2003-02-21 Warren Buffett's Letters to Berkshire Shareholders
To the Shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.:
Our gain in net worth during 2002 was $6.1 billion, which increased the per-share book value of both our Class A and Class B stock by 10.0%. Over the last 38 years (that is, since present management took over) per-share book value has grown from $19 to $41,727, a rate of 22.2% compounded annually.∗
我们在 2002 年的净资产增加了 61 亿美元，使得 A 类股与 B 类股的每股账面价值均增长了 10.0%。在过去 38 年（即现任管理层接手以来），每股账面价值从 19 美元增长到 41,727 美元，年复合增长率为 22.2%。∗
∗All figures used in this report apply to Berkshire's A shares, the successor to the only stock that the company had outstanding before 1996. The B shares have an economic interest equal to 1/30th that of the A.
本报告所用的所有数据均以 Berkshire 的 A 类股为准；A 类股是 1996 年之前公司唯一流通的股票的继承者。B 类股所对应的经济权益等于 A 类股的 1/30。
In all respects 2002 was a banner year. I’ll provide details later, but here’s a summary:
2002 年在各个方面都是一个“丰收年”。我稍后会提供细节，但先给出一个摘要：
- Our various non-insurance operations performed exceptionally well, despite a sluggish economy. A decade ago Berkshire’s annual pre-tax earnings from our non-insurance businesses was $272 million. Now, from our ever-expanding collection of manufacturing, retailing, service and finance businesses, we earn that sum monthly.
尽管经济疲软，我们的各类非保险业务表现极其出色。十年前，Berkshire 的非保险业务税前利润一年只有 2.72 亿美元。如今，我们不断扩张的制造、零售、服务与金融业务组合，每个月就能赚到同样的金额。
- Our insurance group increased its float to $41.2 billion, a hefty gain of $5.7 billion. Better yet, the use of these funds in 2002 cost us only 1%. Getting back to low-cost float feels good, particularly after our poor results during the three previous years. Berkshire’s reinsurance division and GEICO shot the lights out in 2002, and underwriting discipline was restored at General Re. *
我们的保险集团将 float 增加到 412 亿美元，增长了 57 亿美元，幅度很可观。更重要的是，2002 年我们使用这些资金的成本只有 1%。在此前三年表现糟糕之后，重新回到低成本 float 的感觉很好。2002 年，Berkshire 的再保险部门与 GEICO 表现爆棚，而 General Re 的承保纪律也得以恢复。
- Berkshire acquired some important new businesses — with economic characteristics ranging from good to great, run by managers ranging from great to great. Those attributes are two legs of our “entrance” strategy, the third being a sensible purchase price. Unlike LBO operators and private equity firms, we have no “exit” strategy — we buy to keep. That’s one reason why Berkshire is usually the first — and sometimes the only — choice for sellers and their managers.
Berkshire 收购了一些重要的新业务——这些业务的经济特性从“不错”到“极佳”不等，由一群从“很棒”到“极其出色”的经理人运营。这些特质构成了我们“入场（entrance）”策略的两条腿，第三条腿是一个理性的收购价格。与 LBO 操作者和私募股权公司不同，我们没有“退出（exit）”策略——我们买下就是为了长期持有。这也是为什么 Berkshire 通常会成为卖方及其管理团队的第一选择——有时甚至是唯一选择。
- Our marketable securities outperformed most indices. For Lou Simpson, who manages equities at GEICO, this was old stuff. But, for me, it was a welcome change from the last few years, during which my investment record was dismal.
我们的可交易证券（marketable securities）跑赢了大多数指数。对管理 GEICO 股票投资的 Lou Simpson 来说，这不过是“家常便饭”。但对我而言，这是一个可喜的变化——因为在此前几年里，我的投资记录相当糟糕。
The confluence of these favorable factors in 2002 caused our book-value gain to outstrip the performance of the S&P 500 by 32.1 percentage points. This result is aberrational: Charlie Munger, Berkshire’s vice chairman and my partner, and I hope to achieve — at most — an average annual advantage of a few points. In the future, there will be years in which the S&P soundly trounces us. That will in fact almost certainly happen during a strong bull market, because the portion of our assets committed to common stocks has significantly declined. This change, of course, helps our relative performance in down markets such as we had in 2002.
2002 年这些有利因素叠加在一起，使我们的账面价值增幅比标普 500 高出 32.1 个百分点。但这个结果并不具有常态意义：我和 Charlie Munger（Berkshire 副董事长、我的合伙人）希望做到的——充其量——也只是长期平均每年领先几个百分点。未来会有一些年份，我们会被标普“狠狠干趴”。而这几乎肯定会发生在强劲牛市中，因为我们配置在普通股上的资产比例已经显著下降。当然，这种变化会在熊市（比如 2002 年）里帮助我们相对表现更好。
I have another caveat to mention about last year’s results. If you’ve been a reader of financial reports in recent years, you’ve seen a flood of “pro-forma” earnings statements — tabulations in which managers invariably show “earnings” far in excess of those allowed by their auditors. In these presentations, the CEO tells his owners “don’t count this, don’t count that — just count what makes earnings fat.” Often, a forget-all-this-bad-stuff message is delivered year after year without management so much as blushing.
关于去年的结果，我还要补充一个保留意见。近些年如果你读过财务报告，会看到大量“pro-forma（备考）”收益表——管理层在这些表里展示的“收益”总是远高于审计师允许确认的收益。在这种展示里，CEO 会对股东说：“这个别算，那个也别算——只算那些能把收益撑肥的。”而且这种“把坏东西都忘了”的信息往往年复一年地出现，管理层脸都不红一下。
We’ve yet to see a pro-forma presentation disclosing that audited earnings were somewhat high. So let’s make a little history: Last year, on a pro-forma basis, Berkshire had lower earnings than those we actually reported.
我们还从没见过哪家公司的 pro-forma 展示会披露：审计口径的收益其实“稍微高了点”。所以我们来创造一点历史：去年按 pro-forma 口径计算，Berkshire 的盈利反而低于我们实际报告的盈利。
That is true because two favorable factors aided our reported figures. First, in 2002 there was no megacatastrophe, which means that Berkshire (and other insurers as well) earned more from insurance than if losses had been normal. In years when the reverse is true — because of a blockbuster hurricane, earthquake or man-made disaster — many insurers like to report that they would have earned X “except for” the unusual event. The implication is that since such megacats are infrequent, they shouldn’t be counted when “true” earnings are calculated. That is deceptive nonsense. “Except for” losses will forever be part of the insurance business, and they will forever be paid with shareholders’ money.
之所以如此，是因为有两个有利因素帮助了我们报告的数字。第一，2002 年没有出现“超级巨灾（megacatastrophe）”，这意味着 Berkshire（以及其他保险公司）从保险业务中赚到的利润，会比“损失处于正常水平”时更高。在相反的年份——比如遇到破纪录的飓风、地震或人为灾难——很多保险公司喜欢说：如果不是那次特殊事件，他们本来可以赚到 X。其暗示是：既然这种巨灾不常发生，那么在计算“真实”盈利时就不该把它算进去。那是骗人的胡扯。“如果不是……”式的损失，永远都是保险业的一部分；而且它们永远会用股东的钱来支付。
Nonetheless, for the purposes of this exercise, we’ll take a page from the industry’s book. For last year, when we didn’t have any truly major disasters, a downward adjustment is appropriate if you wish to “normalize” our underwriting result.
不过，为了完成这个练习，我们就借用一下行业的玩法。对于去年这种“确实没有重大灾难”的年份，如果你想把我们的承保结果“标准化”，做一个向下调整是合适的。
Secondly, the bond market in 2002 favored certain strategies we employed in our finance and financial products business. Gains from those strategies will certainly diminish within a year or two — and may well disappear.
第二，2002 年的债券市场环境，有利于我们在金融及金融产品业务中采用的某些策略。来自这些策略的收益，肯定会在一两年内下降——甚至很可能消失。
Soooo . . . “except for” a couple of favorable breaks, our pre-tax earnings last year would have been about $500 million less than we actually reported. We’re happy, nevertheless, to bank the excess. As Jack Benny once said upon receiving an award: “I don’t deserve this honor — but, then, I have arthritis, and I don’t deserve that either.”
所以……如果把这两次“走运”的因素剔除，我们去年税前利润大概会比实际报告少 5 亿美元。尽管如此，我们还是很高兴把这多出来的收益“存进银行”。正如 Jack Benny 曾在领奖时说过：“我不配得到这份荣誉——不过，我也有关节炎，而那我同样不配得。”
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We continue to be blessed with an extraordinary group of managers, many of whom haven’t the slightest financial need to work. They stick around, though: In 38 years, we’ve never had a single CEO of a subsidiary elect to leave Berkshire to work elsewhere. Counting Charlie, we now have six managers over 75, and I hope that in four years that number increases by at least two (Bob Shaw and I are both 72). Our rationale: “It’s hard to teach a new dog old tricks.”
我们依然“有福气”，拥有一群非同寻常的经理人，其中很多人从财务角度看根本不需要工作。但他们还是留在这里：38 年里，我们没有任何一家子公司的 CEO 选择离开 Berkshire 去别处工作。算上 Charlie，我们现在有 6 位经理人超过 75 岁；我希望四年后这个数字至少再增加两位（Bob Shaw 和我都 72 岁）。我们的理由是：“很难教一只新狗学会老把戏。”
Berkshire’s operating CEOs are masters of their crafts and run their businesses as if they were their own. My job is to stay out of their way and allocate whatever excess capital their businesses generate. It’s easy work.
Berkshire 的经营型 CEO 们都是各自领域的大师，并且像经营自己的公司一样在经营业务。我的工作就是别挡他们的路，并把他们的业务产生的多余资本进行配置。很轻松的活。
My managerial model is Eddie Bennett, who was a batboy. In 1919, at age 19, Eddie began his work with the Chicago White Sox, who that year went to the World Series. The next year, Eddie switched to the Brooklyn Dodgers, and they, too, won their league title. Our hero, however, smelled trouble. Changing boroughs, he joined the Yankees in 1921, and they promptly won their first pennant in history. Now Eddie settled in, shrewdly seeing what was coming. In the next seven years, the Yankees won five American League titles.
我心目中的管理楷模是 Eddie Bennett——他是个“捡球童/球棒童（batboy）”。1919 年，19 岁的 Eddie 开始在 Chicago White Sox 工作，那一年球队打进了 World Series。第二年，Eddie 转去 Brooklyn Dodgers，他们也拿了联盟冠军。但我们的英雄嗅到了麻烦。换个区，他在 1921 年加入 Yankees，而 Yankees 立刻赢得了队史第一面联盟冠军旗（pennant）。Eddie 这下安顿下来——他精明地看到了未来。接下来的 7 年里，Yankees 拿了 5 次 American League 冠军。
What does this have to do with management? It’s simple — to be a winner, work with winners. In 1927, for example, Eddie received $700 for the 1/8th World Series share voted him by the legendary Yankee team of Ruth and Gehrig. This sum, which Eddie earned by working only four days (because New York swept the Series) was roughly equal to the full-year pay then earned by batboys who worked with ordinary associates.
这跟管理有什么关系？很简单——想当赢家，就跟赢家一起干。比如 1927 年，传奇的 Yankee 队（Ruth 和 Gehrig 所在那支）投票给 Eddie 一个 1/8 的 World Series 分成份额，他拿到了 700 美元。这笔钱，Eddie 只工作了四天就赚到（因为 New York 横扫了系列赛），差不多相当于当时那些跟“普通队友”干活的 batboy 全年的工资。
Eddie understood that how he lugged bats was unimportant; what counted instead was hooking up with the cream of those on the playing field. I’ve learned from Eddie. At Berkshire, I regularly hand bats to many of the heaviest hitters in American business.
Eddie 明白：他怎么搬球棒并不重要；真正重要的是跟球场上那群最强的人“绑在一起”。我从 Eddie 身上学到这一点。在 Berkshire，我经常把球棒递给美国商界里最能打的那一批重炮手。
Acquisitions
收购
We added some sluggers to our lineup last year. Two acquisitions pending at yearend 2001 were completed: Albecca (which operates under the name Larson-Juhl), the U.S. leader in custom-made picture frames; and Fruit of the Loom, the producer of about 33.3% of the men’s and boy’s underwear sold in the U.S. and of other apparel as well.
去年我们在阵容里又加了几位“重炮手”。有两项在 2001 年年末仍待完成的收购已于去年完成：Albecca（以 Larson-Juhl 的名称运营），美国定制画框的行业领导者；以及 Fruit of the Loom——其生产的男士与男童内衣约占美国销量的 33.3%，同时也生产其他服装产品。
Both companies came with outstanding CEOs: Steve McKenzie at Albecca and John Holland at Fruit. John, who had retired from Fruit in 1996, rejoined it three years ago and rescued the company from the disastrous path it had gone down after he’d left. He’s now 70, and I am trying to convince him to make his next retirement coincident with mine (presently scheduled for five years after my death — a date subject, however, to extension).
两家公司都配了出色的 CEO：Albecca 的 Steve McKenzie，以及 Fruit 的 John Holland。John 在 1996 年从 Fruit 退休，三年前又回归，并把公司从他离开后所走上的灾难性道路上拉了回来。他现在 70 岁，而我正试图说服他把下一次退休安排得跟我同步（我目前的退休计划是在我去世五年后——当然，这个日期也可能延长）。
We initiated and completed two other acquisitions last year that were somewhat below our normal size threshold. In aggregate, however, these businesses earn more than $60 million pre-tax annually. Both operate in industries characterized by tough economics, but both also have important competitive strengths that enable them to earn decent returns on capital.
我们去年还发起并完成了另外两项收购，规模略低于我们通常的门槛。但合计来看，这些业务每年税前盈利超过 6,000 万美元。它们所在的行业经济性都很“硬”，但也都拥有重要的竞争优势，使得它们能获得还不错的资本回报。
The newcomers are:
新加入的是：
(a) CTB, a worldwide leader in equipment for the poultry, hog, egg production and grain industries; and
CTB：家禽、猪、蛋品生产以及谷物行业设备领域的全球领导者；以及
(b) Garan, a manufacturer of children’s apparel, whose largest and best-known line is Garanimals®.
Garan：一家童装制造商，其最大、最知名的产品线是 Garanimals®。
These two companies came with the managers responsible for their impressive records: Vic Mancinelli at CTB and Seymour Lichtenstein at Garan.
这两家公司也带来了推动其耀眼成绩的管理者：CTB 的 Vic Mancinelli，以及 Garan 的 Seymour Lichtenstein。
The largest acquisition we initiated in 2002 was The Pampered Chef, a company with a fascinating history dating back to 1980. Doris Christopher was then a 34-year-old suburban Chicago home economics teacher with a husband, two little girls, and absolutely no business background. Wanting, however, to supplement her family’s modest income, she turned to thinking about what she knew best — food preparation. Why not, she wondered, make a business out of marketing kitchenware, focusing on the items she herself had found most useful?
2002 年我们启动的最大一笔收购是 The Pampered Chef（TPC）。这家公司有一段很有意思的历史，可以追溯到 1980 年。当时，Doris Christopher 是芝加哥郊区的一名 34 岁家政学教师：有丈夫、两个年幼的女儿，而且完全没有商业背景。不过，她想给家庭那份并不宽裕的收入做些补充，于是开始琢磨自己最懂的东西——食物准备。她想：为什么不把“卖厨房用品”做成一门生意呢？重点推那些她自己觉得最好用的工具。
To get started, Doris borrowed $3,000 against her life insurance policy — all the money ever injected into the company — and went to the Merchandise Mart on a buying expedition. There, she picked up a dozen each of this and that, and then went home to set up operations in her basement.
为了起步，Doris 用自己的寿险保单做抵押借了 3,000 美元——这也是这家公司历史上唯一一次注入的外部资金——然后去 Merchandise Mart 进货。在那里，她每样挑一打、每样拿一点，买完就回家，把地下室当作运营基地。
Her plan was to conduct in-home presentations to small groups of women, gathered at the homes of their friends. While driving to her first presentation, though, Doris almost talked herself into returning home, convinced she was doomed to fail.
她的计划是：在顾客家里给一小群女性做产品演示——这些女性由她们朋友邀请，聚在朋友家里。可是在开车去第一次演示的路上，Doris 几乎说服自己掉头回家，认定自己注定会失败。
But the women she faced that evening loved her and her products, purchased $175 of goods, and TPC was underway. Working with her husband, Jay, Doris did $50,000 of business in the first year. Today — only 22 years later — TPC does more than $700 million of business annually, working through 67,000 kitchen consultants.
但那天晚上的女性观众喜欢她，也喜欢她的产品，当场买了 175 美元的货，TPC 就此启动。Doris 和丈夫 Jay 一起干，第一年就做到了 50,000 美元的生意。今天——仅仅 22 年之后——TPC 年销售额已经超过 7 亿美元，通过 67,000 名“厨房顾问（kitchen consultants）”开展业务。
I’ve been to a TPC party, and it’s easy to see why the business is a success. The company’s products, in large part proprietary, are well-styled and highly useful, and the consultants are knowledgeable and enthusiastic. Everyone has a good time. Hurry to pamperedchef.com on the Internet to find where to attend a party near you.
我参加过一次 TPC 的聚会（party），很容易看出这门生意为什么能成功。TPC 的产品在很大程度上是自有（proprietary）的，设计美观、非常实用；顾问们专业、热情。大家都玩得很开心。赶紧上网去 pamperedchef.com，看看你附近哪里可以参加聚会。
Two years ago, Doris brought in Sheila O’Connell Cooper, now CEO, to share the management load, and in August they met with me in Omaha. It took me about ten seconds to decide that these were two managers with whom I wished to partner, and we promptly made a deal. Berkshire shareholders couldn’t be luckier than to be associated with Doris and Sheila.
两年前，Doris 请来了 Sheila O’Connell Cooper（现任 CEO）来分担管理工作。8 月，她们在 Omaha 跟我见面。我大概花了 10 秒钟就决定：这是两位我愿意与之长期合作的经理人，我们随即达成交易。Berkshire 的股东能与 Doris 和 Sheila 结缘，真是再幸运不过。
最有可能的解释是巴菲特喜欢跟住房有关的商业模式，前面已经家具、地毯、砖头、保温材料，等等。我是从割草机想到以地毯为主营业务的Shaw，2001年收购的，交易额21亿美元，当时的净利润2.92亿美元，销售额近50亿美元，非常低的价格，20年后，这个企业的销售额成长的不怎么样但利润增长非常好，2005年披露的数据是4.85亿，当年投入的钱应该早就赚回了。
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Berkshire also made some important acquisitions last year through MidAmerican Energy Holdings (MEHC), a company in which our equity interest is 80.2%. Because the Public Utility Holding Company Act (PUHCA) limits us to 9.9% voting control, however, we are unable to fully consolidate MEHC’s financial statements.
Berkshire 去年还通过 MidAmerican Energy Holdings（MEHC）完成了几笔重要收购；我们在这家公司中的股权权益为 80.2%。但由于《Public Utility Holding Company Act（PUHCA）》将我们的表决权控制限制在 9.9%，我们无法将 MEHC 的财务报表进行完全并表。
Despite the voting-control limitation — and the somewhat strange capital structure at MEHC it has engendered — the company is a key part of Berkshire. Already it has $18 billion of assets and delivers our largest stream of non-insurance earnings. It could well grow to be huge.
尽管表决权受限——以及这种限制在 MEHC 造成的某种“有点怪”的资本结构——这家公司仍然是 Berkshire 的关键组成部分。它目前已经拥有 180 亿美元资产，并贡献了我们非保险业务中最大的一条利润来源。它很可能会成长为一家体量巨大的企业。
Last year MEHC acquired two important gas pipelines. The first, Kern River, extends from Southwest Wyoming to Southern California. This line moves about 900 million cubic feet of gas a day and is undergoing a $1.2 billion expansion that will double throughput by this fall. At that point, the line will carry enough gas to generate electricity for ten million homes.
去年，MEHC 收购了两条重要的天然气管道。第一条是 Kern River，从怀俄明州西南部延伸到南加州。这条管线每天输送约 9 亿立方英尺天然气，并正在进行一项 12 亿美元的扩建工程，计划在今年秋天把输送能力翻倍。届时，该管线的输气量足以支持为 1,000 万户家庭发电所需的燃气供应。
The second acquisition, Northern Natural Gas, is a 16,600 mile line extending from the Southwest to a wide range of Midwestern locations. This purchase completes a corporate odyssey of particular interest to Omahans.
第二笔收购是 Northern Natural Gas：一条长达 16,600 英里的管线，从美国西南部延伸到中西部许多地区。这笔收购完成了一段对 Omaha 人而言颇有意味的“公司漂流记”。
From its beginnings in the 1930s, Northern Natural was one of Omaha’s premier businesses, run by CEOs who regularly distinguished themselves as community leaders. Then, in July, 1985, the company — which in 1980 had been renamed InterNorth — merged with Houston Natural Gas, a business less than half its size. The companies announced that the enlarged operation would be headquartered in Omaha, with InterNorth’s CEO continuing in that job.
从 1930 年代起，Northern Natural 就是 Omaha 的头部企业之一，其 CEO 们常常在社区领袖角色上表现突出。随后在 1985 年 7 月，这家公司（它在 1980 年已改名为 InterNorth）与 Houston Natural Gas 合并——后者规模还不到它的一半。两家公司宣布，合并后的总部将设在 Omaha，同时 InterNorth 的 CEO 继续担任这一职位。
Within a year, those promises were broken. By then, the former CEO of Houston Natural had taken over the top job at InterNorth, the company had been renamed, and the headquarters had been moved to Houston. These switches were orchestrated by the new CEO — Ken Lay — and the name he chose was Enron.
但不到一年，这些承诺就被打破：Houston Natural Gas 的前 CEO 接管了 InterNorth 的最高职位；公司被重新命名；总部也迁到了 Houston。这些“调包”由新 CEO——Ken Lay——一手操盘，而他选定的新名字是 Enron。
Fast forward 15 years to late 2001. Enron ran into the troubles we’ve heard so much about and borrowed money from Dynegy, putting up the Northern Natural pipeline operation as collateral. The two companies quickly had a falling out, and the pipeline’s ownership moved to Dynegy. That company, in turn, soon encountered severe financial problems of its own.
时间快进 15 年，来到 2001 年末。Enron 陷入了我们后来听到太多的麻烦，于是向 Dynegy 借钱，并把 Northern Natural 的管道业务作为抵押品。两家公司很快闹翻，管道业务的所有权转到了 Dynegy。紧接着，Dynegy 自己也很快遭遇了严重的财务问题。
MEHC received a call on Friday, July 26, from Dynegy, which was looking for a quick and certain cash sale of the pipeline. Dynegy phoned the right party: On July 29, we signed a contract, and shortly thereafter Northern Natural returned home.
MEHC 在 7 月 26 日（周五）接到 Dynegy 的电话；Dynegy 想要快速、确定地把这条管道以现金卖掉。它打对了电话：7 月 29 日我们就签了合同，不久之后 Northern Natural 便“回家”了。
When 2001 began, Charlie and I had no idea that Berkshire would be moving into the pipeline business. But upon completion of the Kern River expansion, MEHC will transport about 8% of all gas used in the U.S. We continue to look for large energy-related assets, though in the electric utility field PUHCA constrains what we can do.
2001 年开始时，Charlie 和我完全没想到 Berkshire 会进入管道业务。但当 Kern River 的扩建完成后，MEHC 将运输美国约 8% 的天然气使用量。我们仍在寻找大型能源相关资产，不过在电力公用事业领域，PUHCA 会约束我们能做的事情。
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A few years ago, and somewhat by accident, MEHC found itself in the residential real estate brokerage business. It is no accident, however, that we have dramatically expanded the operation. Moreover, we are likely to keep on expanding in the future.
几年前，某种程度上算是“无心插柳”，MEHC 意外进入了住宅房地产经纪业务。但我们后来大幅扩张这项业务，绝不是偶然。而且，未来我们很可能还会继续扩张。
铁路/能源，住房/汽车，保险，这些业务都有非常长的经济前景。
We call this business HomeServices of America. In the various communities it serves, though, it operates under the names of the businesses it has acquired, such as CBS in Omaha, Edina Realty in Minneapolis and Iowa Realty in Des Moines. In most metropolitan areas in which we operate, we are the clear market leader.
我们把这门生意称为 HomeServices of America。不过在它所服务的各个社区里，它通常沿用所收购企业的本地品牌来运营，比如 Omaha 的 CBS、Minneapolis 的 Edina Realty，以及 Des Moines 的 Iowa Realty。在我们开展业务的大多数大都市圈里，我们都是明确的市场领导者。
HomeServices is now the second largest residential brokerage business in the country. On one side or the other (or both), we participated in $37 billion of transactions last year, up 100% from 2001.
HomeServices 现在是全美第二大的住宅经纪业务。去年我们在交易中站在买方或卖方（或两边都参与），合计参与了 370 亿美元的交易额，较 2001 年增长 100%。
Most of our growth came from three acquisitions we made during 2002, the largest of which was Prudential California Realty. Last year, this company, the leading realtor in a territory consisting of Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego Counties, participated in $16 billion of closings.
我们增长的大部分来自 2002 年完成的三笔收购，其中最大的一笔是 Prudential California Realty。去年，这家公司作为覆盖 Los Angeles、Orange 和 San Diego Counties 这一片区域的头部经纪商，参与完成了 160 亿美元的成交。
In a very short period, Ron Peltier, the company’s CEO, has increased HomeServices’ revenues — and profits — dramatically. Though this business will always be cyclical, it’s one we like and in which we continue to have an appetite for sensible acquisitions.
在很短时间里，该公司的 CEO Ron Peltier 大幅提升了 HomeServices 的营收——以及利润。尽管这门生意永远带有周期性，但它是我们喜欢的业务之一；只要收购价格合理、逻辑清楚，我们仍然会对收购保持“胃口”。
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Dave Sokol, MEHC’s CEO, and Greg Abel, his key associate, are huge assets for Berkshire. They are dealmakers, and they are managers. Berkshire stands ready to inject massive amounts of money into MEHC — and it will be fun to watch how far Dave and Greg can take the business.
MEHC 的 CEO Dave Sokol，以及他的关键搭档 Greg Abel，都是 Berkshire 的巨大资产。他们既能做交易，也能管业务。Berkshire 随时准备向 MEHC 注入巨额资金——而看着 Dave 和 Greg 能把这门生意带到多远，会是一件很有意思的事。
The Economics of Property/Casualty Insurance
财产/意外险（Property/Casualty，P/C）保险的经济学
Our core business — though we have others of great importance — is insurance. To understand Berkshire, therefore, it is necessary that you understand how to evaluate an insurance company. The key determinants are: (1) the amount of float that the business generates; (2) its cost; and (3) most critical of all, the long-term outlook for both of these factors.
我们的核心业务——尽管我们还有其他同样非常重要的业务——是保险。因此，要理解 Berkshire，你就必须懂得如何评估一家保险公司。关键决定因素是：（1）这门生意产生多少 float；（2）float 的成本；以及（3）最关键的——这两项因素的长期前景。
To begin with, float is money we hold but don't own. In an insurance operation, float arises because premiums are received before losses are paid, an interval that sometimes extends over many years. During that time, the insurer invests the money. This pleasant activity typically carries with it a downside: The premiums that an insurer takes in usually do not cover the losses and expenses it eventually must pay. That leaves it running an “underwriting loss,” which is the cost of float. An insurance business has value if its cost of float over time is less than the cost the company would otherwise incur to obtain funds. But the business is a lemon if its cost of float is higher than market rates for money. Moreover, the downward trend of interest rates in recent years has transformed underwriting losses that formerly were tolerable into burdens that move insurance businesses deeply into the lemon category.
首先，float 是我们“持有但并不拥有”的钱。在保险业务中，float 的产生源于这样一个事实：保费先收进来，而赔付在后面才发生；两者之间的间隔有时会长达多年。在这段时间里，保险公司可以把这笔钱拿去投资。这件事听上去很愉快，但通常也伴随着一个“阴暗面”：保险公司收进来的保费，往往不足以覆盖最终必须支付的赔款和费用。于是它就会出现“承保亏损（underwriting loss）”，而这正是 float 的成本。若一家保险业务在长期里所付出的 float 成本，低于公司通过其他方式获得资金所需付出的成本，那么这门保险业务就有价值；但如果它的 float 成本高于市场资金利率，那么这门生意就是一颗“柠檬”（lemon，指烂生意）。而且，近些年利率持续下行，使得过去尚可忍受的承保亏损，变成了沉重负担，把许多保险业务深深推入“柠檬类别”。
Historically, Berkshire has obtained its float at a very low cost. Indeed, our cost has been less than zero in many years; that is, we’ve actually been paid for holding other people’s money. In 2001, however, our cost was terrible, coming in at 12.8%, about half of which was attributable to World Trade Center losses. Back in 1983-84, we had years that were even worse. There’s nothing automatic about cheap float.
从历史上看，Berkshire 获得 float 的成本一直非常低。事实上，在很多年份里，我们的成本甚至低于零——也就是说，我们持有别人的钱，反而还拿到了报酬。但在 2001 年，我们的 float 成本糟糕透顶，达到 12.8%；其中大约一半源自 World Trade Center 的损失。早在 1983-84 年，我们曾经历过更糟的年份。低成本 float 从来都不是“自动发生”的。
The table that follows shows (at intervals) the float generated by the various segments of Berkshire’s insurance operations since we entered the business 36 years ago upon acquiring National Indemnity Company (whose traditional lines are included in the segment “Other Primary”). For the table we have calculated our float — which we generate in large amounts relative to our premium volume — by adding net loss reserves, loss adjustment reserves, funds held under reinsurance assumed and unearned premium reserves, and then subtracting insurance-related receivables, prepaid acquisition costs, prepaid taxes and deferred charges applicable to assumed reinsurance. (Got that?)
下面这张表（按时间间隔展示）列出了自我们 36 年前通过收购 National Indemnity Company（其传统业务线被归入 “Other Primary” 分部）进入保险业以来，Berkshire 各个保险业务板块所产生的 float。表中我们对 float 的计算方法是：把净赔付准备金（net loss reserves）、赔付调整准备金（loss adjustment reserves）、分入再保险项下持有资金（funds held under reinsurance assumed）以及未赚保费准备金（unearned premium reserves）相加，然后再减去与保险相关的应收款（insurance-related receivables）、预付获取成本（prepaid acquisition costs）、预付税款（prepaid taxes）以及适用于分入再保险的递延费用（deferred charges applicable to assumed reinsurance）。（都明白了吗？）
Last year our cost of float was 1%. As I mentioned earlier, you should temper your enthusiasm about this favorable result given that no megacatastrophe occurred in 2002. We’re certain to get one of these disasters periodically, and when we do our float-cost will spike.
去年我们的 float 成本是 1%。正如我先前提到的，你应当对这个有利结果保持克制，因为 2002 年没有发生“超级巨灾（megacatastrophe）”。这类灾难我们肯定会周期性地遇到；一旦发生，我们的 float 成本就会飙升。
Our 2002 results were hurt by 1) a painful charge at General Re for losses that should have been recorded as costs in earlier years, and 2) a “desirable” charge we incur annually for retroactive insurance (see the next section for more about these items). These costs totaled $1.75 billion, or about 4.6% of float. Fortunately, our overall underwriting experience on 2002 business was excellent, which allowed us, even after the charges noted, to approach a no-cost result.
我们 2002 年的结果受到两项因素的伤害：1）General Re 计提了一笔令人痛苦的费用，原因是一些本该在更早年份作为成本确认的损失；2）我们每年都会为追溯性保险（retroactive insurance）计提一笔“可以接受/甚至算是好事的”费用（关于这些项目，下一节会更详细说明）。这两项成本合计 17.5 亿美元，约相当于 float 的 4.6%。幸运的是，我们 2002 年承保的整体经验非常出色，这使得即便扣除上述费用，我们仍然接近“零成本”的水平。
Absent a megacatastrophe, I expect our cost of float in 2003 to again be very low — perhaps even less than zero. In the rundown of our insurance operations that follows, you will see why I’m optimistic that, over time, our underwriting results will both surpass those achieved by the industry and deliver us investable funds at minimal cost.
如果没有超级巨灾，我预计 2003 年我们的 float 成本仍会非常低——甚至可能低于零。在接下来对我们保险业务的梳理中，你会看到为什么我乐观地认为：长期来看，我们的承保结果既会超过行业水平，也会以极低成本为我们提供可投资资金。
Insurance Operations
保险业务运营
If our insurance operations are to generate low-cost float over time, they must: (a) underwrite with unwavering discipline; (b) reserve conservatively; and (c) avoid an aggregation of exposures that would allow a supposedly “impossible” incident to threaten their solvency. All of our major insurance businesses, with one exception, have regularly met those tests.
如果我们的保险业务要在长期里持续产生低成本 float，它们必须做到：（a）承保纪律始终如一、毫不动摇；（b）准备金计提保守；（c）避免风险暴露的“聚集”，以免某个按理说“不可能”的事件会威胁到偿付能力。除一个例外之外，我们所有主要保险业务都经常满足这些测试。
The exception is General Re, and there was much to do at that company last year to get it up to snuff. I’m delighted to report that under Joe Brandon’s leadership, and with yeoman assistance by Tad Montross, enormous progress has been made on each of the fronts described.
这个例外就是 General Re。去年这家公司需要做很多工作才能把它拉回到合格水平。我很高兴地报告：在 Joe Brandon 的领导下，并在 Tad Montross 的“老黄牛式”支持之下，上述每一个方面都取得了巨大的进展。
When I agreed in 1998 to merge Berkshire with Gen Re, I thought that company stuck to the three rules I’ve enumerated. I had studied the operation for decades and had observed underwriting discipline that was consistent and reserving that was conservative. At merger time, I detected no slippage in Gen Re’s standards.
当我在 1998 年同意让 Berkshire 与 Gen Re 合并时，我以为 Gen Re 遵守我列出的三条规则。我研究这家公司已经几十年，看到它的承保纪律一贯稳定、准备金也一直保守。合并时，我没有发现 Gen Re 的标准有任何松动。
I was dead wrong. Gen Re’s culture and practices had substantially changed and unbeknownst to management — and to me — the company was grossly mispricing its current business. In addition, Gen Re had accumulated an aggregation of risks that would have been fatal had, say, terrorists detonated several large-scale nuclear bombs in an attack on the U.S. A disaster of that scope was highly improbable, of course, but it is up to insurers to limit their risks in a manner that leaves their finances rock-solid if the “impossible” happens. Indeed, had Gen Re remained independent, the World Trade Center attack alone would have threatened the company’s existence.
我错得离谱。Gen Re 的文化和做法已经发生了重大变化；而管理层——以及我——都没有意识到，公司正在严重低价承保当期业务。此外，Gen Re 还积累了一堆“聚集性风险”：如果恐怖分子在袭击美国时引爆数枚大当量核弹，这些风险的叠加足以致命。当然，这种规模的灾难极不可能发生，但保险公司的职责就是把风险限制在这样一种程度：哪怕“不可能”真的发生，财务也依然坚如磐石。事实上，如果 Gen Re 当时仍然独立，仅 World Trade Center 那次袭击就足以威胁公司的生存。
When the WTC disaster occurred, it exposed weaknesses in Gen Re’s operations that I should have detected earlier. But I was lucky: Joe and Tad were on hand, freshly endowed with increased authority and eager to rapidly correct the errors of the past. They knew what to do — and they did it.
当 World Trade Center（WTC）灾难发生时，它暴露了 Gen Re 运营中的一些弱点——这些问题本该更早被我发现。但我算是走运：Joe 和 Tad 当时就在现场，刚刚获得更多授权，并且急切地想迅速纠正过去的错误。他们知道该做什么——也确实把事情做成了。
It takes time for insurance policies to run off, however, and 2002 was well along before we managed to reduce our aggregation of nuclear, chemical and biological risk (NCB) to a tolerable level. That problem is now behind us.
不过，保险保单的“自然到期/跑完（run off）”需要时间；直到 2002 年已经过去很久，我们才设法把核、生、化风险（NCB：nuclear, chemical and biological）的聚集暴露降到可接受水平。这个问题现在已经解决了。
On another front, Gen Re’s underwriting attitude has been dramatically altered: The entire organization now understands that we wish to write only properly-priced business, whatever the effect on volume. Joe and Tad judge themselves only by Gen Re’s underwriting profitability. Size simply doesn’t count.
在另一个方面，Gen Re 的承保态度发生了戏剧性的改变：整个组织现在都明白，我们只想承保“定价正确”的业务——不管这会对业务规模造成什么影响。Joe 和 Tad 只用 Gen Re 的承保盈利能力来衡量自己。规模根本不算数。
Finally, we are making every effort to get our reserving right. If we fail at that, we can’t know our true costs. And any insurer that has no idea what its costs are is heading for big trouble.
最后，我们正竭尽全力把准备金计提做对。要是这件事失败了，我们就无法知道自己的真实成本。而任何一家根本不知道自己成本是多少的保险公司，都在朝着大麻烦狂奔。
很容易失控的地方。
At yearend 2001, General Re attempted to reserve adequately for all losses that had occurred prior to that date and were not yet paid — but we failed badly. Therefore the company’s 2002 underwriting results were penalized by an additional $1.31 billion that we recorded to correct the estimation mistakes of earlier years. When I review the reserving errors that have been uncovered at General Re, a line from a country song seems apt: “I wish I didn’t know now what I didn’t know then.”
在 2001 年年末，General Re 试图为此前已经发生但尚未支付的所有损失进行充分计提——但我们做得非常失败。因此，公司的 2002 年承保结果被额外惩罚：我们为纠正以往年度估计错误，又补记了 13.1 亿美元。当我回顾 General Re 被揭示出来的那些准备金错误时，一句乡村歌曲的歌词特别贴切：“真希望我现在不知道，当时我不知道的那些事。”
I can promise you that our top priority going forward is to avoid inadequate reserving. But I can’t guarantee success. The natural tendency of most casualty-insurance managers is to underreserve, and they must have a particular mindset — which, it may surprise you, has nothing to do with actuarial expertise — if they are to overcome this devastating bias. Additionally, a reinsurer faces far more difficulties in reserving properly than does a primary insurer. Nevertheless, at Berkshire, we have generally been successful in our reserving, and we are determined to be at General Re as well.
我可以向你保证：我们未来的首要任务就是避免准备金不足。但我不能保证一定能成功。大多数意外险管理者的“天然倾向”就是少计准备金；如果他们要克服这种毁灭性的偏差，就必须具备一种特定的心态——可能会让你惊讶——这种心态与精算专业能力毫无关系。此外，再保险公司在正确计提准备金方面的难度，要远高于原保险公司。尽管如此，在 Berkshire，我们总体上一直能把准备金计提做得不错；而我们也决心在 General Re 也做到这一点。
敢于面对现实、对于没有根据的自我解释保持警惕。
In summary, I believe General Re is now well positioned to deliver huge amounts of no-cost float to Berkshire and that its sink-the-ship catastrophe risk has been eliminated. The company still possesses the important competitive strengths that I’ve outlined in the past. And it gained another highly significant advantage last year when each of its three largest worldwide competitors, previously rated AAA, was demoted by at least one rating agency. Among the giants, General Re, rated AAA across-the-board, is now in a class by itself in respect to financial strength.
总之，我相信 General Re 现在已处在一个很好的位置：它能够为 Berkshire 提供巨量的“零成本 float”，而且那种“足以把船压沉”的灾难性风险已经被消除。公司仍然保有我过去所阐述的那些重要竞争优势。并且，去年它又获得了另一项极其关键的优势：其全球最大的三家竞争对手——此前都被评为 AAA——分别至少被一家评级机构下调了评级。于是，在这些巨头中，General Re 以“全线 AAA”的评级，在财务实力方面已经形成了独一档的地位。
No attribute is more important. Recently, in contrast, one of the world’s largest reinsurers — a company regularly recommended to primary insurers by leading brokers — has all but ceased paying claims, including those both valid and due. This company owes many billions of dollars to hundreds of primary insurers who now face massive write-offs. “Cheap” reinsurance is a fool’s bargain: When an insurer lays out money today in exchange for a reinsurer’s promise to pay a decade or two later, it’s dangerous — and possibly life-threatening — for the insurer to deal with any but the strongest reinsurer around.
没有任何属性比财务实力更重要。最近，作为对比，全球最大的再保险公司之一——一家长期被顶级经纪人推荐给原保险公司的企业——几乎已经停止赔付理赔款项，包括那些既有效又到期应付的索赔。这家公司欠了数百家原保险公司数十亿美元，而这些公司现在面临巨额核销。“便宜”的再保险，是傻瓜交易：当一家保险公司今天掏钱，换取再保险公司在十年或二十年后才兑现的支付承诺时，如果它选择的不是最强的再保险公司之一，那对这家保险公司而言就是危险的——甚至可能是致命的。
既然愿意买再保险为什么不选择最好的？最有保障的？如果真想省成本可以选择不买。
Berkshire shareholders owe Joe and Tad a huge thank you for their accomplishments in 2002. They worked harder during the year than I would wish for anyone — and it is paying off.
Berkshire 的股东应该向 Joe 和 Tad 为 2002 年取得的成果致以深深的感谢。他们这一年付出的努力之大，连我都不希望任何人承受——而这些努力正在见到回报。
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At GEICO, everything went so well in 2002 that we should pinch ourselves. Growth was substantial, profits were outstanding, policyholder retention was up and sales productivity jumped significantly. These trends continue in early 2003.
在 GEICO，2002 年一切进展得如此之好，以至于我们都该掐自己一把确认不是在做梦。增长很可观，利润极其出色，保单续保率上升，销售生产力也显著跃升。这些趋势在 2003 年初仍在延续。
Thank Tony Nicely for all of this. As anyone who knows him will attest, Tony has been in love with GEICO for 41 years — ever since he went to work for the company at 18 — and his results reflect this passion. He is proud of the money we save policyholders — about $1 billion annually versus what other insurers, on average, would have charged them. He is proud of the service we provide these policyholders: In a key industry survey, GEICO was recently ranked above all major competitors. He is proud of his 19,162 associates, who last year were awarded profit-sharing payments equal to 19% of their base salary because of the splendid results they achieved. And he is proud of the growing profits he delivers to Berkshire shareholders.
这一切都要感谢 Tony Nicely。任何认识他的人都会作证：Tony 爱 GEICO 爱了 41 年——自从他 18 岁进入公司工作起就是如此——他的业绩正是这种热情的体现。他为我们替保单持有人省下的钱而自豪——相对于其他保险公司平均会收取的保费，我们每年大约为客户节省 10 亿美元。他为我们提供的服务而自豪：在一项关键的行业调查中，GEICO 最近被评为高于所有主要竞争对手。他为 19,162 名同事（associates）而自豪：由于他们取得了极其出色的成绩，去年他们获得的利润分享（profit-sharing）支付相当于其基础工资的 19%。他也为自己不断为 Berkshire 股东带来的利润增长而自豪。
GEICO took in $2.9 billion in premiums when Berkshire acquired full ownership in 1996. Last year, its volume was $6.9 billion, with plenty of growth to come. Particularly promising is the company’s Internet operation, whose new business grew by 75% last year. Check us out at GEICO.com (or call 800-847-7536). In most states, shareholders get a special 8% discount.
Berkshire 在 1996 年收购 GEICO 的全部所有权时，GEICO 的保费收入为 29 亿美元。去年，这一规模已达到 69 亿美元，而且未来还有大量增长空间。尤其令人期待的是公司的互联网业务：去年通过互联网带来的新业务增长了 75%。欢迎访问 GEICO.com（或拨打 800-847-7536）。在大多数州，股东可以享受特别的 8% 折扣。
Here’s one footnote to GEICO’s 2002 earnings that underscores the need for insurers to do business with only the strongest of reinsurers. In 1981-1983, the managers then running GEICO decided to try their hand at writing commercial umbrella and product liability insurance. The risks seemed modest: the company took in only $3,051,000 from this line and used almost all of it — $2,979,000 — to buy reinsurance in order to limit its losses. GEICO was left with a paltry $72,000 as compensation for the minor portion of the risk that it retained. But this small bite of the apple was more than enough to make the experience memorable. GEICO’s losses from this venture now total a breathtaking $94.1 million or about 130,000% of the net premium it received. Of the total loss, uncollectable receivables from deadbeat reinsurers account for no less than $90.3 million (including $19 million charged in 2002). So much for “cheap” reinsurance.
关于 GEICO 2002 年盈利，还有一条脚注，进一步说明保险公司为什么必须只与最强的再保险公司做生意。1981-1983 年，当时负责 GEICO 的管理层决定试着承保商业伞式责任险（commercial umbrella）和产品责任险（product liability）。这些风险看上去并不大：这条业务线总共只收了 3,051,000 美元的保费，并且几乎把全部保费——2,979,000 美元——都用来购买再保险，以限制自身损失。GEICO 仅留下可怜的 72,000 美元，作为它所保留那一小部分风险的报酬。但就是这“一小口苹果”，也足以让这次经历刻骨铭心。GEICO 从这次尝试中累计产生的损失，如今高达惊人的 9,410 万美元，约等于其所收净保费的 130,000%。在这笔总损失中，由于“赖账再保险公司”造成的无法收回应收款（uncollectable receivables）不少于 9,030 万美元（其中包括 2002 年计提的 1,900 万美元）。所谓“便宜”再保险，不过如此。
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Ajit Jain’s reinsurance division was the major reason our float cost us so little last year. If we ever put a photo in a Berkshire annual report, it will be of Ajit. In color!
Ajit Jain 领导的再保险部门，是我们去年 float 成本如此之低的主要原因。如果 Berkshire 的年报里哪天要放一张照片，那一定是 Ajit 的——而且是彩色的！
Ajit’s operation has amassed $13.4 billion of float, more than all but a handful of insurers have ever built up. He accomplished this from a standing start in 1986, and even now has a workforce numbering only 20. And, most important, he has produced underwriting profits.
Ajit 的团队已经累积了 134 亿美元的 float，这一规模超过绝大多数保险公司一辈子能积累到的水平。他从 1986 年“白手起家”做到今天，而即使现在团队人数也只有 20 人。最重要的是：他做出了持续的承保盈利。
His profits are particularly remarkable if you factor in some accounting arcana that I am about to lay on you. So prepare to eat your spinach (or, alternatively, if debits and credits aren’t your thing, skip the next two paragraphs).
如果你再把我接下来要讲的一些会计“奥秘”考虑进去，他的盈利就更显得非同寻常。所以准备好吃点菠菜（或者，如果借贷记账这套不是你的菜，那就跳过接下来的两段）。
Ajit’s 2002 underwriting profit of $534 million came after his operation recognized a charge of $428 million attributable to “retroactive” insurance he has written over the years. In this line of business, we assume from another insurer the obligation to pay up to a specified amount for losses they have already incurred — often for events that took place decades earlier — but that are yet to be paid (for example, because a worker hurt in 1980 will receive monthly payments for life). In these arrangements, an insurer pays us a large upfront premium, but one that is less than the losses we expect to pay. We willingly accept this differential because a) our payments are capped, and b) we get to use the money until loss payments are actually made, with these often stretching out over a decade or more. About 80% of the $6.6 billion in asbestos and environmental loss reserves that we carry arises from capped contracts, whose costs consequently can’t skyrocket.
Ajit 在 2002 年实现的承保利润为 5.34 亿美元——这是在他的团队确认了一笔 4.28 亿美元费用之后得到的，而这笔费用来自他多年写下的“追溯性（retroactive）”保险。在这类业务里，我们从另一家保险公司那里接手一项义务：对其已经发生、但尚未支付的损失（常常对应几十年前的事件）在某个上限以内负责赔付（例如：一名在 1980 年受伤的工人，可能终身每月领取赔付）。在这种安排中，对方保险公司会一次性向我们支付一大笔预收保费，但这笔保费低于我们预计最终要支付的赔款。我们之所以愿意接受这个“差额”，是因为：a）我们的赔付是有上限（capped）的；b）在实际赔付发生之前，我们可以使用这笔钱，而赔付往往会拉长到十年甚至更久。我们所计提的 66 亿美元石棉与环境损失准备金中，大约 80% 来自这种“有上限合同”，因此其成本不可能无限飙升。
When we write a retroactive policy, we immediately record both the premium and a reserve for the expected losses. The difference between the two is entered as an asset entitled “deferred charges — reinsurance assumed.” This is no small item: at yearend, for all retroactive policies, it was $3.4 billion. We then amortize this asset downward by charges to income over the expected life of each policy. These charges — $440 million in 2002, including charges at Gen Re — create an underwriting loss, but one that is intentional and desirable. And even after this drag on reported results, Ajit achieved a large underwriting gain last year.
当我们签一份追溯性保单时，会立刻同时记录：收到的保费，以及预计损失的准备金。两者之间的差额，会作为一项资产入账，名为 “deferred charges — reinsurance assumed（递延费用—分入再保险）”。这不是小数目：在年末，所有追溯性保单合计，这项资产达到 34 亿美元。随后，我们会在每份保单的预计存续期内，通过对当期利润表计提费用的方式，把这项资产逐步摊销下去。这样的摊销费用——2002 年为 4.40 亿美元（其中包括 Gen Re 的相关费用）——会在报表上造成承保亏损，但这是“有意为之、并且是我们想要的”承保亏损。即便在这个对报告利润有拖累的因素之后，Ajit 去年仍然实现了很大的承保盈利。
We want to emphasize, however, that we assume risks in Ajit’s operation that are huge — far larger than those retained by any other insurer in the world. Therefore, a single event could cause a major swing in Ajit’s results in any given quarter or year. That bothers us not at all: As long as we are paid appropriately, we love taking on short-term volatility that others wish to shed. At Berkshire, we would rather earn a lumpy 15% over time than a smooth 12%.
但我们也要强调：Ajit 的业务承担的风险规模极其巨大——远远超过全球任何其他保险公司所保留的风险。因此，单一事件就可能在某一个季度或某一年里让 Ajit 的结果出现大幅波动。我们对此一点也不烦：只要拿到合适的价格，我们就喜欢承接别人想甩掉的短期波动。在 Berkshire，我们宁愿长期赚一个“凹凸不平的 15%”，也不要一个“平滑的 12%”。
If you see Ajit at our annual meeting, bow deeply.
如果你在年度股东大会上见到 Ajit，请深深一鞠躬。
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Berkshire’s smaller insurers had an outstanding year. Their aggregate float grew by 38%, and they realized an underwriting profit of $32 million, or 4.5% of premiums. Collectively, these operations would make one of the finest insurance companies in the country.
Berkshire 旗下规模较小的保险公司去年表现极其出色。它们合计的 float 增长了 38%，并实现了承保利润 3,200 万美元，相当于保费的 4.5%。把这些业务合在一起看，足以构成全美最优秀的保险公司之一。
Included in these figures, however, were terrible results in our California workers’ compensation operation. There, we have work to do. There, too, our reserving severely missed the mark. Until we figure out how to get this business right, we will keep it small.
但这些数字中也包含了我们加州工伤赔偿（California workers’ compensation）业务的糟糕结果。在那里，我们还有很多工作要做。在那里，我们的准备金计提也严重偏离了真实水平。在我们弄清楚如何把这门生意做对之前，我们会把它保持在很小的规模。
For the fabulous year they had in 2002, we thank Rod Eldred, John Kizer, Tom Nerney, Don Towle and Don Wurster. They added a lot of value to your Berkshire investment.
感谢 Rod Eldred、John Kizer、Tom Nerney、Don Towle 和 Don Wurster——2002 年他们交出了一份精彩的成绩单，为你的 Berkshire 投资增加了很多价值。
Sources of Reported Earnings
报告利润的来源
The table that follows shows the main sources of Berkshire’s reported earnings. You will notice that “Purchase-Accounting Adjustments” dropped sharply in 2002, the reason being that GAAP rules changed then, no longer requiring the amortization of goodwill. This change increases our reported earnings, but has no effect on our economic earnings.
下面这张表列出了 Berkshire 报告利润的主要来源。你会注意到，“Purchase-Accounting Adjustments（收购会计调整）”在 2002 年大幅下降，其原因是 GAAP 会计规则在那一年发生了变化：不再要求对 goodwill（商誉）进行摊销。这一变化会提高我们报告利润，但对我们的经济利润没有任何影响。
Here’s a summary of major developments at our non-insurance businesses:
以下是我们非保险业务在 2002 年的主要进展摘要：
• MidAmerican Energy’s earnings grew in 2002 and will likely do so again this year. Most of the increase, both present and expected, results from the acquisitions described earlier. To fund these, Berkshire purchased $1,273 million of MidAmerican junior debt (bringing our total holdings of these 11% obligations to $1,728 million) and also invested $402 million in a “common-equivalent” stock. We now own (on a fully-diluted basis) 80.2% of MidAmerican’s equity. MidAmerican’s financial statements are presented in detail on page 37.
MidAmerican Energy 的盈利在 2002 年增长，并且今年很可能还会再次增长。目前与预期的增长，大多来自前文所述的那些收购。为给这些收购提供资金，Berkshire 购买了 12.73 亿美元的 MidAmerican 次级债（使我们持有的这类 11% 债务总额达到 17.28 亿美元），并且还投入了 4.02 亿美元购买一种“等同普通股（common-equivalent）”的股票。我们现在（按完全摊薄口径 fully-diluted basis）持有 MidAmerican 80.2% 的股权。MidAmerican 的财务报表在第 37 页有详细展示。
• Last year I told you of the problems at Dexter that led to a huge loss in our shoe business. Thanks to Frank Rooney and Jim Issler of H.H. Brown, the Dexter operation has been turned around. Despite the cost of unwinding our problems there, we earned $24 million in shoes last year, an upward swing of $70 million from 2001.
去年我告诉过你 Dexter 出现的问题，导致我们制鞋业务发生了巨大亏损。多亏 H.H. Brown 的 Frank Rooney 和 Jim Issler，Dexter 的运营已经被扭转。尽管处理（unwinding）这些问题付出了成本，我们去年在鞋业仍然赚了 2,400 万美元，相比 2001 年向上改善了 7,000 万美元。
Randy Watson at Justin also contributed to this improvement, increasing margins significantly while trimming invested capital. Shoes are a tough business, but we have terrific managers and believe that in the future we will earn reasonable returns on the capital we employ in this operation.
Justin 的 Randy Watson 也对改善做出了贡献：他显著提升了毛利率，同时削减了投入资本。鞋业是一门艰难的生意，但我们拥有非常出色的经理人，并相信未来这项业务所使用的资本将获得合理回报。
• In a so-so year for home-furnishing and jewelry retailers, our operations did well. Among our eight retailing operations, the best performer was Homemaker’s in Des Moines. There, the talented Merschman family achieved outstanding gains in both sales and profits.
在家居陈设和珠宝零售商普遍表现平平的一年里，我们的业务做得很好。在我们八家零售业务中，表现最好的的是 Des Moines 的 Homemaker’s。在那里，才华横溢的 Merschman 家族在销售与利润两方面都取得了突出的增长。
Nebraska Furniture Mart will open a new blockbuster store in metropolitan Kansas City in August. With 450,000 square feet of retail space, it could well produce the second largest volume of any furniture store in the country — the Omaha operation being the national champion. I hope Berkshire shareholders in the Kansas City area will come out for the opening (and keep coming).
Nebraska Furniture Mart 将在 8 月于 Kansas City 大都会区开设一家新的“爆款店”。该店零售面积达 45 万平方英尺，它很可能成为全美销量第二大的家具门店——而 Omaha 的那家店则是全国冠军。我希望 Kansas City 地区的 Berkshire 股东能来参加开业活动（并且以后也常来）。
Our home and construction-related businesses — Acme Brick, Benjamin Moore Paint, Johns-Manville, MiTek and Shaw — delivered $941 million of pre-tax earnings last year. Of particular significance was Shaw’s gain from $292 million in 2001 to $424 million. Bob Shaw and Julian Saul are terrific operators. Carpet prices increased only 1% last year, but Shaw’s productivity gains and excellent expense control delivered significantly improved margins.
我们的家居与建筑相关业务——Acme Brick、Benjamin Moore Paint、Johns-Manville、MiTek 和 Shaw——去年合计贡献了 9.41 亿美元税前利润。其中尤为重要的是 Shaw：其利润从 2001 年的 2.92 亿美元提升到 4.24 亿美元。Bob Shaw 和 Julian Saul 是极其出色的经营者。去年地毯价格只上涨了 1%，但 Shaw 的生产率提升与卓越的费用控制，带来了显著改善的利润率。
We cherish cost-consciousness at Berkshire. Our model is the widow who went to the local newspaper to place an obituary notice. Told there was a 25-cents-a-word charge, she requested “Fred Brown died.” She was then informed there was a seven-word minimum. “Okay” the bereaved woman replied, “make it ‘Fred Brown died, golf clubs for sale’.”
我们在 Berkshire 非常珍视“成本意识”。我们的典型范例是那位寡妇：她去当地报社登讣告，被告知每个词收费 25 美分，于是她说：“Fred Brown died（弗雷德·布朗去世）。”对方告诉她至少要七个词。寡妇回答：“好吧，那就写成：‘Fred Brown died, golf clubs for sale（弗雷德·布朗去世，高尔夫球杆出售）’。”
• Earnings from flight services increased last year — but only because we realized a special pre-tax gain of $60 million from the sale of our 50% interest in FlightSafety Boeing. Without this gain, earnings from our training business would have fallen slightly in concert with the slowdown in business-aviation activity. FlightSafety training continues to be the gold standard for the industry, and we expect growth in the years to come.
我们的飞行服务业务去年盈利有所增加——但这只是因为我们出售了持有 50% 股权的 FlightSafety Boeing，确认了一笔 6,000 万美元的特殊税前收益。若没有这笔收益，我们培训业务的盈利会随着公务航空活动放缓而小幅下滑。FlightSafety 的培训仍然是行业的黄金标准（gold standard），我们预计未来几年会继续增长。
At NetJets, our fractional-ownership operation, we are the runaway leader of the four-company field. FAA records indicate that our industry share in 2002 was 75%, meaning that clients purchased or leased planes from us that were valued at triple those recorded by our three competitors combined. Last year, our fleet flew 132.7 million nautical miles, taking clients to 130 countries.
在 NetJets（我们的分时产权/共享飞机业务，fractional-ownership operation）方面，我们是四家参与者中的绝对领跑者。FAA 记录显示，2002 年我们占行业份额的 75%，这意味着客户从我们这里购买或租赁的飞机价值，相当于我们三家竞争对手合计记录的三倍。去年，我们的机队飞行了 1.327 亿海里，把客户送达 130 个国家。
Our preeminence is directly attributable to Rich Santulli, NetJets’ CEO. He invented the business in 1986 and ever since has exhibited an unbending devotion to the highest levels of service, safety and security. Rich, Charlie and I insist on planes (and personnel) worthy of carrying our own families — because they regularly do.
我们的领先地位直接归功于 NetJets 的 CEO Rich Santulli。他在 1986 年发明了这门生意，此后始终以毫不妥协的态度追求最高水平的服务、安全与安保。Rich、Charlie 和我坚持：我们的飞机（以及人员）必须配得上承载我们自己的家人——因为他们确实经常在我们的飞机上飞行。
Though NetJets revenues set a record in 2002, the company again lost money. A small profit in the U.S. was more than offset by losses in Europe. Overall, the fractional-ownership industry lost significant sums last year, and that is almost certain to be the outcome in 2003 as well. The bald fact is that airplanes are costly to operate.
尽管 NetJets 在 2002 年的营收创了纪录，公司仍然再次亏损。美国业务的小幅盈利，被欧洲业务的亏损所抵消。整体来看，分时产权行业去年亏了不少钱，而 2003 年几乎肯定也会如此。冷冰冰的事实是：飞机的运营成本非常高。
Over time, this economic reality should work to our advantage, given that for a great many companies, private aircraft are an essential business tool. And for most of these companies, NetJets makes compelling sense as either a primary or supplementary supplier of the aircraft they need.
从长远看，这一经济现实反而可能对我们有利，因为对很多公司而言，私人飞机是不可或缺的商业工具。而对其中大多数公司来说，NetJets 作为其所需飞机的主要或补充供应方，都具有很强的吸引力。
Many businesses could save millions of dollars annually by flying with us. Indeed, the yearly savings at some large companies could exceed $10 million. Equally important, these companies would actually increase their operational capabilities by using us. A fractional ownership of a single NetJets plane allows a client to have several planes in the air simultaneously. Additionally, through the interchange arrangement we make available, an owner of an interest in one plane can fly any of 12 other models, using whatever plane makes most sense for a mission. (One of my sisters owns a fraction of a Falcon 2000, which she uses for trips to Hawaii, but — exhibiting the Buffett gene — she interchanges to a more economical Citation Excel for short trips in the U.S.)
很多企业如果改用我们，每年可能省下数百万美元。事实上，一些大型企业的年度节省甚至可能超过 1,000 万美元。同样重要的是：使用我们反而会提升它们的运营能力。只要拥有一架 NetJets 飞机的一份分时产权，客户就可以在同一时间让多架飞机同时在空中飞行。此外，通过我们提供的“机型互换（interchange）”安排，拥有某一机型权益的客户可以使用另外 12 种机型中的任何一种——根据任务选择最合适的飞机。（我有个妹妹就持有 Falcon 2000 的一份产权，用来飞夏威夷；但——体现了 Buffett 基因——她在美国境内短途出行时会换成更经济的 Citation Excel。）
The roster of NetJets users confirms the advantages we offer major businesses. Take General Electric, for example. It has a large fleet of its own but also has an unsurpassed knowledge of how to utilize aircraft effectively and economically. And it is our largest customer.
NetJets 的客户名单也印证了我们为大企业提供的优势。比如 General Electric：它自己就有一支庞大的机队，同时对如何高效且经济地利用飞机拥有无可匹敌的经验。而它也是我们最大的客户。
• Our finance and financial products line covers a variety of operations, among them certain activities in high-grade fixed-income securities that proved highly profitable in 2002. Earnings in this arena will probably continue for a while, but are certain to decrease — and perhaps disappear — in time.
我们的金融与金融产品（finance and financial products）业务涵盖多种运营活动，其中包括我们在高评级固定收益证券（high-grade fixed-income securities）上的某些操作——这些操作在 2002 年带来了很高的利润。这个领域的盈利可能还会持续一段时间，但必然会下降——甚至最终可能消失。
This category also includes a highly satisfactory — but rapidly diminishing — income stream from our Berkadia investment in Finova (described in last year’s report). Our partner, Leucadia National Corp., has managed this operation with great skill, willingly doing far more than its share of the heavy lifting. I like this division of labor and hope to join with Leucadia in future transactions.
这一类别还包括我们通过 Berkadia 投资 Finova 所获得的一条令人满意——但在迅速减弱——的收益流（已在去年的报告中描述）。我们的合作伙伴 Leucadia National Corp. 非常娴熟地管理了这项业务，并且心甘情愿地承担了远超其份额的重活。我喜欢这种分工方式，也希望未来能与 Leucadia 在其他交易中继续合作。
On the minus side, the Finance line also includes the operations of General Re Securities, a derivatives and trading business. This entity lost $173 million pre-tax last year, a result that, in part, is a belated acknowledgment of faulty, albeit standard, accounting it used in earlier periods. Derivatives, in fact, deserve an extensive look, both in respect to the accounting their users employ and to the problems they may pose for both individual companies and our economy.
不利的一面是：金融业务线还包括 General Re Securities 的运营——这是一家做衍生品与交易的业务实体。该实体去年税前亏损 1.73 亿美元，其中一部分结果，是对其早期期间所采用的一种（虽然是行业标准、但有问题的）会计处理方式的迟来承认。事实上，衍生品值得我们进行一次深入审视：既要看使用者所采用的会计处理，也要看它们可能给单个公司以及整个经济带来的问题。
Derivatives
衍生品
Charlie and I are of one mind in how we feel about derivatives and the trading activities that go with them: We view them as time bombs, both for the parties that deal in them and the economic system.
Charlie 和我在对衍生品及其相关交易活动的看法上完全一致：我们认为它们是“定时炸弹”，不仅对参与交易的各方如此，对整个经济体系亦然。
Having delivered that thought, which I’ll get back to, let me retreat to explaining derivatives, though the explanation must be general because the word covers an extraordinarily wide range of financial contracts. Essentially, these instruments call for money to change hands at some future date, with the amount to be determined by one or more reference items, such as interest rates, stock prices or currency values. If, for example, you are either long or short an S&P 500 futures contract, you are a party to a very simple derivatives transaction — with your gain or loss derived from movements in the index. Derivatives contracts are of varying duration (running sometimes to 20 or more years) and their value is often tied to several variables.
把这个观点先抛出来（我后面会再展开），我先退一步解释一下什么是衍生品。不过解释只能是概念性的，因为“衍生品”这个词覆盖了极其广泛的金融合约。本质上，这类工具约定：在未来某个日期发生现金流交换，而金额由一个或多个参考变量决定，例如利率、股价或汇率。比如，如果你做多或做空一份标普 500 指数期货合约，你就参与了一笔非常简单的衍生品交易——你的盈亏来自指数的波动。衍生品合约期限长短不一（有时可达 20 年甚至更久），其价值往往还会同时绑定多个变量。
Unless derivatives contracts are collateralized or guaranteed, their ultimate value also depends on the creditworthiness of the counterparties to them. In the meantime, though, before a contract is settled, the counterparties record profits and losses — often huge in amount — in their current earnings statements without so much as a penny changing hands.
除非衍生品合约有抵押品支持或有担保，否则其最终价值还取决于交易对手的信用状况。与此同时，在合约最终结算之前，交易双方就会在当期利润表中确认盈亏——金额往往巨大——而期间甚至一分钱现金都未必真正发生过交换。
The range of derivatives contracts is limited only by the imagination of man (or sometimes, so it seems, madmen). At Enron, for example, newsprint and broadband derivatives, due to be settled many years in the future, were put on the books. Or say you want to write a contract speculating on the number of twins to be born in Nebraska in 2020. No problem — at a price, you will easily find an obliging counterparty.
衍生品合约的范围，唯一的边界就是人的想象力（有时看起来更像是疯子的想象力）。比如在 Enron，连新闻纸（newsprint）和宽带（broadband）的衍生品合约都被做出来并入账，且要在很多年后才结算。又比如你想写一份合约去赌 2020 年 Nebraska 会出生多少对双胞胎？没问题——只要价格合适，你很容易找到一个愿意对赌的对手方。
When we purchased Gen Re, it came with General Re Securities, a derivatives dealer that Charlie and I didn’t want, judging it to be dangerous. We failed in our attempts to sell the operation, however, and are now terminating it.
我们收购 Gen Re 时，也顺带带来了 General Re Securities——一家做衍生品交易的机构。Charlie 和我都不想要它，因为我们认为这东西很危险。但我们试图出售这项业务没有成功，所以现在我们正在终止它。
But closing down a derivatives business is easier said than done. It will be a great many years before we are totally out of this operation (though we reduce our exposure daily). In fact, the reinsurance and derivatives businesses are similar: Like Hell, both are easy to enter and almost impossible to exit. In either industry, once you write a contract — which may require a large payment decades later — you are usually stuck with it. True, there are methods by which the risk can be laid off with others. But most strategies of that kind leave you with residual liability.
然而，关闭一家衍生品业务，说起来容易做起来难。我们要在许多年之后才能彻底退出（虽然我们每天都在降低风险敞口）。事实上，再保险业务与衍生品业务很像：就像地狱一样，两者都很容易进去，却几乎不可能出来。在这两个行业里，一旦你签了合约——而合约可能要求你在几十年后支付一大笔钱——你通常就被套住了。确实，你可以用一些办法把风险转给别人，但大多数这样的策略都会让你仍然留下一些“尾部责任”。
Another commonality of reinsurance and derivatives is that both generate reported earnings that are often wildly overstated. That’s true because today’s earnings are in a significant way based on estimates whose inaccuracy may not be exposed for many years.
再保险与衍生品还有一个共同点：它们经常制造出“被严重高估”的报告利润。原因在于：今天的盈利在很大程度上建立在各种估计之上，而这些估计到底错得有多离谱，可能很多年后才会暴露出来。
Errors will usually be honest, reflecting only the human tendency to take an optimistic view of one’s commitments. But the parties to derivatives also have enormous incentives to cheat in accounting for them. Those who trade derivatives are usually paid (in whole or part) on “earnings” calculated by mark-to-market accounting. But often there is no real market (think about our contract involving twins) and “mark-to-model” is utilized. This substitution can bring on large-scale mischief. As a general rule, contracts involving multiple reference items and distant settlement dates increase the opportunities for counterparties to use fanciful assumptions. In the twins scenario, for example, the two parties to the contract might well use differing models allowing both to show substantial profits for many years. In extreme cases, mark-to-model degenerates into what I would call mark-to-myth.
这些错误通常是“诚实的错误”，只是反映了人类对自己承诺倾向于乐观的天性。但在衍生品这里，各方在会计处理上“作假”的激励也极其强烈。做衍生品交易的人往往（全部或部分）按“盈利”拿报酬，而这些“盈利”是按盯市（mark-to-market）口径计算的。但很多时候根本不存在真实市场（想想我们那份双胞胎合约），于是就改用“模型盯市（mark-to-model）”。这种替代会引发大规模的猫腻。一般来说，参考变量越多、结算日期越远的合约，对手方越有机会用各种天马行空的假设来做文章。比如在“双胞胎”那份合约里，两边很可能使用不同模型，从而在很多年里双方都能报出可观利润。极端情况下，mark-to-model 会退化成我称之为 “mark-to-myth（盯神话计价）”。
Of course, both internal and outside auditors review the numbers, but that’s no easy job. For example, General Re Securities at yearend (after ten months of winding down its operation) had 14,384 contracts outstanding, involving 672 counterparties around the world. Each contract had a plus or minus value derived from one or more reference items, including some of mind-boggling complexity. Valuing a portfolio like that, expert auditors could easily and honestly have widely varying opinions.
当然，内部审计和外部审计都会复核这些数字，但这绝不是一件轻松的事。举例来说：到年末时（在 General Re Securities 已经“收缩/清盘”了十个月之后），它仍有 14,384 份未到期合约，涉及全球 672 个交易对手。每一份合约都有一个正或负的价值，取决于一个或多个参考变量，其中有些复杂到令人咋舌。给这样一个组合估值，即使是专家审计师，也完全可能在诚实、专业的前提下得出差异极大的判断。
The valuation problem is far from academic: In recent years, some huge-scale frauds and near-frauds have been facilitated by derivatives trades. In the energy and electric utility sectors, for example, companies used derivatives and trading activities to report great “earnings” — until the roof fell in when they actually tried to convert the derivatives-related receivables on their balance sheets into cash. “Mark-to-market” then turned out to be truly “mark-to-myth.”
估值问题远不只是学术讨论：近些年，一些规模巨大的欺诈与“几乎构成欺诈”的事件，都被衍生品交易所助推。比如在能源与电力公用事业行业，一些公司利用衍生品与交易活动报告出惊人的“盈利”——直到它们真的试图把资产负债表上那些与衍生品相关的应收款变成现金时，屋顶才塌下来。到那时，“mark-to-market（盯市）”才暴露出其实是彻头彻尾的 “mark-to-myth（盯神话计价）”。
I can assure you that the marking errors in the derivatives business have not been symmetrical. Almost invariably, they have favored either the trader who was eyeing a multi-million dollar bonus or the CEO who wanted to report impressive “earnings” (or both). The bonuses were paid, and the CEO profited from his options. Only much later did shareholders learn that the reported earnings were a sham.
我可以向你保证：衍生品业务里的计价错误从来不是“对称”的。几乎无一例外，它们都偏向于某一方：要么是盯着几百万美元奖金的交易员，要么是想报出漂亮“盈利”的 CEO（或者两者都得利）。奖金发出去了，CEO 也靠期权赚到了。只是很久以后，股东才发现那些被报告出来的盈利不过是一场骗局。
Another problem about derivatives is that they can exacerbate trouble that a corporation has run into for completely unrelated reasons. This pile-on effect occurs because many derivatives contracts require that a company suffering a credit downgrade immediately supply collateral to counterparties. Imagine, then, that a company is downgraded because of general adversity and that its derivatives instantly kick in with their requirement, imposing an unexpected and enormous demand for cash collateral on the company. The need to meet this demand can then throw the company into a liquidity crisis that may, in some cases, trigger still more downgrades. It all becomes a spiral that can lead to a corporate meltdown.
衍生品的另一个问题是：它们会把公司因为完全无关原因而遭遇的麻烦进一步放大。之所以会出现这种“落井下石效应（pile-on effect）”，是因为很多衍生品合约规定：一旦公司信用评级被下调，就必须立刻向交易对手补充抵押品（collateral）。想象一下：一家公司因为总体逆风而被降级，与此同时它的衍生品条款被瞬间触发，要求公司立即提供大量现金抵押品——这是一笔意外且巨大的现金需求。为了满足这个需求，公司可能被推入流动性危机；而这种危机又可能进一步引发新的降级。于是形成螺旋式恶化，最终可能导致公司崩溃。
Derivatives also create a daisy-chain risk that is akin to the risk run by insurers or reinsurers that lay off much of their business with others. In both cases, huge receivables from many counterparties tend to build up over time. (At Gen Re Securities, we still have $6.5 billion of receivables, though we’ve been in a liquidation mode for nearly a year.) A participant may see himself as prudent, believing his large credit exposures to be diversified and therefore not dangerous. Under certain circumstances, though, an exogenous event that causes the receivable from Company A to go bad will also affect those from Companies B through Z. History teaches us that a crisis often causes problems to correlate in a manner undreamed of in more tranquil times.
衍生品还会制造一种“雏菊链（daisy-chain）”风险，类似于原保险/再保险公司把大量业务分出给他人时所面临的风险。在这两种情况下，来自许多交易对手的巨额应收款会随着时间累积起来。（在 Gen Re Securities，我们仍然有 65 亿美元的应收款，尽管我们几乎一整年都处于清算模式。）参与者可能自认为很谨慎，因为他相信自己的巨大信用敞口足够分散，因此并不危险。但在某些情形下，一个外生事件如果让 A 公司的应收款变坏，也会连带影响 B 到 Z 公司的应收款。历史告诉我们：危机常常会让风险相关性以一种在平静时期根本想象不到的方式突然上升。
独立性不够跟不能独立思考的风险是一样的。
In banking, the recognition of a “linkage” problem was one of the reasons for the formation of the Federal Reserve System. Before the Fed was established, the failure of weak banks would sometimes put sudden and unanticipated liquidity demands on previously-strong banks, causing them to fail in turn. The Fed now insulates the strong from the troubles of the weak. But there is no central bank assigned to the job of preventing the dominoes toppling in insurance or derivatives. In these industries, firms that are fundamentally solid can become troubled simply because of the travails of other firms further down the chain. When a “chain reaction” threat exists within an industry, it pays to minimize links of any kind. That’s how we conduct our reinsurance business, and it’s one reason we are exiting derivatives.
在银行业，对“联动（linkage）”问题的认识，是促成 Federal Reserve System（美联储体系）成立的原因之一。在美联储建立之前，弱银行的倒闭有时会对原本强健的银行施加突然而且出乎意料的流动性需求，导致这些强银行也相继倒下。如今，美联储把强者与弱者的麻烦隔离开来。但在保险或衍生品领域，并不存在一个“中央银行”来负责阻止多米诺骨牌连锁倒下。在这些行业里，一些基本面扎实的公司，可能仅仅因为链条更下游其他公司的困境就被拖入麻烦之中。当一个行业内部存在“链式反应”的威胁时，最明智的做法就是尽量减少各种形式的“链接”。我们在再保险业务上就是这么做的，这也是我们退出衍生品的原因之一。
保险业和银行的重要区别。
Many people argue that derivatives reduce systemic problems, in that participants who can’t bear certain risks are able to transfer them to stronger hands. These people believe that derivatives act to stabilize the economy, facilitate trade, and eliminate bumps for individual participants. And, on a micro level, what they say is often true. Indeed, at Berkshire, I sometimes engage in large-scale derivatives transactions in order to facilitate certain investment strategies.
很多人认为衍生品可以降低系统性问题，因为那些无法承受某些风险的参与者，可以把风险转移给更强的承担者。他们相信衍生品能稳定经济、促进贸易，并为个体参与者“削平波动”。从微观层面看，这种说法往往确实成立。事实上，在 Berkshire，我有时也会进行大规模衍生品交易，以便推动某些投资策略的实施。
Charlie and I believe, however, that the macro picture is dangerous and getting more so. Large amounts of risk, particularly credit risk, have become concentrated in the hands of relatively few derivatives dealers, who in addition trade extensively with one other. The troubles of one could quickly infect the others. On top of that, these dealers are owed huge amounts by non-dealer counterparties. Some of these counterparties, as I’ve mentioned, are linked in ways that could cause them to contemporaneously run into a problem because of a single event (such as the implosion of the telecom industry or the precipitous decline in the value of merchant power projects). Linkage, when it suddenly surfaces, can trigger serious systemic problems.
但 Charlie 和我认为，宏观图景是危险的，而且正在变得更危险。大量风险——尤其是信用风险——已经集中在少数衍生品交易商（dealers）的手里，而这些交易商彼此之间还进行着大量交易。一家出问题，麻烦很快就可能传染给其他家。除此之外，这些交易商还被非交易商对手方欠着巨额款项。而这些对手方中，有些如我所说，彼此间存在某种“链接”，使得它们可能因为单一事件而同时陷入困境（例如电信行业的崩塌，或商用电力项目价值的急剧下跌）。联动一旦突然浮现，就可能触发严重的系统性问题。
Indeed, in 1998, the leveraged and derivatives-heavy activities of a single hedge fund, Long-Term Capital Management, caused the Federal Reserve anxieties so severe that it hastily orchestrated a rescue effort. In later Congressional testimony, Fed officials acknowledged that, had they not intervened, the outstanding trades of LTCM — a firm unknown to the general public and employing only a few hundred people — could well have posed a serious threat to the stability of American markets. In other words, the Fed acted because its leaders were fearful of what might have happened to other financial institutions had the LTCM domino toppled. And this affair, though it paralyzed many parts of the fixed-income market for weeks, was far from a worst-case scenario.
事实上，在 1998 年，某一家对冲基金——Long-Term Capital Management（LTCM）——高杠杆且重度依赖衍生品的活动，就让美联储焦虑到不得不仓促协调一次救援行动。后来在国会作证时，美联储官员承认：如果他们没有干预，LTCM 那些尚未平仓的交易——这是一家公众几乎没听过、员工只有几百人的机构——很可能会对美国市场的稳定构成严重威胁。换句话说，美联储之所以出手，是因为其领导层担心：如果 LTCM 这张多米诺骨牌倒下，其他金融机构会发生什么。而这场事件尽管让固定收益市场的许多部分瘫痪了数周，却仍远称不上最坏情形。
One of the derivatives instruments that LTCM used was total-return swaps, contracts that facilitate 100% leverage in various markets, including stocks. For example, Party A to a contract, usually a bank, puts up all of the money for the purchase of a stock while Party B, without putting up any capital, agrees that at a future date it will receive any gain or pay any loss that the bank realizes.
LTCM 使用过的一种衍生品工具是“总回报互换（total-return swaps）”。这类合约可以在多种市场实现 100% 杠杆，包括股票市场。举例来说：合约的一方 A（通常是银行）出资买入股票；而另一方 B 不需要投入任何资本，却同意在未来某个日期接收银行实现的所有收益，或支付银行发生的所有亏损。
Total-return swaps of this type make a joke of margin requirements. Beyond that, other types of derivatives severely curtail the ability of regulators to curb leverage and generally get their arms around the risk profiles of banks, insurers and other financial institutions. Similarly, even experienced investors and analysts encounter major problems in analyzing the financial condition of firms that are heavily involved with derivatives contracts. When Charlie and I finish reading the long footnotes detailing the derivatives activities of major banks, the only thing we understand is that we don’t understand how much risk the institution is running.
这种总回报互换把保证金（margin）要求变成了笑话。更进一步，其他类型的衍生品还会严重削弱监管者遏制杠杆的能力，使其更难整体掌握银行、保险公司以及其他金融机构的风险轮廓。同样地，即便是经验丰富的投资者和分析师，在分析那些大量参与衍生品合约的公司财务状况时，也会遇到巨大困难。Charlie 和我读完主要银行披露衍生品活动的长篇脚注后，唯一能确定的是：我们并不理解这家机构到底在承担多大的风险。
The derivatives genie is now well out of the bottle, and these instruments will almost certainly multiply in variety and number until some event makes their toxicity clear. Knowledge of how dangerous they are has already permeated the electricity and gas businesses, in which the eruption of major troubles caused the use of derivatives to diminish dramatically. Elsewhere, however, the derivatives business continues to expand unchecked. Central banks and governments have so far found no effective way to control, or even monitor, the risks posed by these contracts.
衍生品这只“妖怪”如今已经完全从瓶子里跑出来了；几乎可以肯定，这类工具会在种类与数量上不断繁殖，直到某个事件让它们的毒性彻底暴露。关于它们有多危险的认识，已经在电力与天然气行业广泛传播——该行业曾爆发重大危机，导致衍生品使用量大幅减少。但在其他领域，衍生品业务仍在不受约束地扩张。到目前为止，各国央行和政府都没有找到有效方法去控制——甚至只是监测——这些合约带来的风险。
Charlie and I believe Berkshire should be a fortress of financial strength — for the sake of our owners, creditors, policyholders and employees. We try to be alert to any sort of megacatastrophe risk, and that posture may make us unduly apprehensive about the burgeoning quantities of long-term derivatives contracts and the massive amount of uncollateralized receivables that are growing alongside. In our view, however, derivatives are financial weapons of mass destruction, carrying dangers that, while now latent, are potentially lethal.
Charlie 和我相信 Berkshire 应当成为一座“财务实力的堡垒（fortress of financial strength）”——为了我们的股东、债权人、保单持有人和员工。我们努力对任何形式的“超级巨灾”风险保持警觉，而这种姿态可能会让我们对不断膨胀的长期衍生品合约数量，以及随之增长的大量无抵押应收款，显得过度担忧。但在我们看来，衍生品就是“金融大规模杀伤性武器（financial weapons of mass destruction）”：它们的危险眼下还潜伏着，却具有潜在致命性。
Investments
投资
Below we show our common stock investments. Those that had a market value of more than $500 million at the end of 2002 are itemized.
下面我们列示了我们的普通股投资。在 2002 年年末市值超过 5 亿美元的持仓，会单独列示出来。
We continue to do little in equities. Charlie and I are increasingly comfortable with our holdings in Berkshire’s major investees because most of them have increased their earnings while their valuations have decreased. But we are not inclined to add to them. Though these enterprises have good prospects, we don’t yet believe their shares are undervalued.
我们仍然几乎不做股票方面的新增投资。Charlie 和我对 Berkshire 的主要被投公司（major investees）越来越放心，因为其中大多数企业的盈利增加了，而估值却下降了。但我们并不打算加仓。尽管这些企业前景不错，我们还不认为它们的股票被低估了。
In our view, the same conclusion fits stocks generally. Despite three years of falling prices, which have significantly improved the attractiveness of common stocks, we still find very few that even mildly interest us. That dismal fact is testimony to the insanity of valuations reached during The Great Bubble. Unfortunately, the hangover may prove to be proportional to the binge.
在我们看来，这个结论同样适用于股票整体。尽管股价已经连续下跌了三年，这显著提升了普通股的吸引力，但我们仍然几乎找不到哪怕“稍微”能引起我们兴趣的股票。这个令人沮丧的事实，恰恰证明了“大泡沫（The Great Bubble）”时期估值达到了何等疯狂的程度。不幸的是，这次宿醉很可能会与当时的狂饮成正比。
The aversion to equities that Charlie and I exhibit today is far from congenital. We love owning common stocks — if they can be purchased at attractive prices. In my 61 years of investing, 50 or so years have offered that kind of opportunity. There will be years like that again. Unless, however, we see a very high probability of at least 10% pre-tax returns (which translate to 6½-7% after corporate tax), we will sit on the sidelines. With short-term money returning less than 1% after-tax, sitting it out is no fun. But occasionally successful investing requires inactivity.
如今 Charlie 和我对股票的回避，绝非天生如此。我们热爱持有普通股——前提是能以有吸引力的价格买到。在我 61 年的投资生涯里，大约有 50 年都存在这样的机会。未来还会再有那样的年份。但除非我们看到至少 10% 的税前回报率具有很高概率（折算为公司税后约 6.5%—7%），否则我们会选择观望。短期资金税后回报不到 1%，观望一点也不好玩；但偶尔，成功投资就要求你什么也别做。
Last year we were, however, able to make sensible investments in a few “junk” bonds and loans. Overall, our commitments in this sector sextupled, reaching $8.3 billion by yearend.
不过，去年我们确实能在一些“垃圾债（junk）”债券与贷款上做出合理投资。总体而言，我们在这一领域的承诺规模增长了六倍，到年末达到 83 亿美元。
Investing in junk bonds and investing in stocks are alike in certain ways: Both activities require us to make a price-value calculation and also to scan hundreds of securities to find the very few that have attractive reward/risk ratios. But there are important differences between the two disciplines as well. In stocks, we expect every commitment to work out well because we concentrate on conservatively financed businesses with strong competitive strengths, run by able and honest people. If we buy into these companies at sensible prices, losses should be rare. Indeed, during the 38 years we have run the company’s affairs, gains from the equities we manage at Berkshire (that is, excluding those managed at General Re and GEICO) have exceeded losses by a ratio of about 100 to one.
在某些方面，投资垃圾债与投资股票是相似的：两者都要求我们做“价格—价值”比较，并且要在成百上千只证券里筛出极少数具有吸引力的回报/风险比。但这两门功夫也有重要差别。在股票上，我们期望每一笔投入都能有好结果，因为我们集中投资于财务结构保守、竞争优势强、并由既能干又诚实的人管理的企业。只要我们以合理价格买入这些公司，亏损就应当是罕见的。事实上，在我们掌管公司事务的 38 年里，我们在 Berkshire 自己管理的股票投资（不包括 General Re 和 GEICO 管理的部分）收益与亏损之比大约达到 100 比 1。
Purchasing junk bonds, we are dealing with enterprises that are far more marginal. These businesses are usually overloaded with debt and often operate in industries characterized by low returns on capital. Additionally, the quality of management is sometimes questionable. Management may even have interests that are directly counter to those of debtholders. Therefore, we expect that we will have occasional large losses in junk issues. So far, however, we have done reasonably well in this field.
而买垃圾债时，我们面对的企业边际性要强得多。这些企业通常背负过多债务，且常常处于资本回报率低的行业。此外，管理层质量有时也令人存疑；管理层甚至可能与债权人的利益直接对立。因此，我们预期在垃圾债上偶尔会出现较大损失。不过到目前为止，我们在这个领域做得还算不错。
Corporate Governance
公司治理
Both the ability and fidelity of managers have long needed monitoring. Indeed, nearly 2,000 years ago, Jesus Christ addressed this subject, speaking (Luke 16:2) approvingly of “a certain rich man” who told his manager, “Give an account of thy stewardship; for thou mayest no longer be steward.”
管理者的能力与忠诚（fidelity）长期以来都需要被监督。事实上，早在将近 2,000 年前，Jesus Christ 就谈到了这个话题：他在《路加福音》16:2 中称许地提到“有一个财主”，对他的管家说：“把你所经管的交代明白；因你不能再作我的管家。”（“Give an account of thy stewardship; for thou mayest no longer be steward.”）
able+trustworthy，非常长的历史经验说明这是有本质的。
Accountability and stewardship withered in the last decade, becoming qualities deemed of little importance by those caught up in the Great Bubble. As stock prices went up, the behavioral norms of managers went down. By the late ’90s, as a result, CEOs who traveled the high road did not encounter heavy traffic.
在过去十年里，“问责（accountability）”与“受托责任（stewardship）”逐渐枯萎；在“大泡沫（The Great Bubble）”的裹挟下，人们把这些品质看得无足轻重。股价上涨时，管理者的行为规范却在下滑。到了 90 年代末，结果就是：走正道的 CEO 路上几乎没什么车——高尚不再拥挤。
Most CEOs, it should be noted, are men and women you would be happy to have as trustees for your children’s assets or as next-door neighbors. Too many of these people, however, have in recent years behaved badly at the office, fudging numbers and drawing obscene pay for mediocre business achievements. These otherwise decent people simply followed the career path of Mae West: “I was Snow White but I drifted.”
需要说明的是，大多数 CEO 都是你愿意托付孩子资产的人，或者愿意与之做邻居的人。然而，近年来其中太多人在办公室里表现很糟糕：做账、糊弄数字，并且因为平庸的经营业绩而拿走了令人作呕的高薪。这些本来还算体面的人，只是沿着 Mae West 的“职业轨迹”走了下去：“我曾是 Snow White，但我渐渐漂移了。”
In theory, corporate boards should have prevented this deterioration of conduct. I last wrote about the responsibilities of directors in the 1993 annual report. (We will send you a copy of this discussion on request, or you may read it on the Internet in the Corporate Governance section of the 1993 letter.) There, I said that directors “should behave as if there was a single absentee owner, whose long-term interest they should try to further in all proper ways.” This means that directors must get rid of a manager who is mediocre or worse, no matter how likable he may be. Directors must react as did the chorus-girl bride of an 85-yearold multimillionaire when he asked whether she would love him if he lost his money. “Of course,” the young beauty replied, “I would miss you, but I would still love you.”
理论上，公司董事会本应阻止这种行为的滑坡。我上一次谈董事责任是在 1993 年的年报里。（如有需要我们可以寄给你一份；你也可以在网上阅读 1993 年股东信的“公司治理”部分。）在那里我说过：董事“应当像面对一位缺席但唯一的所有者那样行事，并在一切正当方式上努力增进其长期利益。”这意味着：无论某位经理人多么讨人喜欢，只要他的能力平庸甚至更差，董事就必须把他换掉。董事的反应应该像那位 85 岁百万富翁的新娘（合唱团女孩）一样——当他问“如果我失去钱财你还会爱我吗？”时，那位年轻美人答道：“当然，我会想念你——但我仍然会爱你。”
In the 1993 annual report, I also said directors had another job: “If able but greedy managers overreach and try to dip too deeply into the shareholders’ pockets, directors must slap their hands.” Since I wrote that, over-reaching has become common but few hands have been slapped.
在 1993 年年报里，我还说过董事们还有另一项工作：“如果那些有能力但贪婪的经理人越界，试图把手伸得太深、从股东口袋里掏太多钱，董事就必须拍掉他们的手。”自从我写下这句话之后，越界行为变得司空见惯，但真正被拍掉的手却寥寥无几。
Why have intelligent and decent directors failed so miserably? The answer lies not in inadequate laws — it’s always been clear that directors are obligated to represent the interests of shareholders — but rather in what I’d call “boardroom atmosphere.”
为什么聪明而体面（intelligent and decent）的董事会如此彻底地失职？答案不在于法律不够——董事有义务代表股东利益这一点一直都很清楚——而在于我称之为“董事会会议室氛围（boardroom atmosphere）”的东西。
It’s almost impossible, for example, in a boardroom populated by well-mannered people, to raise the question of whether the CEO should be replaced. It’s equally awkward to question a proposed acquisition that has been endorsed by the CEO, particularly when his inside staff and outside advisors are present and unanimously support his decision. (They wouldn’t be in the room if they didn’t.) Finally, when the compensation committee — armed, as always, with support from a high-paid consultant — reports on a megagrant of options to the CEO, it would be like belching at the dinner table for a director to suggest that the committee reconsider.
比如说，在一间由彬彬有礼的人组成的会议室里，提出“是否应该更换 CEO”这个问题几乎是不可能的。同样，让人很难开口去质疑一项已被 CEO 背书的收购提案——尤其是当他的内部团队和外部顾问都在场，并且一致支持他的决定时。（如果他们不同意，他们压根就不会出现在会议室里。）最后，当薪酬委员会——照例带着一位高薪顾问的背书——向董事会汇报要给 CEO 发放一大笔期权时，如果某位董事建议委员会重新考虑，那在社交层面就像在餐桌上打嗝一样失礼。
These “social” difficulties argue for outside directors regularly meeting without the CEO — a reform that is being instituted and that I enthusiastically endorse. I doubt, however, that most of the other new governance rules and recommendations will provide benefits commensurate with the monetary and other costs they impose.
这些“社交”层面的困难，说明外部董事应当定期在没有 CEO 参与的情况下单独开会——这是一项正在推行的改革，而我对此非常支持。不过，我怀疑其他大多数新的治理规则与建议，能否带来与其所施加的金钱成本和其他成本相称的收益。
The current cry is for “independent” directors. It is certainly true that it is desirable to have directors who think and speak independently — but they must also be business-savvy, interested and shareholder-oriented. In my 1993 commentary, those are the three qualities I described as essential.
眼下的口号是要“独立（independent）”董事。拥有能独立思考、独立发声的董事当然是好事——但他们还必须具备商业判断力（business-savvy）、真正投入（interested），并且以股东为导向（shareholder-oriented）。在我 1993 年的评论里，这三点就是我认为不可或缺的品质。
Over a span of 40 years, I have been on 19 public-company boards (excluding Berkshire’s) and have interacted with perhaps 250 directors. Most of them were “independent” as defined by today’s rules. But the great majority of these directors lacked at least one of the three qualities I value. As a result, their contribution to shareholder well-being was minimal at best and, too often, negative. These people, decent and intelligent though they were, simply did not know enough about business and/or care enough about shareholders to question foolish acquisitions or egregious compensation. My own behavior, I must ruefully add, frequently fell short as well: Too often I was silent when management made proposals that I judged to be counter to the interests of shareholders. In those cases, collegiality trumped independence.
在 40 年的时间里，我曾在 19 家上市公司董事会任职（不包括 Berkshire），并与大约 250 位董事有过共事或互动。按今天的规则定义，其中大多数都算“独立董事”。但绝大多数人至少缺少我看重的三项品质之一。因此，他们对股东福祉的贡献，往好了说也只是有限；太多时候甚至是负面的。尽管这些人都体面而聪明，但他们要么不够懂商业，要么不够在乎股东，以至于不会去质疑愚蠢的收购或荒唐的薪酬。我也必须遗憾地承认：我自己的表现也经常不及格——管理层提出一些我认为损害股东利益的提案时，我太多次保持沉默。在这些时候，“和气（collegiality）”压过了“独立（independence）”。
So that we may further see the failings of “independence,” let’s look at a 62-year case study covering thousands of companies. Since 1940, federal law has mandated that a large proportion of the directors of investment companies (most of these mutual funds) be independent. The requirement was originally 40% and now it is 50%. In any case, the typical fund has long operated with a majority of directors who qualify as independent.
为了更进一步看清“独立”的缺陷，我们来观察一个横跨 62 年、覆盖成千上万家公司的案例研究。自 1940 年起，联邦法律规定投资公司（大多数是共同基金）的相当一部分董事必须是独立的。最初要求是 40%，现在是 50%。不管怎样，典型基金长期以来都由“符合独立标准”的董事占多数来运作。
These directors and the entire board have many perfunctory duties, but in actuality have only two important responsibilities: obtaining the best possible investment manager and negotiating with that manager for the lowest possible fee. When you are seeking investment help yourself, those two goals are the only ones that count, and directors acting for other investors should have exactly the same priorities. Yet when it comes to independent directors pursuing either goal, their record has been absolutely pathetic.
这些独立董事以及整个董事会有许多例行公事般的职责，但实际上只有两项真正重要的责任：找到最好的投资管理人，并与其谈判拿到尽可能低的费用。你自己寻求投资帮助时，真正要紧的也就是这两件事；董事们代表其他投资者行事时，也应当有完全相同的优先级。然而，独立董事在追求这两项目标时的记录，简直是惨不忍睹。
Many thousands of investment-company boards meet annually to carry out the vital job of selecting who will manage the savings of the millions of owners they represent. Year after year the directors of Fund A select manager A, Fund B directors select manager B, etc. … in a zombie-like process that makes a mockery of stewardship. Very occasionally, a board will revolt. But for the most part, a monkey will type out a Shakespeare play before an “independent” mutual-fund director will suggest that his fund look at other managers, even if the incumbent manager has persistently delivered substandard performance. When they are handling their own money, of course, directors will look to alternative advisors — but it never enters their minds to do so when they are acting as fiduciaries for others.
成千上万家投资公司董事会每年开会，去执行一项至关重要的工作：选择谁来管理其所代表的数百万持有人储蓄。年复一年，A 基金董事选 A 管理人，B 基金董事选 B 管理人，等等……像僵尸一样重复这个流程，把受托责任（stewardship）变成了笑话。极少数情况下，董事会会反抗。但在大多数情况下，你让猴子敲键盘敲出一部莎士比亚的戏剧，都比让一位“独立”的共同基金董事建议去考察其他管理人更容易——即便现任管理人长期交出糟糕的业绩。当这些董事在管理自己的钱时，他们当然会去寻找别的顾问；但当他们以受托人身份替别人行事时，脑子里却从来不会冒出同样的念头。
The hypocrisy permeating the system is vividly exposed when a fund management company — call it “A” — is sold for a huge sum to Manager “B”. Now the “independent” directors experience a “counterrevelation” and decide that Manager B is the best that can be found — even though B was available (and ignored) in previous years. Not so incidentally, B also could formerly have been hired at a far lower rate than is possible now that it has bought Manager A. That’s because B has laid out a fortune to acquire A, and B must now recoup that cost through fees paid by the A shareholders who were “delivered” as part of the deal. (For a terrific discussion of the mutual fund business, read John Bogle’s Common Sense on Mutual Funds.)
当一家基金管理公司——我们叫它“A”——以巨额价格被管理人“B”收购时，这个体系里弥漫的虚伪会被赤裸裸地暴露出来。此时，“独立董事”会出现一种“反向顿悟（counterrevelation）”，突然决定：管理人 B 就是能找到的最好选择——尽管 B 在此前很多年里一直就在那里（却被他们忽视）。更不巧的是：在 B 收购 A 之前，本来完全可能以更低的费率聘用 B。可一旦 B 买下了 A，就不再可能了。因为 B 为收购 A 付出了一大笔钱，现在必须通过 A 的股东所支付的管理费把这笔钱“收回来”——而 A 的股东正是作为交易的一部分被“交付”给 B 的。（想了解共同基金行业的一篇极佳讨论，请读 John Bogle 的《Common Sense on Mutual Funds》。）
A few years ago, my daughter was asked to become a director of a family of funds managed by a major institution. The fees she would have received as a director were very substantial, enough to have increased her annual income by about 50% (a boost, she will tell you, she could use!). Legally, she would have been an independent director. But did the fund manager who approached her think there was any chance that she would think independently as to what advisor the fund should employ? Of course not. I am proud to say that she showed real independence by turning down the offer. The fund, however, had no trouble filling the slot (and — surprise — the fund has not changed managers).
几年前，我女儿被邀请去担任某个由大型机构管理的一组基金的董事。她作为董事能拿到的报酬非常可观——足以把她的年收入提高大约 50%（她会告诉你：她确实用得上这笔增量！）。从法律上讲，她将是“独立董事”。但那个邀请她的基金管理人，会真的认为她会在“基金该聘用哪位投资顾问”这件事上独立思考吗？当然不会。我很自豪地说，她用真正的独立性拒绝了这个邀请。不过这家基金也毫不费力地填补了空缺（而且——毫不意外——基金也没有更换管理人）。
Investment company directors have failed as well in negotiating management fees (just as compensation committees of many American companies have failed to hold the compensation of their CEOs to sensible levels). If you or I were empowered, I can assure you that we could easily negotiate materially lower management fees with the incumbent managers of most mutual funds. And, believe me, if directors were promised a portion of any fee savings they realized, the skies would be filled with falling fees. Under the current system, though, reductions mean nothing to “independent” directors while meaning everything to managers. So guess who wins?
投资公司董事在谈判管理费方面也同样失败（就像美国很多公司的薪酬委员会没能把 CEO 薪酬控制在合理水平一样）。如果你或我拥有谈判授权，我可以向你保证：我们很容易就能与大多数共同基金的现任管理人谈出实质性更低的管理费。并且，相信我：如果董事们能从他们争取到的“费率节省”中分得一部分，那么天空都会被“费率下跌”砸满。但在现行制度下，费率下降对“独立董事”毫无意义，却对管理人意义重大。所以你猜谁会赢？
Having the right money manager, of course, is far more important to a fund than reducing the manager’s fee. Both tasks are nonetheless the job of directors. And in stepping up to these all-important responsibilities, tens of thousands of “independent” directors, over more than six decades, have failed miserably. (They’ve succeeded, however, in taking care of themselves; their fees from serving on multiple boards of a single “family” of funds often run well into six figures.)
当然，拥有正确的基金经理，比降低管理费对基金更重要得多。但这两件事依然是董事的职责。而在履行这两项至关重要的责任上，六十多年里、数以万计的“独立董事”都失败得一塌糊涂。（不过他们在照顾自己方面倒是成功的：他们在单一基金“家族”里同时担任多个董事职位所获得的报酬，往往高到六位数。）
When the manager cares deeply and the directors don’t, what’s needed is a powerful countervailing force — and that’s the missing element in today’s corporate governance. Getting rid of mediocre CEOs and eliminating overreaching by the able ones requires action by owners — big owners. The logistics aren’t that tough: The ownership of stock has grown increasingly concentrated in recent decades, and today it would be easy for institutional managers to exert their will on problem situations. Twenty, or even fewer, of the largest institutions, acting together, could effectively reform corporate governance at a given company, simply by withholding their votes for directors who were tolerating odious behavior. In my view, this kind of concerted action is the only way that corporate stewardship can be meaningfully improved.
当管理人非常在乎，而董事不在乎时，就需要一种强有力的制衡力量——而这正是当今公司治理里缺失的关键元素。要赶走平庸的 CEO、要遏制那些有能力但越界的 CEO，必须依靠所有者的行动——大股东的行动。其实操作并不难：近几十年来，股票所有权越来越集中；今天，机构投资者完全可以在问题情形中施加其意志。只要规模最大的二十家、甚至更少的机构联合行动，就可以在某家公司有效改革公司治理——方法很简单：对那些容忍可憎行为的董事，集体不投赞成票。依我看，这种一致行动，是实质改善公司受托责任（corporate stewardship）的唯一途径。
Unfortunately, certain major investing institutions have “glass house” problems in arguing for better governance elsewhere; they would shudder, for example, at the thought of their own performance and fees being closely inspected by their own boards. But Jack Bogle of Vanguard fame, Chris Davis of Davis Advisors, and Bill Miller of Legg Mason are now offering leadership in getting CEOs to treat their owners properly. Pension funds, as well as other fiduciaries, will reap better investment returns in the future if they support these men.
不幸的是，一些大型投资机构在呼吁“改善别人的治理”时也有“玻璃房子（glass house）”问题：比如说，如果要让他们自己的董事会去严格审视他们自身的业绩与收费，他们会不寒而栗。不过，因 Vanguard 而闻名的 Jack Bogle、Davis Advisors 的 Chris Davis，以及 Legg Mason 的 Bill Miller，正在为推动 CEO 正确对待股东提供领导力。养老基金以及其他受托人（fiduciaries）如果支持这些人，未来将获得更好的投资回报。
The acid test for reform will be CEO compensation. Managers will cheerfully agree to board “diversity,” attest to SEC filings and adopt meaningless proposals relating to process. What many will fight, however, is a hard look at their own pay and perks.
改革的“试金石”将是 CEO 薪酬。管理层会很乐意支持董事会“多元化”，会在 SEC 文件上签字背书，也会采纳各种与流程有关却毫无意义的提案。但他们真正会拼命抵抗的，是对他们自己的薪酬与福利（pay and perks）进行严肃审视。
In recent years compensation committees too often have been tail-wagging puppy dogs meekly following recommendations by consultants, a breed not known for allegiance to the faceless shareholders who pay their fees. (If you can’t tell whose side someone is on, they are not on yours.) True, each committee is required by the SEC to state its reasoning about pay in the proxy. But the words are usually boilerplate written by the company’s lawyers or its human-relations department.
近年来，薪酬委员会往往像“摇尾巴的小狗”，温顺地跟着顾问的建议走——而这类顾问并不是以忠于支付他们费用的无名股东而著称。（如果你看不出来某个人站在哪一边，那他就不在你这边。）确实，SEC 要求每个薪酬委员会在委托书（proxy）中说明其薪酬决策理由，但这些文字通常是公司律师或人力资源部门写的官样文章（boilerplate）。
This costly charade should cease. Directors should not serve on compensation committees unless they are themselves capable of negotiating on behalf of owners. They should explain both how they think about pay and how they measure performance. Dealing with shareholders’ money, moreover, they should behave as they would were it their own.
这场昂贵的做戏应该结束。董事若自身没有代表股东谈判的能力，就不应进入薪酬委员会。他们应当解释：自己如何看待薪酬，以及如何衡量业绩。更重要的是，既然是在处理股东的钱，他们就应当像对待自己的钱那样行事。
Think Independently+Think Correctly的形成是个小概率的事件，平均每天有2个心理反应的事件，1岁以前700个；3岁以前2100个；15岁以前有1万个事件，假设3%是个临界值，3%的负面反应永久性的改变一个人的性格，1岁以前是21次，但凡发生21次照顾不到位的事件就完了。
In the 1890s, Samuel Gompers described the goal of organized labor as “More!” In the 1990s, America’s CEOs adopted his battle cry. The upshot is that CEOs have often amassed riches while their shareholders have experienced financial disasters.
1890 年代，Samuel Gompers 用 “More!” 来概括有组织劳工的目标。到了 1990 年代，美国的 CEO 们把这句口号当成了自己的战斗号角。结果就是：CEO 往往积累了巨额财富，而股东却遭遇了财务灾难。
Directors should stop such piracy. There’s nothing wrong with paying well for truly exceptional business performance. But, for anything short of that, it’s time for directors to shout “Less!” It would be a travesty if the bloated pay of recent years became a baseline for future compensation. Compensation committees should go back to the drawing boards.
董事们应当制止这种海盗行径。为真正卓越的经营业绩支付高薪没有任何问题。但只要达不到那种级别，就该轮到董事们喊 “Less!” 了。如果近年来膨胀的薪酬变成未来薪酬的“基准线”，那将是一场悲剧。薪酬委员会应该回到起点，重新设计方案。
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Rules that have been proposed and that are almost certain to go into effect will require changes in Berkshire’s board, obliging us to add directors who meet the codified requirements for “independence.”
一些已经被提出、并且几乎肯定会生效的新规则，将要求 Berkshire 的董事会做出调整：我们必须新增符合被明文化的“独立性（independence）”要求的董事。
Doing so, we will add a test that we believe is important, but far from determinative, in fostering independence: We will select directors who have huge and true ownership interests (that is, stock that they or their family have purchased, not been given by Berkshire or received via options), expecting those interests to influence their actions to a degree that dwarfs other considerations such as prestige and board fees.
在这么做的同时，我们还会加入一项我们认为重要、但并非决定性的“独立性测试”：我们会挑选那些拥有巨大且真实的所有权利益（也就是他们本人或家族用真金白银买来的股票，而不是 Berkshire 赠与的、也不是通过期权获得的），并期望这种利益对其行为的影响，远远超过诸如声望与董事费之类的其他考量。
That gets to an often-overlooked point about directors’ compensation, which at public companies averages perhaps $50,000 annually. It baffles me how the many directors who look to these dollars for perhaps 20% or more of their annual income can be considered independent when Ron Olson, for example, who is on our board, may be deemed not independent because he receives a tiny percentage of his very large income from Berkshire legal fees. As the investment company saga suggests, a director whose moderate income is heavily dependent on directors’ fees — and who hopes mightily to be invited to join other boards in order to earn more fees — is highly unlikely to offend a CEO or fellow directors, who in a major way will determine his reputation in corporate circles. If regulators believe that “significant” money taints independence (and it certainly can), they have overlooked a massive class of possible offenders.
这引出一个经常被忽视的点：董事薪酬。在上市公司里，董事年薪平均大约 5 万美元。我实在想不通：那些把这笔钱当作自己年收入 20% 甚至更大比例的董事，怎么还能被认为是“独立”的；而像 Ron Olson 这样的董事——他在我们董事会里——却可能被判定为不独立，只因为他从 Berkshire 的法律服务费中获得了其巨额收入的一小部分。共同基金董事会的故事也提示我们：一个收入中等、却高度依赖董事费的董事——并且强烈希望被邀请加入更多董事会以赚取更多费用——几乎不可能去得罪 CEO 或其他董事；而这些人将在很大程度上决定他在公司圈子里的声誉。如果监管者认为“相当可观”的钱会玷污独立性（这当然可能），那他们忽视了一大类潜在的“违规者”。
At Berkshire, wanting our fees to be meaningless to our directors, we pay them only a pittance. Additionally, not wanting to insulate our directors from any corporate disaster we might have, we don’t provide them with officers’ and directors’ liability insurance (an unorthodoxy that, not so incidentally, has saved our shareholders many millions of dollars over the years). Basically, we want the behavior of our directors to be driven by the effect their decisions will have on their family’s net worth, not by their compensation. That’s the equation for Charlie and me as managers, and we think it’s the right one for Berkshire directors as well.
在 Berkshire，我们希望董事费对董事来说“无关紧要”，因此只给他们象征性的微薄报酬。此外，我们也不想把董事隔离在公司可能遭遇的任何灾难之外，所以我们不给他们购买高管与董事责任保险（D&O liability insurance）——这种做法虽不寻常，但顺带一提，多年来为股东省下了数以百万计的费用。归根结底，我们希望董事的行为是由“他们的决策会如何影响其家族净资产”来驱动，而不是由薪酬来驱动。Charlie 和我作为管理者就是按这套算式行事的，我们也认为这同样是 Berkshire 董事应当遵循的正确算式。
To find new directors, we will look through our shareholders list for people who directly, or in their family, have had large Berkshire holdings — in the millions of dollars — for a long time. Individuals making that cut should automatically meet two of our tests, namely that they be interested in Berkshire and shareholder-oriented. In our third test, we will look for business savvy, a competence that is far from commonplace.
为了寻找新董事，我们会在股东名单里寻找那些本人或其家族长期持有大量 Berkshire 股票（以百万美元计）的人。能达到这一门槛的人，应该天然就满足我们两项测试：他们对 Berkshire 感兴趣，并且以股东为导向。至于第三项测试，我们会看他们是否具备商业判断力（business savvy）——而这项能力远不像人们想象得那么常见。
Finally, we will continue to have members of the Buffett family on the board. They are not there to run the business after I die, nor will they then receive compensation of any kind. Their purpose is to ensure, for both our shareholders and managers, that Berkshire’s special culture will be nurtured when I’m succeeded by other CEOs.
最后，我们仍会让 Buffett 家族成员留在董事会里。他们并不是为了在我去世后接管业务，也不会在那之后领取任何形式的报酬。他们的目的，是为了确保——无论对股东还是对管理层——当我由其他 CEO 接任后，Berkshire 那种独特的文化仍会被持续培育与传承。
Any change we make in the composition of our board will not alter the way Charlie and I run Berkshire. We will continue to emphasize substance over form in our work and waste as little time as possible during board meetings in show-and-tell and perfunctory activities. The most important job of our board is likely to be the selection of successors to Charlie and me, and that is a matter upon which it will focus.
我们对董事会构成做出的任何改变，都不会改变 Charlie 和我经营 Berkshire 的方式。我们会继续在工作中强调“实质重于形式”，并在董事会会议里尽可能少浪费时间在走过场、展示汇报和例行公事上。董事会最重要的一项工作，很可能就是选择 Charlie 和我的继任者，而这将是它重点关注的事项。
The board we have had up to now has overseen a shareholder-oriented business, consistently run in accord with the economic principles set forth on pages 68-74 (which I urge all new shareholders to read). Our goal is to obtain new directors who are equally devoted to those principles.
迄今为止，我们的董事会一直监督着一家以股东为导向的企业，并持续按照第 68-74 页所阐述的经济原则来运行（我强烈建议所有新股东阅读）。我们的目标，是找到同样忠于这些原则的新董事。
The Audit Committee
审计委员会
Audit committees can’t audit. Only a company’s outside auditor can determine whether the earnings that a management purports to have made are suspect. Reforms that ignore this reality and that instead focus on the structure and charter of the audit committee will accomplish little.
审计委员会并不能“审计”。只有公司的外部审计师，才能判断管理层声称取得的盈利是否可疑。忽视这一现实、转而把注意力放在审计委员会的结构与章程上的改革，收效甚微。
As we’ve discussed, far too many managers have fudged their company’s numbers in recent years, using both accounting and operational techniques that are typically legal but that nevertheless materially mislead investors. Frequently, auditors knew about these deceptions. Too often, however, they remained silent. The key job of the audit committee is simply to get the auditors to divulge what they know.
正如我们讨论过的，近年来太多管理层“做花账”，用的既有会计手段，也有经营手段——这些方法通常合法，但却会对投资者造成实质性误导。很多时候，审计师是知道这些“把戏”的。但太多时候，他们选择沉默。审计委员会的关键工作，就是让审计师把他们知道的事情说出来。
To do this job, the committee must make sure that the auditors worry more about misleading its members than about offending management. In recent years auditors have not felt that way. They have instead generally viewed the CEO, rather than the shareholders or directors, as their client. That has been a natural result of day-to-day working relationships and also of the auditors’ understanding that, no matter what the book says, the CEO and CFO pay their fees and determine whether they are retained for both auditing and other work. The rules that have been recently instituted won’t materially change this reality. What will break this cozy relationship is audit committees unequivocally putting auditors on the spot, making them understand they will become liable for major monetary penalties if they don’t come forth with what they know or suspect.
要做到这一点，委员会必须让审计师更担心“误导委员会成员”，而不是更担心“得罪管理层”。近些年，审计师并不这么想。他们往往把 CEO 视为客户，而不是股东或董事。这是日常工作关系的自然结果，也是因为审计师明白：不管书面规则怎么写，审计与其他业务的费用，都是 CEO 和 CFO 在付；是否继续聘用他们，也由 CEO 和 CFO 决定。最近出台的规则并不会实质性改变这一现实。真正能打破这种“亲密关系”的，是审计委员会明确无误地把审计师“顶到墙上”：让他们明白，如果不把自己知道的或怀疑的事情说出来，他们将承担巨额金钱处罚的责任。
In my opinion, audit committees can accomplish this goal by asking four questions of auditors, the answers to which should be recorded and reported to shareholders. These questions are:
在我看来，审计委员会可以通过向审计师提出四个问题来实现这一目标；这些问题的答案应当被记录下来，并向股东报告。这四个问题是：
1.If the auditor were solely responsible for preparation of the company’s financial statements, would they have in any way been prepared differently from the manner selected by management? This question should cover both material and nonmaterial differences. If the auditor would have done something differently, both management’s argument and the auditor’s response should be disclosed. The audit committee should then evaluate the facts.
如果由审计师单独负责编制公司的财务报表，那么报表在任何方面是否会与管理层所选择的编制方式不同？这个问题应当覆盖“重大差异”和“非重大差异”。如果审计师会做得不一样，那么管理层的理由与审计师的回应都应当披露。随后由审计委员会评估事实。
2.If the auditor were an investor, would he have received — in plain English — the information essential to his understanding the company’s financial performance during the reporting period?
如果审计师自己是投资者，他是否会以“通俗英语（plain English）”收到理解公司在报告期内财务表现所必需的信息？
3. Is the company following the same internal audit procedure that would be followed if the auditor himself were CEO? If not, what are the differences and why?
公司是否遵循了这样一套内部审计流程：如果审计师本人是 CEO，他也会采用同样的流程？如果不是，差异是什么？为什么会有这些差异？
4.Is the auditor aware of any actions — either accounting or operational — that have had the purpose and effect of moving revenues or expenses from one reporting period to another?
审计师是否知道公司采取过任何行动——无论是会计层面还是经营层面——其目的与效果都是把收入或费用从一个报告期“挪到”另一个报告期？
If the audit committee asks these questions, its composition — the focus of most reforms — is of minor importance. In addition, the procedure will save time and expense. When auditors are put on the spot, they will do their duty. If they are not put on the spot . . . well, we have seen the results of that.
如果审计委员会真的去问这四个问题，那么它的“构成”（这正是大多数改革聚焦的点）就只是次要问题。此外，这套做法还能节省时间和费用。只要把审计师“顶到墙上”，他们就会履行职责；如果不把他们顶到墙上……好吧，我们已经见识过那会带来什么结果。
The questions we have enumerated should be asked at least a week before an earnings report is released to the public. That timing will allow differences between the auditors and management to be aired with the committee and resolved. If the timing is tighter — if an earnings release is imminent when the auditors and committee interact — the committee will feel pressure to rubberstamp the prepared figures. Haste is the enemy of accuracy. My thinking, in fact, is that the SEC’s recent shortening of reporting deadlines will hurt the quality of information that shareholders receive. Charlie and I believe that rule is a mistake and should be rescinded.
这些问题至少应当在财报向公众发布前一周提出。这样的时间安排，能让审计师与管理层之间的分歧在委员会面前被摊开并得到解决。若时间更紧——比如审计师与委员会互动时，财报发布已迫在眉睫——委员会就会感受到“盖章通过”的压力。仓促是准确性的敌人。实际上，我认为 SEC 最近缩短披露截止期限，会损害股东获得信息的质量。Charlie 和我认为这条规则是错误的，应该撤销。
The primary advantage of our four questions is that they will act as a prophylactic. Once the auditors know that the audit committee will require them to affirmatively endorse, rather than merely acquiesce to, management’s actions, they will resist misdoings early in the process, well before specious figures become embedded in the company’s books. Fear of the plaintiff’s bar will see to that.
我们这四个问题的首要优势在于：它们会起到“预防针（prophylactic）”的作用。一旦审计师知道审计委员会会要求他们“积极背书（affirmatively endorse）”，而不是仅仅“默许（acquiesce）”管理层的做法，他们就会在流程早期抵制不当行为——远在那些似是而非的数字被写进账本并固化之前。对原告律师群体（plaintiff’s bar）的恐惧，会确保这一点。
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The Chicago Tribune ran a four-part series on Arthur Andersen last September that did a great job of illuminating how accounting standards and audit quality have eroded in recent years. A few decades ago, an Arthur Andersen audit opinion was the gold standard of the profession. Within the firm, an elite Professional Standards Group (PSG) insisted on honest reporting, no matter what pressures were applied by the client. Sticking to these principles, the PSG took a stand in 1992 that the cost of stock options should be recorded as the expense it clearly was. The PSG’s position was reversed, however, by the “rainmaking” partners of Andersen who knew what their clients wanted — higher reported earnings no matter what the reality. Many CEOs also fought expensing because they knew that the obscene megagrants of options they craved would be slashed if the true costs of these had to be recorded.
《Chicago Tribune》去年 9 月刊登了一组四篇的系列报道，主题是 Arthur Andersen。这组报道非常出色地揭示了：近年来，会计准则与审计质量是如何被一步步侵蚀的。几十年前，Arthur Andersen 的审计意见曾是行业的黄金标准。在事务所内部，有一个精英的 Professional Standards Group（PSG，职业准则小组），无论客户施加何种压力，都坚持真实披露。坚持这些原则，PSG 在 1992 年明确表态：股票期权的成本应该像它本来就该是的那样，被确认为费用。但 Andersen 的“招财合伙人（rainmaking partners）”后来推翻了 PSG 的立场，因为他们太清楚客户想要什么——不管现实如何，报表利润要更高。许多 CEO 也反对费用化，因为他们知道：如果必须记录期权的真实成本，他们梦寐以求的那种荒唐巨额期权奖励（obscene megagrants）就会被大幅削减。
Soon after the Andersen reversal, the independent accounting standards board (FASB) voted 7-0 for expensing options. Predictably, the major auditing firms and an army of CEOs stormed Washington to pressure the Senate — what better institution to decide accounting questions? — into castrating the FASB. The voices of the protesters were amplified by their large political contributions, usually made with corporate money belonging to the very owners about to be bamboozled. It was not a sight for a civics class.
在 Andersen 反转立场之后不久，独立的会计准则制定机构 FASB 以 7-0 投票赞成期权费用化。可以预见的是，大型审计事务所和一支由 CEO 组成的“军团”冲向华盛顿，施压参议院——还有什么机构比参议院更适合来决定会计问题呢？——要求阉割 FASB。抗议者的声音，因为他们巨额的政治捐款而被放大；而这些捐款通常用的是公司资金——也就是那些即将被忽悠的股东的钱。那场面绝不是给公民课看的。
To its shame, the Senate voted 88-9 against expensing. Several prominent Senators even called for the demise of the FASB if it didn’t abandon its position. (So much for independence.) Arthur Levitt, Jr., then Chairman of the SEC — and generally a vigilant champion of shareholders — has since described his reluctant bowing to Congressional and corporate pressures as the act of his chairmanship that he most regrets. (The details of this sordid affair are related in Levitt’s excellent book, Take on the Street.)
可耻的是，参议院以 88-9 的表决反对期权费用化。还有几位知名参议员甚至威胁：如果 FASB 不放弃立场，就要让它消失。（所谓独立，也不过如此。）Arthur Levitt, Jr. 当时是 SEC 主席——总体而言也是警觉的股东权益捍卫者——他后来把自己“不得不”在国会与企业压力下低头，描述为其任期中最懊悔的一件事。（这桩丑闻的细节，Levitt 在他那本很棒的书《Take on the Street》里有详细叙述。）
With the Senate in its pocket and the SEC outgunned, corporate America knew that it was now boss when it came to accounting. With that, a new era of anything-goes earnings reports — blessed and, in some cases, encouraged by big-name auditors — was launched. The licentious behavior that followed quickly became an air pump for The Great Bubble.
参议院被收进口袋、SEC 又火力不敌之后，美国企业界就明白了：在会计问题上，他们现在才是老大。于是，一个“什么都可以（anything-goes）”的盈利报告新时代被开启——由大牌审计师背书，并且在某些情况下还被他们鼓励。随之而来的放纵行为，很快就成了“大泡沫（The Great Bubble）”的打气筒。
After being threatened by the Senate, FASB backed off its original position and adopted an “honor system” approach, declaring expensing to be preferable but also allowing companies to ignore the cost if they wished. The disheartening result: Of the 500 companies in the S&P, 498 adopted the method deemed less desirable, which of course let them report higher “earnings.” Compensation-hungry CEOs loved this outcome: Let FASB have the honor; they had the system.
在遭到参议院威胁后，FASB 退回了原先立场，改采用一种“荣誉制度（honor system）”的做法：声明期权费用化更可取，但也允许公司如果愿意可以不计入成本。令人沮丧的结果是：标普 500 的 500 家公司中，有 498 家选择了那种被认为“较不理想”的方法——当然，这让它们可以报出更高的“盈利”。渴望薪酬的 CEO 们爱死了这个结局：荣誉归 FASB；制度归他们。
In our 1992 annual report, discussing the unseemly and self-serving behavior of so many CEOs, I said “the business elite risks losing its credibility on issues of significance to society — about which it may have much of value to say — when it advocates the incredible on issues of significance to itself.”
在我们 1992 年年报里，我讨论了很多 CEO 那种不体面且自利的行为，并写道：“当商业精英在与自身利益攸关的问题上鼓吹不可置信之事时，他们就冒着在对社会意义重大、且他们可能确有价值可言的问题上丧失公信力的风险。”
That loss of credibility has occurred. The job of CEOs is now to regain America’s trust — and for the country’s sake it’s important that they do so. They will not succeed in this endeavor, however, by way of fatuous ads, meaningless policy statements, or structural changes of boards and committees. Instead, CEOs must embrace stewardship as a way of life and treat their owners as partners, not patsies. It’s time for CEOs to walk the walk.
这种公信力的丧失已经发生。CEO 现在的工作，是重新赢回美国的信任——而且为了国家的利益，这件事很重要。但他们不可能靠一些愚蠢的广告、毫无意义的政策声明，或对董事会与委员会结构做些表面文章就完成这项任务。相反，CEO 必须把受托责任（stewardship）当成一种生活方式，像对待合伙人一样对待所有者，而不是把他们当成“傻瓜（patsies）”。是时候让 CEO 们言行一致、用行动说话了。
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Three suggestions for investors: First, beware of companies displaying weak accounting. If a company still does not expense options, or if its pension assumptions are fanciful, watch out. When managements take the low road in aspects that are visible, it is likely they are following a similar path behind the scenes. There is seldom just one cockroach in the kitchen.
给投资者三条建议：第一，要警惕会计质量差的公司。如果一家公司仍然不把期权费用化，或者它的养老金假设过于天马行空，那就得小心。管理层在那些人人看得见的地方都愿意走“下坡路”，那么在幕后很可能也在走同样的路。厨房里很少只有一只蟑螂。
Trumpeting EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) is a particularly pernicious practice. Doing so implies that depreciation is not truly an expense, given that it is a “non-cash” charge. That’s nonsense. In truth, depreciation is a particularly unattractive expense because the cash outlay it represents is paid up front, before the asset acquired has delivered any benefits to the business. Imagine, if you will, that at the beginning of this year a company paid all of its employees for the next ten years of their service (in the way they would lay out cash for a fixed asset to be useful for ten years). In the following nine years, compensation would be a “non-cash” expense — a reduction of a prepaid compensation asset established this year. Would anyone care to argue that the recording of the expense in years two through ten would be simply a bookkeeping formality?
大肆鼓吹 EBITDA（息税折旧摊销前利润）是一种尤其有害的做法。这种说法暗示：折旧并不是真正的费用，因为它是“非现金（non-cash）”费用。胡扯。事实上，折旧是一种特别不讨喜的费用，因为它所代表的现金支出是“先付的”：你在资产还没给业务带来任何好处之前，就已经把钱掏出去了。想象一下：在今年年初，一家公司把未来十年员工的工资一次性付清（就像它买一项可使用十年的固定资产时会一次性掏钱那样）。那么在随后的九年里，薪酬就会变成一种“非现金”费用——不过是对今年建立的“预付薪酬资产”的逐年减少。有人会愿意争辩：第 2 年到第 10 年确认这项费用，只是簿记上的形式主义吗？
Second, unintelligible footnotes usually indicate untrustworthy management. If you can’t understand a footnote or other managerial explanation, it’s usually because the CEO doesn’t want you to. Enron’s descriptions of certain transactions still baffle me.
第二，看不懂的脚注通常意味着管理层不可信。如果你看不懂某个脚注或管理层解释，通常是因为 CEO 不想让你看懂。Enron 对某些交易的描述至今仍让我摸不着头脑。
Finally, be suspicious of companies that trumpet earnings projections and growth expectations. Businesses seldom operate in a tranquil, no-surprise environment, and earnings simply don’t advance smoothly (except, of course, in the offering books of investment bankers).
最后，要对那些大肆宣扬盈利预测与增长预期的公司保持怀疑。企业很少处在一个风平浪静、没有意外的环境里，盈利也几乎不可能平滑上升（当然，投行的发行推介书里除外）。
Charlie and I not only don’t know today what our businesses will earn next year — we don’t even know what they will earn next quarter. We are suspicious of those CEOs who regularly claim they do know the future — and we become downright incredulous if they consistently reach their declared targets. Managers that always promise to “make the numbers” will at some point be tempted to make up the numbers.
Charlie 和我不仅不知道我们的业务明年会赚多少钱——我们甚至不知道下个季度会赚多少钱。我们会对那些 CEO 经常声称自己知道未来的人保持怀疑；而当他们还总能精准实现自己宣称的目标时，我们就更是难以置信。那些总是承诺“要把数字做出来（make the numbers）”的管理层，迟早会被诱惑去“把数字编出来”。
Shareholder-Designated Contributions
股东指定捐赠
About 97.3% of all eligible shares participated in Berkshire's 2002 shareholder-designated contributions program, with contributions totaling $16.5 million.
在 Berkshire 2002 年的“股东指定捐赠（shareholder-designated contributions）”项目中，约 97.3% 的合资格股份参与了该计划，捐赠总额为 1,650 万美元。
Cumulatively, over the 22 years of the program, Berkshire has made contributions of $197 million pursuant to the instructions of our shareholders. The rest of Berkshire's giving is done by our subsidiaries, which stick to the philanthropic patterns that prevailed before they were acquired (except that their former owners themselves take on the responsibility for their personal charities). In aggregate, our subsidiaries made contributions of $24 million in 2002, including in-kind donations of $4 million.
在该项目实施的 22 年里，Berkshire 按照股东指示累计捐赠了 1.97 亿美元。Berkshire 其余的慈善捐赠由各子公司自行完成；它们基本沿用被收购前就已形成的慈善捐赠模式（唯一的变化是：原来的所有者本人不再以公司名义承担其个人慈善捐赠的责任）。合计来看，我们的子公司在 2002 年捐赠了 2,400 万美元，其中包括价值 400 万美元的实物捐赠。
To participate in future programs, you must own Class A shares that are registered in the name of the actual owner, not the nominee name of a broker, bank or depository. Shares not so registered on August 31, 2003 will be ineligible for the 2003 program. When you get the contributions form from us, return it promptly so that it does not get put aside or forgotten. Designations received after the due date will not be honored.
若要参与未来的项目，你必须持有以“实际所有人本人姓名”登记的 A 类股，而不是以经纪商、银行或托管机构的代持名义（nominee name）登记的股份。若股份在 2003 年 8 月 31 日时仍未按上述方式登记，将不具备参与 2003 年项目的资格。你从我们这里收到捐赠表格后，请尽快寄回，以免被搁置或遗忘。逾期提交的指定将不予承认。
The Annual Meeting
年度股东大会
This year’s annual meeting will be held on Saturday, May 3, and once again we will be at the Civic Auditorium. The doors will open at 7 a.m., the movie will begin at 8:30, and the meeting itself will commence at 9:30. There will be a short break at noon for food. (Sandwiches will be available at the Civic’s concession stands.) That interlude aside, Charlie and I will answer questions until 3:30. Give us your best shot.
今年的年度股东大会将于 5 月 3 日（周六）举行，地点依旧是 Civic Auditorium。大门早上 7 点开放，影片 8:30 开始，会议本身 9:30 正式开始。中午会短暂休息用餐。（Civic 的餐饮摊位会提供三明治。）除了这段插曲之外，Charlie 和我会一直回答问题到 3:30。放马过来，尽管出招。
An attachment to the proxy material that is enclosed with this report explains how you can obtain the credential you will need for admission to the meeting and other events. As for plane, hotel and car reservations, we have again signed up American Express (800-799-6634) to give you special help. They do a terrific job for us each year, and I thank them for it.
随本报告附上的委托书（proxy）材料中有一份附件，解释了你如何获取进入大会及其他活动所需的入场凭证（credential）。至于机票、酒店与租车预订，我们再次委托 American Express（800-799-6634）为你提供特别协助。他们每年都帮我们把事情办得非常漂亮，在此向他们致谢。
In our usual fashion, we will run vans from the larger hotels to the meeting. Afterwards, the vans will make trips back to the hotels and to Nebraska Furniture Mart, Borsheim’s and the airport. Even so, you are likely to find a car useful.
按惯例，我们会从规模较大的酒店安排面包车接送股东前往会场。会议结束后，面包车会把大家送回酒店，以及 Nebraska Furniture Mart、Borsheim’s 和机场。即便如此，你可能还是会觉得有辆车更方便。
Our exhibit area for Berkshire goods and services will be bigger and better than ever this year. So be prepared to spend. I think you will particularly enjoy visiting The Pampered Chef display, where you may run into Doris and Sheila.
今年我们的 Berkshire 商品与服务展区会比以往更大、更好。所以做好准备：要花钱。我想你会特别喜欢 The Pampered Chef 的展位，那里你可能会遇到 Doris 和 Sheila。
GEICO will have a booth staffed by a number of its top counselors from around the country, all of them ready to supply you with auto insurance quotes. In most cases, GEICO will be able to give you a special shareholder discount (usually 8%). This special offer is permitted by 41 of the 49 jurisdictions in which we operate. Bring the details of your existing insurance and check out whether we can save you money.
GEICO 会设一个展台，由来自全国各地的一批顶尖顾问（counselors）驻场，随时为你提供车险报价。多数情况下，GEICO 可以给股东一个特别折扣（通常为 8%）。在我们运营的 49 个辖区中，有 41 个允许我们提供这项特别优惠。带上你现有保险的相关信息，来看看我们能不能帮你省钱。
On Saturday, at the Omaha airport, we will have the usual array of aircraft from NetJets® available for your inspection. Just ask a representative at the Civic about viewing any of these planes. If you buy what we consider an appropriate number of items during the weekend, you may well need your own plane to take them home. Furthermore, if you buy a fraction of a plane, I’ll personally see that you get a three-pack of briefs from Fruit of the Loom.
周六，在 Omaha 机场，我们会照常展示一批 NetJets® 的飞机供你参观。只要在 Civic 找一位工作人员问一下，就能安排你去看任何一架飞机。要是你在这个周末买了我们认为“合适数量”的东西，你很可能会需要自己的飞机把它们带回家。另外，如果你买下一架飞机的分时产权（fraction），我会亲自确保你收到 Fruit of the Loom 的三条装内裤一套。
At Nebraska Furniture Mart, located on a 77-acre site on 72nd Street between Dodge and Pacific, we will again be having “Berkshire Weekend” pricing, which means we will be offering our shareholders a discount that is customarily given only to employees. We initiated this special pricing at NFM six years ago, and sales during the “Weekend” grew from $5.3 million in 1997 to $14.2 million in 2002.
在 Nebraska Furniture Mart（NFM）——位于 72nd Street、Dodge 与 Pacific 之间，占地 77 英亩——我们将再次推出“Berkshire Weekend”价格，也就是给股东提供通常只给员工的折扣。我们在六年前开始在 NFM 推行这一特殊定价，“周末”期间的销售额从 1997 年的 530 万美元增长到 2002 年的 1,420 万美元。
To get the discount, you must make your purchases during the Thursday, May 1 through Monday, May 5 period and also present your meeting credential. The period’s special pricing will even apply to the products of several prestigious manufacturers that normally have ironclad rules against discounting but that, in the spirit of our shareholder weekend, have made an exception for you. We appreciate their cooperation. NFM is open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekdays and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sundays. On Saturday this year, from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m., we are having a special affair for shareholders only. I’ll be there, eating hot dogs and drinking Coke.
要获得折扣，你必须在 5 月 1 日（周四）到 5 月 5 日（周一）这段期间购物，并出示你的大会入场凭证（meeting credential）。这段期间的特殊定价，甚至也适用于一些知名厂商的产品——这些厂商通常有“铁律”禁止打折，但出于股东周末的精神，专门为你破例。我们感谢他们的配合。NFM 的营业时间：工作日 10:00–21:00，周日 10:00–18:00。今年周六晚上 6 点到 10 点，我们会有一场仅限股东参加的特别活动。我会在那儿，吃热狗、喝可乐。
Borsheim’s — the largest jewelry store in the country except for Tiffany’s Manhattan store — will have two shareholder-only events. The first will be a cocktail reception from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. on Friday, May 2. The second, the main gala, will be from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday, May 4. Ask Charlie to autograph your sales ticket.
Borsheim’s——除 Tiffany’s 位于 Manhattan 的门店外，全美最大的珠宝店——将举办两场仅限股东参加的活动。第一场是鸡尾酒招待会：5 月 2 日（周五）18:00–22:00。第二场是主庆典：5 月 4 日（周日）9:00–17:00。记得让 Charlie 在你的购物小票上签名。
Shareholder prices will be available Thursday through Monday, so if you wish to avoid the large crowds that will assemble on Friday evening and Sunday, come at other times and identify yourself as a shareholder. On Saturday, we will be open until 6 p.m. Borsheim’s operates on a gross margin that is fully twenty percentage points below that of its major rivals, so the more you buy, the more you save (or at least that’s what my wife and daughter tell me).
股东价格从周四到周一都有效，所以如果你想避开周五晚间与周日聚集的大人潮，可以选择其他时间来，并表明你是股东。周六我们营业到下午 6 点。Borsheim’s 的毛利率比主要竞争对手足足低 20 个百分点，因此你买得越多，省得越多（至少我太太和女儿是这么跟我说的）。
In the mall outside of Borsheim’s, we will have some of the world’s top bridge experts available to play with our shareholders on Sunday afternoon. We expect Bob Hamman, Sharon Osberg, Fred Gitelman and Sheri Winestock to host tables. Patrick Wolff, twice U.S. chess champion, will also be in the mall, taking on all comers — blindfolded! Last year, Patrick played six games simultaneously — with his blindfold securely in place — and for the first time suffered a loss. (He won the other five games, however.) He’s been training overtime ever since and is planning to start a new streak this year.
在 Borsheim’s 外面的商场区域，周日下午我们会安排一些世界顶级的桥牌专家与股东同桌对弈。我们预计 Bob Hamman、Sharon Osberg、Fred Gitelman 和 Sheri Winestock 会坐镇牌桌。两届美国国际象棋冠军 Patrick Wolff 也会在商场里，蒙眼接受任何人挑战——没错，蒙眼！去年 Patrick 同时下六盘棋——全程蒙眼——并首次输了一盘（不过他赢了另外五盘）。此后他一直加练，今年准备开启一段新的连胜。
Additionally, Bill Robertie, one of only two players who have twice won the backgammon world championship, will be on hand to test your skill at that game. Finally, we will have a newcomer: Peter Morris, the winner of the World Scrabble Championship in 1991. Peter will play on five boards simultaneously (no blindfold for him, however) and will also allow his challengers to consult a Scrabble dictionary.
此外，Bill Robertie——世界上仅有两位曾两次夺得西洋双陆棋（backgammon）世界冠军的选手之一——也会到场测试你的棋艺。最后，我们还有一位新面孔：Peter Morris，1991 年世界拼字锦标赛（World Scrabble Championship）冠军。Peter 将同时在五盘棋局中对弈（不过他不蒙眼），并且允许挑战者查阅 Scrabble 字典。
We are also going to test your vocal chords at the mall. My friend, Al Oehrle of Philadelphia, will be at the piano to play any song in any key. Susie and I will lead the singing. She is good.
我们还准备在商场里“考验”一下你的嗓子。我在 Philadelphia 的朋友 Al Oehrle 会坐在钢琴前，任何歌曲、任何调（key）都能弹。Susie 和我会带头领唱。她唱得很好。
Gorat’s — my favorite steakhouse — will again be open exclusively for Berkshire shareholders on Sunday, May 4, and will be serving from 4 p.m. until 10 p.m. Please remember that to come to Gorat’s on Sunday, you must have a reservation. To make one, call 402-551-3733 on April 1 (but not before). If Sunday is sold out, try Gorat’s on one of the other evenings you will be in town. Show your sophistication by ordering a rare T-bone with a double order of hash browns.
Gorat’s——我最喜欢的牛排馆——今年将再次在 5 月 4 日（周日）仅对 Berkshire 股东开放，供应时间为下午 4 点到晚上 10 点。请记住：周日去 Gorat’s 必须提前订位。要订位，请在 4 月 1 日拨打 402-551-3733（但别早打）。如果周日已经订满了，那就试试你在城里其他晚上的时间。想显得更懂行一点，就点一份三分熟（rare）的 T-bone，再加一份“双倍薯饼（hash browns）”。
There won’t be a ball game this year. After my fastball was clocked at 5 mph last year, I decided to hang up my spikes. So I’ll see you on Saturday night at NFM instead.
今年不会有棒球赛了。去年我的快速球被测出来只有每小时 5 英里之后，我决定把钉鞋挂起来退休。所以我们周六晚上在 NFM 见。
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Next year our meeting will be held at Omaha’s new convention center. This switch in locations will allow us to hold the event on either Saturday or Monday, whichever the majority of you prefer. Using the enclosed special ballot, please vote for your preference — but only if you are likely to attend in the future.
明年我们的大会将移至 Omaha 的新会展中心举行。更换地点后，我们可以把活动安排在周六或周一——具体选哪天，取决于你们大多数人的偏好。请使用随附的特别选票投票表明你的偏好——但前提是你未来很可能会参加大会。
We will make the Saturday/Monday decision based upon a count of shareholders, not shares. That is, a Class B shareholder owning one share will have a vote equal to that of a Class A shareholder owning many shares. If the vote is close, we will go with the preference of out-of-towners.
我们会按“股东人数”而不是“持股数量”来做周六/周一的决定。也就是说，一个只持有 1 股 B 类股的股东，其投票权等同于持有很多 A 类股的股东。如果票数非常接近，我们会按外地股东（out-of-towners）的偏好来决定。
Again, please vote only if there is a reasonable chance that you will be attending some meetings in the future.
再次提醒：只有在你未来确有合理可能参加股东大会的情况下，才请投票。
February 21, 2003
Warren E. Buffett
Chairman of the Board
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