net worth is tied up there. (Thanks to BillG. I’m well into the nine digit range.) I feel fine about having 90%+ tied up in Microsoft. We have a “safety net” of tax free municipal bonds so I know the family will be OK if something happens. And we don’t intend to leave much to the kids, so I’m simply building a huge pile of chits to someday turn back to society. I do wonder about the time period ten or twenty or more years down the road. If at some point then the outlook for Microsoft has changed, I hope I will have learned enough from your approach such that I will have the ability to identify new areas of intrinsic value and continue to grow the pie of chits at a high rate.

鉴于微软是我所熟悉的业务（也就是说，我的能力圈有限！），而且我认同您的投资理念，因此我超过 90% 的净资产都投在它身上。（多亏比尔·盖茨，我的身家早已迈入九位数。）我很安心把 90%+ 的财富放在微软。我们持有免税市政债券作“安全网”，因此若出现什么意外，家人也能安然无恙。我们也无意给孩子留下太多，所以我只是积累一大堆筹码，未来某天再回馈社会。我确实会思考十年、二十年或更久之后的情形。如果那时微软的前景已变，我希望我已从您的方法中学到了足够多，以便发现新的内在价值领域，并继续高效扩张筹码。

But for now, I’m heads down selling more software..

但就目前而言，我仍埋头努力多卖软件……

I’m curious as to what you think about the Lowenstein book. I’m sure it is difficult to have so much of your life spread across the pages, on the other hand; there are so many things for you to be proud of. It was great to gain an understanding of Graham’s approach, and more importantly your significant advancement of the approach. I round the arguments of the EMT (efficient market theoreticians) just laughable. They should spend a few days at Disney World so they can observe crowd theory in action. Believe me, the longest lines don’t necessarily translate into the best value! But the best part of the book was to learn more about your values, and in particular the discipline of character that leads to your success in investing. I wish there were a magic formula for teaching this to our children.

我很好奇您对洛文斯坦这本书的看法。我知道把您的人生如此铺陈在纸面上一定很不容易，但另一方面，您有太多值得骄傲的事。书中让我深入了解了格雷厄姆的方法，更重要的是看到您在这一方法上的重大拓展。我觉得“有效市场理论”学派的论点简直可笑。他们该去迪士尼乐园待几天，亲眼看看人群理论的实际演示。相信我，排队最长的项目并不一定代表最佳价值！不过这本书最精彩的，是让我更了解您的价值观，尤其是那种塑造您投资成功的品格纪律。我多希望有一套神奇的公式来教给孩子们。

This leaves me one final task for this note. I’ve done a very poor job of adequately thanking you for all the great things you’ve done for me – golf at Augusta, Seminole, the Buffett Classic, and in particular, the opportunity to listen in on great conversations and learn from you. I want you to know I’ve really appreciated your kindness. and if there is ever anything I might do to reciprocate, please let me know.

这封信还剩最后一件事。我一直没能好好感谢您为我做的一切美好事——在奥古斯塔、高松岭打高尔夫，参加 Buffett Classic，尤其是有机会聆听精彩对话并向您学习。我想让您知道，我由衷感激您的善意，若有朝一日我能回报，还请告诉我。

Thanks. Jeff Raikes

谢谢。杰夫·雷克斯

From: Sent: To: Subject:

Warren Buffett

Thursday, August 21, 1997 3:13 PM Jeff Raikes

Re: Go Huskers!

Hi, Jeff;

I have so few friends who use e-mail that I only look for it once a week or so (and usually find nothing) so excuse the slowness in responding. I am also reasonably fast at typing but poor in the accuracy department and find it easier just to plow ahead rather than correct, knowing I am always writing to those who will find a little deciphering an interesting but easy challenge.

我用电子邮件的朋友寥寥无几，所以我大约一周才查看一次（而且通常什么也收不到），因此回复迟缓还请见谅。我打字速度尚可，但准确率欠佳，与其边打边改，不如一路敲到底；反正我写信的对象总能把多花点功夫“破译”当成有趣却轻松的挑战。

I am afraid you have the Husker-Husky situation correctly handicapped. We need a miracle and it’s unlikely to happen in a stadium in which Frost will not be able to hear a word he shouts. I hope Osborne has had him working on hand signals all summer.

恐怕你对海斯克队与哈士奇队的形势判断得十分准确。我们需要奇迹，而在那座弗罗斯特连自己嘶吼都听不见的球场，奇迹恐怕难以出现。我真希望奥斯本整个夏天都让他练习手势。

Your analysis of Microsoft, why I should invest in it, and why I don’t could be more on the money. In effect the company has a royalty on a communication stream that can do nothing but grow. It’s as if you were getting paid for every gallon of water starting in a small stream but with added amounts received as tributaries turned the stream into an Amazon. The toughest question is how hard to push prices and I wrote a note to Bill on that after our December meeting last year. Bell should have anticipated Bill and let someone else put in the phone infrastructure while he collected by the minute and distance (and even importance of 1-hr call he could have figured a way to monitor it) in perpetuity.

你对微软的分析——我为何该投资、又为何没有投资——再贴切不过。实际上，微软对一条只会壮大的信息流收取版税。就像从一条小溪的每加仑水开始收费，而支流汇入后，那条小溪最终变成亚马逊。最棘手的问题是价格能推到多高；去年十二月会议后我还就此给比尔写过一张便条。贝尔当初若能料到比尔的做法，就该让别人铺设电话基础设施，自己按通话时长、距离（甚至一小时电话的重要性——他肯定能想出监测办法）永续收费。

微软搞了Windows，Google赚了最多的钱，苹果搞了App Store，腾讯、Meta赚了很多钱，相似的场景一遍遍重复，借助陌生人的力量，陌生人也会发展自己的力量，护城河应该是封闭的，Windows和App Store恰恰不是封闭的。

Coke is now getting a royalty on swallows; probably 7.2 billion a day. If this average gulp is one ounce. I feel 100 % sure (perhaps mistakenly) that I know the odds of this continuing—again 100 % as long as cola doesn’t cause cancer. Bill has an even better royalty—one which I would never bet against but I don’t feel I am capable of assessing probabilities about, except to the extent that with a gun to my head and forced to make a guess, I would go with it rather than against. But to calibrate whether my certainty is 80 % or 55 %, say, for a 20-year run would be folly. If I had to make such decisions, I would do my best but I prefer to structure investing as a no-called-strikes game and just wait for the fat one.

可口可乐现在对“吞咽”收取版税——大约每天72亿次。如果平均每口一盎司，我百分之百确定（也许是错觉）这种局面会持续下去——只要可乐不会致癌，概率依旧是百分之百。比尔的版税更胜一筹——我永远不会押注它会失败，但若要我评估其中概率，我自觉做不到；如果被架着枪逼着猜，我宁愿押正面而非反面。但要精确校准我究竟有80%还是55%的把握，并据此下注20年，那就是愚蠢。若真得做这种决定，我会尽力而为，但我更愿把投资当作“没有被三振”的比赛，耐心等那颗大好的球。

I watched Ted Williams on cable the other day and he referred to a book called *The Science of Hitting* which I then ran down. It has a drawing of the batter’s box in it that he had referred to on the show with lots of little squares in it, all parts of the strike zone. In his favourite spot, the box showed .400 reflecting what he felt he would hit if he only swung at pitches in that area. Low and outside, but still in the strike zone, he got down to .260. Of course, if he had two strikes on him, he was going to swing at that .260 pitch but otherwise he waited for one in the “happy zone” as he put it. I think the same approach makes sense in investing.

前几天我在有线电视上看到了泰德·威廉斯的节目，他提到一本叫《击球的科学》的书，我随后去找来看。书里画了一个击球区示意图，正是他在节目里提到的，划分了许多小方格，对应好球带的各个部位。在他最喜欢的区域，标示的是.400，表示如果他只挥击落到该区域的球，他打击率可达.400。低角外角，但仍在好球带内的区域，他只能打到.260。当然，如果已经两好球，他也会挥那颗.260的球，否则他就等落到所谓“快乐区”的球。我认为投资同样适用这种方法。

Your happy zone, because of the business experience you have had, what you see every day, your natural talents, etc. is going to be different than mine. I am sure, moreover, that you can hit balls better in my happy zone than I can in yours just because they are fatter pitches in general.

你的“快乐区”因为你的商业经验、每日所见以及天赋等，与我的必然不同。而且我确信，你在我的快乐区里击球的水平也会胜过我在你的区里表现，因为那里的球普遍更“肥”。

Lets talk more about this when we get together. As a beginner, I always feel that when I send off any e-mail, it is going to vanish into the ether, and I would hate to have that happen with everything I know. GO HUSKERS—warren

等我们见面时再详谈吧。作为电邮初学者，我总觉得每次点发送，邮件都会消失在以太中——若我所有所知也如此蒸发，那就太糟了。冲吧，海斯克！——沃伦

1997-08-17 Warren Buffett and Jeff Raikes discuss Microsoft investment

1997-08-17 Warren Buffett and Jeff Raikes discuss Microsoft investment

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