I.H.101.Warren Buffett.Right Business
对经济状况的商业判断——以及某种程度上的对人的判断——但关键是业务的经济状况——这是交易中99%的关键。
1、《1776 Adam Smith.The wealth of nations》
The greatest improvements in the productive powers of labour, and the greater part of the skill, dexterity, and judgment, with which it is anywhere directed, or applied, seem to have been the effects of the division of labour.
劳动生产力的最大改进，以及在任何地方对劳动进行指挥或加以运用时所依赖的技能、熟练与判断中的大部分，似乎都源自分工的作用。
2、《1998-05-04 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting》
64. Avoid the “Frozen Corporation”
避免“冻结的公司”
WARREN BUFFETT: Zone 6, please.
沃伦·巴菲特： 请第6区提问。
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good afternoon, gentlemen. My name is George Donner from Fort Wayne, Indiana.
观众提问者： 下午好，先生们。我是乔治·多纳，来自印第安纳州韦恩堡。
My question has to do with estimating the intrinsic value of a company, in particular the capital-intensive companies like you were mentioning. I’m thinking of things like McDonald’s and Walgreens, but there are lots of others where you have a very healthy and growing operating cash flow, but it’s marginally or completely offset by heavy expenditures on putting up new stores or restaurants, or building a new plant.
我的问题与评估公司的内在价值有关，特别是您提到的资本密集型公司。我想到的是像麦当劳和沃尔格林这样的公司，还有许多类似的公司，它们拥有非常健康且不断增长的经营现金流，但这些现金流却被用于新开店、新餐馆或建新厂房的大量支出部分或完全抵消。
And so my question is, what do you do for your estimate of future free cash flow? And with Treasurys around — long Treasurys around 6 percent — at what rate do you discount those cash flows?
所以我的问题是，您是如何估算未来的自由现金流的？当长期国债收益率大约在6%左右时，您会以什么折现率来折算这些现金流？
WARREN BUFFETT: Well, we discount at the long rate just to have a standard of measurement across all businesses. But we would take the company that is spending the money as it comes in, and they don’t get credit for gross cash flow, they get credit for whatever net cash is left every year.
沃伦·巴菲特： 我们以长期利率作为折现率，只是为了对所有企业采用一个统一的衡量标准。但对于那些随着收入进来就花掉资金的公司，我们不会依据总现金流给出价值，而是依据每年剩余的净现金流。
But of course, if they’re spending the money wisely, even though you have to discount it for more years, the growth in cash development should offset that or they weren’t investing it wisely.
当然，如果他们将资金用在明智的投资上，即使需要折现更多的年份，现金增长所带来的收益应该能弥补这种支出，否则说明他们的投资并不明智。
The best business is one that gives you more and more money every year without putting up anything to get it, or very little. And we’ve got some businesses like that.
最好的生意是每年给你越来越多的钱，而你几乎不需要投入额外的资金来实现这些收益。我们有一些这样的公司。
The second-best business is a business that also gives you more and more money. It takes more money, but the rate at which you invest — reinvest — the money to get that growth is a very satisfactory rate.
第二好的生意是同样每年给你更多的钱，但需要投入更多资金。然而，这些资金再投资所获得的增长率是非常令人满意的。
The worst business of all is the one that grows a lot, and where you’re forced — forced, in effect — forced to grow to stay in the game at all, and where you’re reinvesting the capital at a very low rate of return. And sometimes people are in those businesses without knowing about it.
最糟糕的生意是那种增长很快，但实际上你被迫投入资金来维持竞争力，而这些资金的再投资回报率却非常低。有时，人们进入这样的业务而毫不知情。
But in terms of discounting, in terms of calculating intrinsic value, you look at the cash that is expected to be generated and you discount back at — in our case, we use the long-term Treasury rate. That doesn’t mean that you pay the amount that that present value calculation leads to, but it means that you use that as a common yardstick, that Treasury rate.
至于折现和计算内在价值，我们会根据预计产生的现金流并使用长期国债利率进行折现。这并不意味着你就要支付折现计算得出的现值金额，而是将国债利率作为一个统一的衡量标准。
And that means that if somebody is reinvesting all their cash flow the next five years, they’d better have some very big figures coming in down the road. Because at some day, a financial asset has to give you back cash to justify you laying out cash for it now.
这也意味着，如果某家公司未来五年将所有现金流再投资，那么之后必须要有巨大的现金流回报才行。因为任何金融资产最终必须返还现金，才能证明你现在的现金投入是合理的。
Investing is the art, essentially, of laying out cash now to get a whole lot more cash later on, and something at some point better deliver cash.
投资本质上是现在支付现金以期未来获得更多现金的艺术，而任何资产在某个时刻必须回报现金。
Ben Graham in his class, we used to talk about what he called the Frozen Corporation. And the Frozen Corporation was a company whose charter prohibited it from ever paying anything to its owners, or ever being liquidated, or ever being sold and —
本·格雷厄姆在他的课堂上曾谈到他所称的“冻结的公司”。这种公司章程规定禁止向所有者支付任何款项，也不允许清算或出售。
CHARLIE MUNGER: Sort of like a Hollywood producer. (Laughter)
查理·芒格： 有点像好莱坞的制片人。（笑声）
WARREN BUFFETT: Yeah. And the question was, what was such an enterprise worth? Well, that’s sort of a theoretical question, but it forces you to think about the realities of what business is all about. And business is all about putting out money today to get back more money later on.
沃伦·巴菲特： 是的。问题是这样的企业值多少钱？这虽然是个理论问题，但它迫使你思考商业的本质。而商业的本质是今天投入资金，未来获得更多回报。
Charlie?
查理？
CHARLIE MUNGER: I do think there is an interesting problem that you raise, because I think there is a class of businesses where the eventual cash back part of the equation tends to be an illusion. I think there are businesses where you just keep pouring it in and pouring it in, and then all of a sudden it doesn’t work, and no cash comes back.
查理·芒格： 我确实认为你提到的这个问题很有趣，因为我觉得有一类企业，最终的现金回报往往是种幻觉。这些企业需要你持续投入，直到某一天突然无法运作，再也没有现金回来了。
And what makes our life interesting is trying to avoid those and get in the alternative kind that drowns you in cash. (Laughter)
让我们的生活变得有趣的地方在于，我们努力避免这些企业，选择另一种“用现金淹没你”的企业。（笑声）
WARREN BUFFETT: The one figure we regard as utter nonsense is the so-called EBITDA. I mean, the idea of looking at a figure before the cash requirements and merely staying in the same place — and there usually are — any business with significant fixed assets almost always has with it a concomitant requirement that major cash be reinvested in order simply to stay in the same place competitively and in terms of unit sales — to look at some figure that is before — that is stated before those cash requirements, is absolute folly and it’s been misused by lots of people to sell lots of merchandise in recent years.
沃伦·巴菲特： 我们认为完全荒谬的一个指标就是所谓的 EBITDA（税息折旧及摊销前利润）。它忽视了现金需求，而实际上任何拥有大量固定资产的企业，几乎都需要大量现金再投资，仅仅是为了保持竞争力和销量不下滑。而看 EBITDA 这种未扣除这些现金需求的指标，是绝对愚蠢的，但近年来很多人用它来误导并卖掉大量商品。
CHARLIE MUNGER: It’s not to the credit of the investment banking fraternity that it has learned to speak in terms of EBITDA. I mean, the idea of using a measure that you know is nonsense, and then piling additional reasoning on that false assumption, it’s not creditable intellectual performance. And then once everybody is talking in terms of nonsense, why, it gets to be standard. (Laughter)
查理·芒格： 投资银行行业将 EBITDA 奉为准则并不光彩。明知道这是个荒谬的指标，还以此为基础进行额外推理，这是不值得称道的智力表现。一旦所有人都开始用荒谬的逻辑说话，这种荒谬就变成了标准。（笑声）
75. End of Cold War isn’t an investing factor
冷战结束不是投资的决定性因素
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Second question. Has to do with Ben Graham. And he changed his valuation standards as the decades progressed.
观众提问：第二个问题与本·格雷厄姆有关。他随着时间的推移改变了自己的估值标准。
When he couldn’t buy stocks below a net-net, he changed his standards because the environment changed.
当他无法以低于净流动资产的价格买入股票时，他改变了自己的标准，因为环境发生了变化。
Now, the world today seems to be a much different place than in 1989 when the U.S.S.R. collapsed. Even they are stumbling toward the free enterprise system. The Russian mafia is a perverse illustration of that.
如今，今天的世界看起来与1989年苏联解体时大不相同。即使是他们，也在踉踉跄跄地走向自由企业体系。俄罗斯黑手党就是一种反常的体现。
Now there is only one superpower in the world, the U.S.A., and we must be extremely grateful for the men who put us on the track to the free enterprise system.
现在世界上只有一个超级大国，那就是美国。我们必须非常感激那些让我们走上自由企业体系道路的人们。
Now, the free enterprise system is out of the bottle, it’s not going to get back in. It seems to be expanding and accelerating around the world. With the resulting expansion of world trade, may that lead to a reevaluation of historical measures for measuring investments?
如今，自由企业体系已经走出了瓶子，不会再被关回去。它似乎正在全球范围内扩展和加速。伴随着世界贸易的扩张，这是否会导致对衡量投资的历史标准进行重新评估？
WARREN BUFFETT: Well, my answer to that would be that I doubt it, but I, you know, I also don’t know.
沃伦·巴菲特：嗯，我对此的回答是，我对此表示怀疑，但我也不确定。
But I don’t think that the end of the Cold War is something that I would factor into my evaluation of businesses. There are all kinds of events that happened, and their impact, in terms of being quantified, very difficult to figure over time, very difficult to isolate any single variable in a complex economic equation.
但我不认为冷战的结束会成为我评估企业时的一个考虑因素。世界上发生了各种各样的事件，而要对它们的影响进行量化，在时间长河中非常困难，很难在复杂的经济方程中孤立出单一的变量。
So in terms of how the world was going to work ten years from now, or the returns are going to be on equity in business, you know, I don’t know what will be all the variables that impact on that.
所以，关于世界十年后的运行方式，或者企业股权的回报，我不知道有哪些变量会对这些产生影响。
And obviously, right now people are very bullish about the fact that those returns — or something like those returns — will continue.
显然，现在人们对这些回报——或类似的回报——能够持续下去感到非常乐观。
But I don’t — I would not rely in making such a projection on the fact that the Cold War has ended or really any political or economic development around the world.
但我不会依赖冷战结束的事实，或世界上任何政治或经济发展的事实来进行这样的预测。
I don’t know how to predict future earnings of American business. And when I look at all of the great historic events of the past, nothing there gives me much in the way of a clue as to which ones would signal major changes in profitability of American business.
我不知道如何预测美国企业的未来收益。而当我回顾过去所有的重大历史事件时，没有任何事件能给我提供关于哪些事件会导致美国企业盈利能力发生重大变化的线索。
都有向往当上帝的想法，"pong"的一声，世界从此改变了方向。
Charlie?
查理？
CHARLIE MUNGER: Well, I think you raise one very interesting question. If the rest of the world becomes very much more prosperous, as it will if it adopts the free enterprise system, which investments are likely to do best?
查理·芒格：嗯，我认为你提出了一个非常有趣的问题。如果世界其他地区变得更加繁荣——假如它们采用自由企业体系——哪些投资可能表现得最好？
I would argue that the Cokes and Gillettes and so on are likely to be helped by a great increase in prosperity in what is now the Third World. And I’m not so sure that’s true of a lot of other businesses.
我认为，可口可乐、吉列等公司可能会因目前第三世界国家的巨大繁荣而受益。而我不确定这一点是否适用于许多其他企业。
WARREN BUFFETT: Yeah, we like the international businesses we have. And as I say, our three top holdings all have a major international aspect to them, and really, in aggregate, a dominant international aspect to them.
沃伦·巴菲特：是的，我们喜欢我们拥有的国际化业务。正如我所说，我们的三大主要持仓都有重要的国际化特性，实际上，总体上它们具有主导性的国际化特征。
And there’s no question in my mind that a Coke will grow faster outside of the United States than in the United States, and the same is true of Gillette, maybe the same is true of American Express. So that’s built into what we — our evaluation of those businesses.
毫无疑问，可口可乐在美国以外的增长速度会比在美国更快，吉列也是如此，也许美国运通也是如此。这些都被纳入了我们对这些业务的评估之中。
But I felt that way before 1989, too. I mean, it’s very hard to evaluate how the ball is going to bounce, generally, around the world. But it is a plus to have products such as Gillette has or Coke has, that have demonstrated the fact that they travel extraordinarily well around the world, the people crave those products, and that they’re going to — no one’s going to find a way to do it better than those two companies in their respective fields. And they sell an inexpensive product, so all of that’s going for us.
但早在1989年之前我就有这种看法。我的意思是，很难评估全球格局的走势。但拥有像吉列或可口可乐这样的产品是一大优势，这些产品已经证明它们在全球范围内非常受欢迎，人们对它们有很大的需求。而且没有人会在各自的领域找到比这两家公司更好的运营方式。它们销售的是廉价的产品，这对我们来说是一个优势。
But in terms of how stocks generally sell or the profitability of American business generally is in the future, it doesn’t help me much.
但关于股票的整体表现或美国企业未来的盈利能力，这些对我帮助不大。
Charlie, any more on that?
查理，还有补充吗？
CHARLIE MUNGER: No more.
查理·芒格：没有补充了。
WARREN BUFFETT: OK.
沃伦·巴菲特：好的。
89. Beware of companies that must “spend money like crazy”
小心那些“疯狂花钱”的公司
WARREN BUFFETT: OK, we’re going to go to zone 6 and I’m going to have a Dilly Bar, and Charlie has got one here, too. (Laughter and applause)
沃伦·巴菲特：好的，现在请第6区提问。我先吃一根Dilly Bar，查理也有一根。（笑声与掌声）
These are terrific.
这些真的很棒。
AUDIENCE MEMBER: My question has to do with what you mentioned earlier about how companies have to reinvest a certain amount of cash in their business every year just to stay in place.
观众提问：我的问题与您之前提到的公司每年必须在业务中再投资一定数量的现金以保持现状有关。
And if one could say that the best businesses are the ones that not only throw off lots of cash, but can reinvest it in more capacity. But I suppose the paradox is that the better a company’s opportunities for making expansionary capital expenditures, the worse they appear to be as consumers of cash rather than generators of cash.
如果说最优秀的企业不仅能创造大量现金流，还能将这些现金再投入到扩大产能上去的话，那么这里就存在一个悖论：一家企业越是拥有更好的机会来进行扩张性资本支出，就越会显得它在消耗现金，而非在创造现金。
What specific techniques have you used to figure out the maintenance capital expenditures that you need to do in order to figure out how much cash a company is throwing off? What techniques have you used on Gillette or other companies that you’ve studied?
您使用了哪些具体方法来确定维护性资本支出，以了解一家公司能产生多少现金？在吉列或其他公司上，您使用了哪些方法？
WARREN BUFFETT: Well, if you look at a company such as Gillette or Coke, you won’t find great differences between their depreciation — forget about amortization for the moment — but depreciation and sort of the required capital expenditures.
沃伦·巴菲特：嗯，如果你看像吉列或可口可乐这样的公司，你会发现它们的折旧费用——暂时不考虑摊销——与所需的资本支出之间没有太大差异。
If we got into a hyperinflationary period or — I mean, you can find — you can set up cases where that wouldn’t be true.
如果我们进入一个超级通胀时期——我的意思是，你可以设想一些例子，这种情况可能不成立。
But by and large, the depreciation charge is not inappropriate in most companies to use as a proxy for required capital expenditures. Which is why we think that reported earnings plus amortization of intangibles usually gives a pretty good indication of earning power.
但总体来说，大多数公司的折旧费用用作所需资本支出的替代指标是比较适当的。这也是为什么我们认为报告的收益加上无形资产摊销通常能很好地反映公司的盈利能力。
I don’t — I’ve never given a thought to whether Gillette needs to spend a hundred million dollars more, a hundred million dollars less, than depreciation in order to maintain its competitive position. But I would guess the range is even considerably less than that versus its recorded depreciation.
我从未考虑过吉列是否需要比折旧多花一亿美元，或少花一亿美元，以维持其竞争地位。但我猜测，这个范围比其记录的折旧费用还要小得多。
Businesses you have to worry about — I mean, an airline business is a good case. In the airlines, you know, you just have to keep spending money like crazy. And you have to spend money like crazy if it’s attractive to spend money, and you have to spend it the same way if it’s unattractive. You just — it’s part of the game.
你需要担心的业务——我的意思是，航空业就是一个很好的例子。在航空业，你知道的，你必须不停地疯狂花钱。即使花钱很有吸引力，你也得这么做；而即使花钱不划算，你也得这么做。这就是游戏的一部分。
Even in our textile business, to stay competitive we would’ve needed to spend substantial money without any necessary — any clear prospects of making any money when we got through spending it.
即使在我们的纺织业务中，为了保持竞争力，我们也需要投入大量资金，而在投入后并没有明确的赚钱前景。
And those are real traps, those kind of businesses. And they make out one way or another, but they’re dangerous.
而这些业务就是实实在在的陷阱。这些业务可能会通过某种方式取得一些成果，但它们很危险。
And in a See’s Candy we would love to be able to spend 10 million, 100 million, $500 million and get anything like the returns we’ve gotten in the past.
在See’s糖果业务中，我们很想投入1000万、1亿、甚至5亿美元，并获得类似我们过去的回报。
But there aren’t good ways to do it, unfortunately. We’ll keep looking, but it’s not a business where capital produces the profits.
但不幸的是，没有好的方式实现这一点。我们会继续寻找，但这不是一个资本能直接带来利润的业务。
At FlightSafety, capital produces the profits. You need more simulators as you go along, and more pilots are to be trained, and so capital is required to produce profits. But it’s just not the case at See’s.
在FlightSafety，资本确实带来了利润。随着业务发展，你需要更多的模拟器，需要培训更多的飞行员，因此资本是产生利润的必要条件。但在See’s糖果业务中情况并非如此。
And at Coca-Cola, particularly when new markets come along, you know, the Chinas of the world or East Germany or something of the sort, the Coca-Cola Company itself would frequently make the investments needed to build up the bottling infrastructure to rapidly capitalize on those markets, the old Soviet Union.
在可口可乐公司，尤其是当新市场出现时，比如中国、东德或类似的地方，可口可乐公司本身通常会进行必要的投资，建立瓶装基础设施，以快速抓住这些市场的机会，比如前苏联市场。
So those are — those are expenditures — you don’t even make the calculation on them, you just know you’ve have to do it.
所以这些——这些支出——甚至无需计算，你只需要知道必须这么做。
You got a wonderful business, and you want to have it spread worldwide, and you want to capitalize on it to its fullest.
你拥有一个出色的业务，你希望它在全球范围内扩展，并充分利用其潜力。
And you can make a return on investment calculation, but as far as I’m concerned it’s a waste of time because you’re going to do it anyway, and you know you want to dominate those markets over time.
你可以进行投资回报计算，但在我看来，这是浪费时间，因为你无论如何都会去做，而且你知道你希望长期主导那些市场。
And eventually, you’ll probably fold those investments into other bottling systems as the market gets developed. But you don’t want to wait for conventional bottlers to do it, you want to be there.
最终，随着市场的发展，你可能会将这些投资纳入其他瓶装系统中。但你不想等传统的瓶装公司来做，你希望自己提前布局。
One of the ironies, incidentally — and might get a kick out of it, some of the older members of the audience — that when the Berlin Wall went down and Coke was there that day with Coca-Cola for East Germany, that Coke came from the bottling plant at Dunkirk.
顺便提一下，这有点讽刺——在场的年长观众可能会觉得有趣——当柏林墙倒塌时，可口可乐当天为东德提供的饮料是来自敦刻尔克的瓶装厂。
So there was a certain poetic — (crowd noise) — irony there.
所以，这里确实有某种富有诗意的——（观众骚动）——讽刺。
Charlie, do you have anything on this?
查理，你对这个问题有什么补充吗？
CHARLIE MUNGER: I’ve heard Warren say since very early in his life that the difference between a good business and a bad business is usually the good business just throws up one easy decision after another, whereas the bad business gives you a horrible choice where the decision is hard to make and, is this really going to work? And is it worth the money?
查理·芒格：从很早的时候起，我就听沃伦说过，好的生意和坏的生意之间的区别通常在于，好的生意会不断抛出一个又一个简单的决策，而坏的生意则会让你面临一个又一个糟糕的选择，让人难以决断：“这真的会有效吗？值得投入这笔钱吗？”
If you want a system for determining which is a good business and which is a bad business, just see which one is throwing the management bloopers time after time after time.
如果你想要一个评估什么是好生意，什么是坏生意的系统，那就看看哪种生意不断地让管理层轻松做出明智决策。
Easy decisions. It’s not very hard for us to decide to open a new See’s store in a new shopping center in California that’s obviously going to succeed. It’s a blooper.
简单的决策。比如，我们决定在加州一个显然会成功的新购物中心开一家See’s店，这并不难。这就是轻松的选择。
On the other hand, there are plenty of businesses where the decisions that come across your desk are just awful. And those businesses, by and large, don’t work very well.
另一方面，有许多生意的决策非常糟糕。而这些生意整体表现通常不太好。
WARREN BUFFETT: I’ve been on the board of Coke now for 10 years, and we’ve had project after project come up, and there’s always an ROI. But it doesn’t really make much difference to me, because in the end almost any decision you make that solidifies and extends the dominance of Coke around the world in an industry that’s growing by a significant percentage, and which has great inherent underlying profitability, the decisions are going to be right and you’ve got people there that will execute them well.
沃伦·巴菲特：我已经在可口可乐董事会待了10年，期间我们审议了一个又一个项目，每个项目都有投资回报率（ROI）的计算。但这对我来说并不重要，因为最终，只要你做出的决策能巩固和扩大可口可乐在全球的主导地位，而这个行业的增长率又非常可观，且具有巨大的内在盈利能力，那么这些决策大概率是正确的，而且公司有优秀的人去很好地执行它们。
CHARLIE MUNGER: You’re saying you get blooper after blooper.
查理·芒格：你的意思是，你们一个又一个地做出简单的明智决策。
WARREN BUFFETT: Yeah. And then Charlie and I sat on USAir, and the decisions would come along, and it would be a question of, you know, do you buy the Eastern Shuttle, or whatever it may be?
沃伦·巴菲特：是的。而查理和我在USAir的董事会时，做出的决策就完全不同了，比如“你是否要买下东部航线”，或者其他类似问题。
And you’re running out of money. And yet to play the game and to keep the traffic flow with connecting passengers, I mean, you just have to continually make these decisions — whether you spend a hundred million dollars more on some airport.
而且你的资金快用完了。但为了参与竞争并维持转机乘客的流量，你必须不断做出这些决策——比如是否再在某个机场投入一亿美元。
And they’re agony because, again, you don’t have any real choice, but you also don’t have any real conviction that it’s going to translate — those choices are going to — or lack of choices — are going to translate themselves into real money later on.
这些决策很痛苦，因为你其实没有真正的选择，而且你也没有真正的信心认为这些选择——或者说缺乏选择——最终会带来实际的收益。
So one game is just forcing you to push more money in to the table with no idea of what kind of a hand you hold, and the other one you get a chance to push more money in, knowing that you’ve got a winning hand all the way.
所以，一个是你被迫投入更多资金，但对自己手上的牌完全没底；而另一个则是你有机会投入更多资金，同时知道自己从头到尾都握着一副好牌。
Charlie? Why’d we buy USAir? (Laughter)
查理？我们为什么会买USAir？（笑声）
Could’ve bought more Coke.
我们本可以买更多可口可乐的股票。
98. How Phil Fisher’s “scuttlebutt” method changed Buffett’s life
菲尔·费雪的“边界调查法”如何改变了巴菲特的人生
WARREN BUFFETT: Area 5?
沃伦·巴菲特：请第5区提问？
AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Travis Heath (PH). I’m from Dallas, Texas.
观众提问：我叫特拉维斯·希思（音），来自德克萨斯州达拉斯。
And my question regards what Phil Fisher referred to as “scuttlebutt.” When you’ve identified a business that you consider to warrant further investigation — more intense investigation — how much time do you spend commonly, both in terms of total hours and in terms of the span in weeks or months that you perform that investigation over?
我的问题是关于菲尔·费雪提到的“边界调查法”。当您确定一家值得进一步深入调查的企业时，通常您会花多少时间进行这项调查？总时长是多少？调查通常会持续几周或几个月？
WARREN BUFFETT: Well, the answer to that question is that now I spend practically none because I’ve done it in the past. And the one advantage of allocating capital is that an awful lot of what you do is cumulative in nature, so that you do get continuing benefits out of things that you’d done earlier.
沃伦·巴菲特：嗯，这个问题的答案是，我现在几乎不花时间了，因为过去我已经做过这些调查了。而资本配置的一大优势在于，很多事情的性质是累积性的，因此你会从之前做过的事情中持续受益。
So by now, I’m probably fairly familiar with most of the businesses that might qualify for investment at Berkshire.
因此，到现在为止，我可能已经相当熟悉那些可能符合伯克希尔投资标准的业务了。
But when I started out, and for a long time I used to do a lot of what Phil Fisher described — I followed his scuttlebutt method. And I don’t think you can do too much of it.
但在我刚起步的时候，以及很长一段时间里，我做了很多菲尔·费雪描述的事情——我遵循了他的“边界调查法”。而且我认为这方面的调查永远不会做得过多。
Now, the general premise of why you’re interested in something should be 80 percent of it or thereabouts. I mean, you don’t want to be chasing down every idea that way, so you should have a strong presumption.
不过，你感兴趣的某件事情的总体前提应该占到80%左右。我的意思是，你不想用这种方法追踪每一个想法，所以你需要有一个强有力的假设前提。
You should be like a basketball coach who runs into a seven-footer on the street. I mean, you’re interested to start with; now you have to find out if you can keep him in school, if he’s coordinated, and all that sort of thing. That’s the scuttlebutt aspect of it.
你应该像一个篮球教练在街上遇到一个七英尺高的球员一样。我的意思是，你一开始就应该感兴趣；然后你需要了解他是否能留在学校，是否协调，诸如此类的事情。这就是“边界调查法”的一个方面。
But I believe that as you’re acquiring knowledge about industries in general, companies specifically, that there really isn’t anything like first doing some reading about them, and then getting out and talking to competitors, and customers, and suppliers, and ex-employees, and current employees, and whatever it may be.
但我相信，在你获取行业一般知识和具体公司信息时，确实没有什么比先阅读资料，然后与竞争对手、客户、供应商、前雇员、现雇员以及其他相关人士交流更有效的方法了。
And you will learn a lot. But it should be the last 20 percent or 10 percent. I mean, you don’t want to get too impressed by that, because you really want to start with a business where you think the economics are good, where they look like seven-footers, and then you want to go out with a scuttlebutt approach to possibly reject your original hypothesis.
你会从中学到很多。但这应该是最后的20%或10%的工作。我的意思是，你不想对这些印象过深，因为你确实应该从一家你认为经济状况良好的企业开始，就像那些七英尺高的球员一样，然后用“边界调查法”来验证或否定你的原始假设。
And if you talk to a bunch of people on an industry and you ask them what competitor they fear the most, and why they fear them, and all of that sort of thing. You know, who would they use the silver bullet of Andy Grove’s on and so on, you’re going to learn a lot about it.
如果你和一群业内人士交谈，问他们最害怕的竞争对手是谁，为什么害怕，以及相关的事情，比如他们会用“安迪·格罗夫的银弹”瞄准谁，你会从中学到很多东西。
You’ll probably know more about the industry than most of the people in it when you get through, because you’ll bring an independent perspective to it, and you’ll be listening to everything everyone says rather than coming in with these preconceived notions and just sort of listening to your own truths after a while.
等你完成调查时，你可能比业内大多数人对行业的了解更多，因为你带来了一个独立的视角，并且会倾听每个人的看法，而不是抱着预设立场，仅仅听从自己一开始的成见。
I advise it. I don’t really do it much anymore. I do it a little bit, and I talked in the annual report about how when we made the decision on keeping the American Express when we exchanged our Percs for common stock in 1994, I was using the scuttlebutt approach when I talked to Frank Olson.
我建议大家使用这种方法。我现在几乎不怎么用了，只是偶尔用一下。我在年度报告中提到过，当我们1994年决定将我们的优先股换成美国运通的普通股时，我就是通过与弗兰克·奥尔森的对话使用了“边界调查法”。
I couldn’t have talked to a better guy than Frank Olson. Frank Olson, running Hertz Corporation, lots of experience at United Airlines, and a consumer marketing guy by nature. I mean, he understands business.
没有人比弗兰克·奥尔森更适合交谈了。他经营着赫兹公司，有丰富的United Airlines经验，本质上是一个消费品营销专家。他真的很懂生意。
And when I asked him how strong the American Express card was and what were the strengths and the weaknesses of it, and who was coming along after it, and so on, I mean, he could give me an answer in five minutes that would be better than I could accomplish in hours and hours and hours or weeks of roaming around and doing other things.
当我问他美国运通卡有多强，它的优势和劣势是什么，以及未来可能有哪些竞争对手时，他能在五分钟内给我一个比我花数小时甚至数周时间调查得到的答案更好、更全面的答案。
So you can learn from people. And Frank was a user of it. I mean, Frank was paying X percent to American Express for his Hertz cars. And Frank doesn’t like to pay out money, so why was he paying that? And if he was paying more than he was paying on Master Charge or Visa, why was he paying more? And then what could he do about it?
你可以从人那里学到很多东西。弗兰克自己就是美国运通的用户。他为赫兹的租车业务向美国运通支付了X%的费用。而弗兰克并不喜欢支付额外的费用，那么他为什么愿意支付这笔钱？如果这比他支付给万事达或Visa的费用更高，他为什么还愿意支付？他还能做些什么？
I mean, you just keep asking questions.
我的意思是，你需要不断地问问题。
And I guess Davy [Lorimer Davidson] explained that in that video we had ahead of time. I’m very grateful to him for doing that, because that was a real effort for him.
我想洛瑞默·戴维森在我们之前的视频中解释过这一点。我非常感激他这么做，因为这对他来说确实是一次重要的付出。
But that was really what I was doing back in 1951 when I visited him down in Washington, because I was trying to figure out why people would insure with GEICO rather than with the companies that they were already insuring with, and how permanent that advantage was.
但实际上，这正是我1951年去华盛顿拜访他时所做的事情。当时我试图弄清楚，人们为什么会选择和GEICO投保，而不是继续使用他们已经在使用的保险公司，这种优势能持续多久。
You know, what other things could you do with that advantage? And you know, there were just a lot of questions I wanted to ask him, and he was terrific in giving me the answer. It, you know, changed my life in a major way. So I have nobody to thank but Davy on that.
这种优势还能带来什么？我有很多问题想问他，而他给了我非常出色的答案。这在很大程度上改变了我的人生。所以，这方面我只能感谢戴维。
But that’s the scuttlebutt method and I do advise it.
但这就是“边界调查法”，而且我确实建议大家使用它。
Charlie?
查理？
CHARLIE MUNGER: Nothing to add.
查理·芒格：无可补充。
114. Due diligence is useless and misses the point
尽职调查无用且抓错重点
WARREN BUFFETT: Area 9, please.
沃伦·巴菲特： 第九区，请提问。
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good afternoon. My name is Fred Strasheim (PH) and I’m from here in Omaha.
观众： 下午好。我是弗雷德·斯特拉斯海姆（音），来自这里的奥马哈。
I have a question about your acquisition methodology. And I was intrigued to read in your annual report about your acquisition of Star Furniture.
我想问您关于收购方法的问题。我在您的年报中读到您收购Star Furniture的过程，感到很有趣。
And as I understand the process you followed, Mr. Buffett, you met with Mr. — or you — I’m sorry, you reviewed financials for a brief period, liked what you saw, then you met with Mr. Melvyn Wolff for two hours and struck a deal. And you wrote you had no need to check leases, work out employment contracts, et cetera.
据我所知，巴菲特先生，您的过程是这样的：您花了一小段时间审阅财务数据，觉得不错，然后与梅尔文·沃尔夫先生会面两个小时并达成协议。您写道，您认为不需要检查租约、制定雇佣合同等事宜。
WARREN BUFFETT: Right.
沃伦·巴菲特： 没错。
AUDIENCE MEMBER: I think that most companies, when they do acquisitions, would feel the need to do a significant amount of legal due diligence, to do things like check the leases, check into things like undisclosed environmental liability, or perhaps threatened litigation.
观众： 我认为大多数公司在进行收购时，会觉得需要做大量的法律尽职调查，比如检查租约、调查未披露的环境责任或可能的法律诉讼等事项。
And I guess my question is, have you ever been burned by your approach?
所以我的问题是，您的这种方法是否让您吃过亏？
WARREN BUFFETT: We’ve been burned by the — we’ve been burned only in the sense that we’ve made mistakes on judging the future economics of the business, which would’ve had nothing to do with due diligence.
沃伦·巴菲特： 我们吃过亏，但仅限于在判断企业未来经济状况时犯了错误，而这与尽职调查无关。
We regard what people normally refer to “due diligence” as, as really sort of boilerplate in most cases.
我们认为，人们通常所说的“尽职调查”，在大多数情况下实际上只是例行公事。
It’s a process that big companies go through. And they feel they have to go through it. And they’re ignoring — oftentimes, in our view — they’re ignoring what really counts, which is evaluating the people they’re getting in with, and evaluating the economics of the business. That’s 99 percent of the deal.
这是大公司会走的一个流程。他们觉得必须这么做。但他们忽视了——在我们看来经常忽视了——真正重要的东西，那就是评估与他们合作的人，以及评估企业的经济状况。这占交易的99%。
You know, you may run into an environmental liability problem, you know, one time in a hundred, or you may, you know, you may find a bad lease.
你可能会遇到环境责任问题，这种情况大概百次中有一次，或者你可能会发现一个糟糕的租约。
I asked Melvin about, you know, “Do you have any bad leases?” I mean, that’s the easiest way to do it. And I could read them all and try and look for every clause or something, but it isn’t going to — you know, that is not the problem.
我问梅尔文，“你有没有什么糟糕的租约？”这是最简单的方法。我可以全部读一遍，试图寻找每一条条款或问题，但这不会——你知道，这不是问题的关键。
We’ve made bad — lots of bad deals. We made a bad deal when we bought Hochschild Kohn, for example, the department store operation, back in 1966. But it had — fine people — but we were wrong on the economics of the business.
我们确实做过糟糕的交易，很多糟糕的交易。例如，在1966年，我们收购百货商店Hochschild Kohn时就是一次糟糕的交易。当时有很好的人在经营，但我们对业务的经济状况判断错误。
But the leases didn’t make any difference. You know, that sort of thing just was not important. And I can’t recall any time that what other people refer to as due diligence would’ve avoided a bad deal for us.
但租约并没有什么影响。这种事情根本不重要。我想不起有任何时候，其他人所说的尽职调查能帮我们避免一笔糟糕的交易。
CHARLIE MUNGER: I can’t either.
查理·芒格： 我也想不起有过这样的情况。
WARREN BUFFETT: No. That’s 30-some years. And I —
沃伦·巴菲特： 没有。这是三十多年来的经验。并且——
The key thing — you just don’t want to do — I go — I’m on various public company boards — I’ve been on 19 public company boards — and you know, their idea of the due diligence is to send the lawyers out and have a bunch of investment bankers come in and make presentations and all that.
关键是——你不想做的事情就是——我在不同的上市公司董事会中任职——我曾在19个上市公司董事会任职——你知道，他们所谓的尽职调查就是派律师去，然后让一群投资银行家进来做演示之类的事情。
And I regard that as terribly diversionary, because the board sits there, you know, entranced by all of that, and everybody reporting how wonderful this thing is and how they checked out patents and all that sort of thing. And nobody is focusing really on where the business is going to be in five or 10 years.
我认为这完全是分散注意力，因为董事会坐在那里，被这些东西迷住了，每个人都在汇报这件事多么好，他们检查了专利等等。而没有人真正关注这个业务五年或十年后会怎样。
You know, business judgment about economics — and people to some extent — but the business economics — that is 99 percent of deal making. And the rest, people may do it for their protection. I think too often they do it as a crutch just to go through with the deal that they want to go through with anyway, and of course all the professionals know that. So believe me, they come back with the diligence, whether due or not. And — (Laughter)
你知道，对经济状况的商业判断——以及某种程度上的对人的判断——但关键是业务的经济状况——这是交易中99%的关键。剩下的，人们可能出于自我保护而做这些事。我认为他们太常把尽职调查当成一种借口，只是为了推进他们本来就想推进的交易。当然，所有专业人士都知道这一点。所以相信我，无论尽职调查是否必要，他们都会把结果带回来。（笑）
We are not big fans of that. I don’t know how many deals we’ve made over the years, but I cannot think of anything that traditional due diligence has had a thing to do with.
我们不是这种方式的忠实拥护者。我不知道这些年来我们做了多少笔交易，但我想不出有哪笔交易与传统的尽职调查有关。
CHARLIE MUNGER: No, we’ve had surprises on the favorable side a couple of times —
查理·芒格： 不过，有几次我们在积极方面得到了意外惊喜——
WARREN BUFFETT: That is true. That is true.
沃伦·巴菲特： 确实如此，确实如此。
The kind of people that we’ve generally dealt with have usually told us the bad things first and good things after we made the deal.
我们通常打交道的人，往往会先告诉我们坏消息，而好消息是在交易完成后才告诉我们的。
We made a deal with a fellow over in Rockford in 1969, Eugene Abegg, Illinois National Bank and Trust Company. I made that deal in a couple of hours and, I mean, there just wasn’t any way that Gene was going to be hiding anything bad.
1969年，我们在罗克福德和尤金·阿贝格（Eugene Abegg）达成了一笔交易，他是伊利诺伊国家银行和信托公司的负责人。我在几个小时内就完成了这笔交易，我的意思是，吉恩不可能隐瞒任何坏消息。
For the next ten years when I went over there, every time I’d go to lunch he’d point out some building in town that we owned that wasn’t on the books, or some foundation we had that had money in it he hadn’t told me about.
在接下来的十年里，每次我去那里吃午餐时，他都会指出城里一些我们拥有但未记录在账上的建筑，或者告诉我一些我们有资金但他之前没提过的基金会。
And he even gave me some bills, one of which I carry in my pocket, that he had still sitting around that were issued by the bank that were our own money which he never told me about. We could cut them out like paper dolls. I mean, Gene was not a guy to show all his cards. (Laughter)
他甚至给了我一些钞票，其中一张我现在还放在口袋里，那是银行发行的我们自己的钱，但他从未告诉过我。我们甚至可以像剪纸一样把它们剪出来。我的意思是，吉恩并不是那种会把所有底牌都亮出来的人。（笑）
And those are the kind of people we’ve generally dealt with, and I would certainly say that Melvyn and [his sister] Shirley [Toomin] fit that description in spades.
这些人正是我们通常打交道的对象，我可以肯定地说，梅尔文和[他的妹妹]雪莉[图明]完全符合这个描述。
3、《2007-05-05 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting》
WARREN BUFFETT: I figured it out in 20 years, though. I’ll have to say that for myself. (Laughs)
沃伦·巴菲特：不过，我在 20 年内想明白了。我得为自己说这一点。（笑）
Twenty years, and I finally figured out I was in the wrong business.
二十年后，我终于明白我选错了行业。
But there are businesses — if you gave me first draft pick of all the CEOs in America and said it’s your job to run Ford Motor now or, you know, pick a company that’s in a terribly tough business, you know, I wouldn’t do it.
但是有些企业——如果你让我从所有美国的首席执行官中挑选第一顺位，并说现在你的工作是经营福特汽车公司，或者选择一家处于极其艰难行业的公司，我不会去做。
I mean, that it’s just too tough. They may get it solved, you know, if they get cooperation from unions and a whole bunch of things, but it will not be solely in the control of the CEO who has that job.
我的意思是，这实在是太难了。你知道，如果他们得到工会和一大堆事情的合作，他们可能会解决这个问题，但这不会仅仅由担任该职位的首席执行官控制。
He is dependent on too many good things happening outside to say that he alone can get the job, even if he’s the best in the world.
他过于依赖外界的好事来临，无法仅凭自己就能好这份工作，即使他是世界上最优秀的。
乔布斯回到苹果后再不想做To B的业务，他认为To C才是他真正想做的。
Speaker 2:
So let’s talk more broadly about tablets. A second ago, you said you have a lot of plans for tablets or thoughts about what tablets could be.
那我们更广泛地谈谈平板电脑。刚才你说你对平板有很多计划或想法，关于平板能成为什么。
And when you did your presentation on the iPad, you said it's like, you know, here's your phone, here's your laptop, here's this third category.
在你展示 iPad 时，你说它就像这样：这是手机，这是笔记本电脑，而这是第三个品类。
And if it's not better than a netbook, if it's not of value to people, it's not going to succeed. And in my own review, I liked it. I was favorable. I said it had a chance to really change things.
你还说，如果它不比上网本更好、不对人们有价值，就不会成功。在我的评测中，我很喜欢它，态度积极，我说它有机会真正改变局面。
But I also said people have to feel like it's not an extra thing to carry. They have to feel like it's enough of the time going to replace enough of the things they do on their laptop, not necessarily 100%.
但我也指出，人们必须觉得它不是额外要携带的东西；他们得觉得在足够多的时候，它能替代他们在笔记本上做的足够多的事情，不必百分之百替代。
Is the tablet going to be, eventually replace the laptop, do you think? There are a lot of people who say, well, you'll never do content creation on it, for instance. Talk about what you think, where it's going.
你认为平板最终会取代笔记本吗？很多人说，比如说，你永远不会在平板上进行内容创作。谈谈你怎么看，平板会走向何方。
Not just the iPad, but the tablet itself, as a form factor.
不仅仅是 iPad，而是平板电脑这一形态本身。
Steve Jobs:
I'm trying to think of a good analogy. When we were an agrarian nation, all cars were trucks, because that's what you needed on the farm.
我试着想一个合适的类比。当我们还是一个农业国时，所有汽车都是卡车，因为农场需要它们。
But as vehicles started to be used in the urban centers, And America started to move into those urban and then suburban centers.
但随着车辆开始在城市中心使用，美国也开始向城市乃至郊区迁移。
Cars got more popular and innovations like automatic transmission and power steering and things that you didn't care about in a truck as much started to become paramount in cars.
轿车变得更受欢迎，自动变速箱、动力转向等你在卡车上不太在意的创新开始在轿车上变得至关重要。
And now, Probably, I don't know what the statistics are, maybe one out of every 25 vehicles, 30 vehicles is a truck. Where it used to be 100%. PCs are going to be like trucks. They're still going to be around.
而现在，大概——我不知道确切统计，也许每 25 辆、30 辆车里只有一辆是卡车，而过去则是百分之百。个人电脑会像卡车一样，它们仍会存在。
They're still going to have a lot of value, but they're going to be used by one out of X people.
它们仍将非常有价值，但只会被少数人使用。
5、《2010-11-07 The Forging of a Skeptic - From Accountant to Buffett’s Voice on Wall St.》
Alice: History was one of Warren’s best subjects even when he was very young (in school). He has a liking for it. But at the same time pattern recognition is one of his primary skills and perhaps his greatest skill. So in terms of data points, unlike many people who learn by seeking information on an as-needed basis, Warren is always looking for fuel for pattern recognition before he needs it.
爱丽丝：历史一直是沃伦从小就擅长的科目之一。他对历史有很大的兴趣。但与此同时，模式识别是他最主要的能力之一，甚至可能是他最强的能力。因此，谈到数据点，不像许多人在需要时才寻求信息，沃伦总是在提前为模式识别寻找“燃料”，在他还没有需要它的时候就开始准备。
He’s always looking for context. Having an interest in a broad sweep of history provides vast context for making many decisions because it enables analogies. And that I think has been very helpful for him in avoiding fallacies such as “This time it’s different.”
他总是寻找背景信息，对历史的广泛兴趣为做出许多决策提供了丰富的背景，因为它能够启发类比。我认为这对他避免“这次不同”的谬论非常有帮助。
It allows him to make analogies between industries, for example between the internet/dotcom stocks and early auto stocks, as in the speech he gave at Sun Valley that is described in The Snowball.
这使他能够在行业之间进行类比，例如在他在《雪球》一书中描述的太阳谷演讲中，将互联网/点com股票与早期的汽车股票进行比较。
Miguel: Tell me more about his pattern recognition skills? How is this one of his greatest skills?
米格尔：告诉我更多关于他的模式识别技能？为什么这是他最重要的技能之一？
Alice: Take this example. If you look at the dotcom stocks, the meta-message of that era was world-changing innovation. He went back and more patterns of history when there was a similar meta-message, great bursts of technological innovation in canals, airplanes, steamboats, automobiles, television, and radio. Then he looked for sub-patterns and asked what the outcome was in terms of financial results.
爱丽丝： 以这个例子为例。如果你看看点com股票，当时那个时代的元信息是改变世界的创新。他回顾了更多历史上的模式，当时也有类似的元信息，即在运河、飞机、蒸汽船、汽车、电视和广播等领域的伟大技术创新浪潮。然后他寻找子模式，问这些技术创新在财务结果方面的结局是什么。
With the dotcoms, people were looking to see what was different and unique about them. Warren is always thinking what’s the same between this specific situation and every other situation.
随着互联网公司的兴起，人们在寻找它们与众不同和独特之处。沃伦总是在思考这个特定情况与其他所有情况之间有什么相同之处。
That is the nature of pattern recognition, asking “What can I infer about this situation based on similarities to what I already know and trust that I understand?” There is less emphasis on trying to reason out things on the basis that they are special because they are unique, which in a financial context is perhaps the definition of a speculation. (Warren is not averse to speculation, by the way, as long as it’s what he calls “intelligent speculation,” meaning he’s got long odds in his favor.) But pattern recognition is his default way of thinking. It creates an impulse always to connect new knowledge to old and to primarily be interested in new knowledge that genuinely builds on the old.
这就是模式识别的本质，问自己“根据我已经了解并信任的情况，我能从这个情况中推断出什么？” 他更少强调试图基于它们的独特性来推理，这在金融背景下或许可以定义为投机行为。（顺便说一下，沃伦并不反对投机，只要它是他所称的“明智的投机”，意思是他在这场赌局中有极大的胜算。）但模式识别是他默认的思维方式。这种思维方式促使他总是将新知识与旧知识联系起来，并主要对能够真正建立在旧知识基础上的新知识感兴趣。
Other interesting situations: I have seen him make his famous 5-minute decisions on the phone. Five minutes is the outside amount of time it takes him to make a decision. If the person can be succinct and convey the salient points in 60 seconds he’ll say, “Yes” or “No” in 60 seconds.
其他有趣的情况：我见过他在电话上做出他著名的五分钟决策。五分钟是他做出决策所需的最长时间。如果对方能够简明扼要地在 60 秒内传达要点，他会在 60 秒内说“是”或“否”。
The time is determined by how long it takes the person to convey the salient points, not how long it takes him to think about it. It’s virtually instant once he has grasped the 2 or 3 variables or points that are important to him.
时间是由一个人传达要点所需的时间来决定的，而不是他思考所需的时间。一旦他掌握了对他重要的 2 或 3 个变量或要点，这几乎是瞬间的。
Typically, and this is not well understood, his way of thinking is that there are disqualifying features to an investment. So he rifles through and as soon as you hit one of those it’s done. Doesn’t like the CEO, forget it. Too much tail risk, forget it. Low-margin business, forget it. Many people would try to see whether a balance of other factors made up for these things. He doesn’t analyze from A to Z; it’s a time-waster.
通常，这一点并不被很好地理解，他的思维方式是，投资有一些不合格的特征。因此，他会快速浏览，一旦遇到其中一个，就结束了。不喜欢首席执行官，算了。尾部风险太大，算了。低利润业务，算了。许多人会尝试看看其他因素是否能弥补这些问题。他不从头到尾分析；这浪费时间。
6、《2016-04-30 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting》
And you do — I mentioned pattern recognition earlier — you know, there’s — you — and I would say it’s important to recognize what you can’t do. So we have — we may have tried the department store business and a few things, but we’ve — we’ve generally tried to only swing at things in the strike zone, and our particular strike zone. And it really hasn’t been much more complicated than that.
你确实如此——我之前提到过模式识别——你知道，有——你——我会说，认识到你不能做的事情是很重要的。所以我们——我们可能尝试过百货商店业务和一些其他事情，但我们——我们通常只尝试在我们的击球区内的事情，而我们的特定击球区。实际上，这并没有比这更复杂。
7、《2021-04-15 Jeff Bezos’s Letters to Amazon Shareholders》
Differentiation is Survival and the Universe Wants You to be Typical
差异化是生存之道，而宇宙希望你平庸如常
This is my last annual shareholder letter as the CEO of Amazon, and I have one last thing of utmost importance I feel compelled to teach. I hope all Amazonians take it to heart.
这是我作为亚马逊首席执行官撰写的最后一封年度股东信，我有一件极其重要的事情想要传授。我希望所有亚马逊人都能铭记于心。
Here is a passage from Richard Dawkins’ (extraordinary) book *The Blind Watchmaker*. It’s about a basic fact of biology.
以下这段话摘自理查德·道金斯那本非凡之作《盲眼钟表匠》，讲述的是一个基本的生物学事实。
“Staving off death is a thing that you have to work at. Left to itself – and that is what it is when it dies – the body tends to revert to a state of equilibrium with its environment. If you measure some quantity such as the temperature, the acidity, the water content or the electrical potential in a living body, you will typically find that it is markedly different from the corresponding measure in the surroundings. Our bodies, for instance, are usually hotter than our surroundings, and in cold climates they have to work hard to maintain the differential. When we die the work stops, the temperature differential starts to disappear, and we end up the same temperature as our surroundings. Not all animals work so hard to avoid coming into equilibrium with their surrounding temperature, but all animals do some comparable work. For instance, in a dry country, animals and plants work to maintain the fluid content of their cells, work against a natural tendency for water to flow from them into the dry outside world. If they fail they die. More generally, if living things didn’t work actively to prevent it, they would eventually merge into their surroundings, and cease to exist as autonomous beings. That is what happens when they die.”
“抵御死亡是一项必须努力完成的任务。若不加干预——也就是当生命终结时——身体会趋于与周围环境达到平衡的状态。如果你测量某种生命体的参数，例如体温、酸碱度、水分含量或电位，你通常会发现这些数值与环境中的对应值存在明显差异。比如我们的体温通常高于外部环境，在寒冷的气候中，我们必须努力维持这种温差。当我们死去，这种‘努力’停止，温差开始消失，最终我们的体温与环境一致。并不是所有动物都会为避免与环境温度趋于平衡而付出巨大努力，但所有动物都会在某种程度上做类似的事情。比如在干燥的地区，动物和植物要努力保持细胞中的水分含量，抵抗水分自然流向干燥外部环境的趋势；如果失败，它们就会死亡。更普遍地说，如果生物不积极行动加以抵抗，它们最终将融入周围环境，不再作为独立体存在。这正是它们死亡时所发生的事情。”
While the passage is not intended as a metaphor, it’s nevertheless a fantastic one, and very relevant to Amazon. I would argue that it’s relevant to all companies and all institutions and to each of our individual lives too. In what ways does the world pull at you in an attempt to make you normal? How much work does it take to maintain your distinctiveness? To keep alive the thing or things that make you special?
虽然那段话本意并非比喻，但它仍是一个精彩的隐喻，与亚马逊息息相关。我认为它同样适用于所有公司、所有机构，以及我们每个人的生活。世界是如何在潜移默化中试图让你变得“正常”的？你又需要付出多少努力，才能维持你与众不同的特质？才能保留住那些让你特别的东西？
I know a happily married couple who have a running joke in their relationship. Not infrequently, the husband looks at the wife with faux distress and says to her, “Can’t you just be normal?” They both smile and laugh, and of course the deep truth is that her distinctiveness is something he loves about her. But, at the same time, it’s also true that things would often be easier – take less energy – if we were a little more normal.
我认识一对幸福的夫妻，他们之间有个常开的玩笑。丈夫常常假装苦恼地看着妻子说：“你就不能正常点吗？”然后他们会一起微笑、发笑。当然，内心深处的真相是：正是她与众不同的地方让他深深地爱着她。但与此同时，不可否认的是，如果我们稍微“正常”一些，事情往往也会变得更简单、更省力。
This phenomenon happens at all scale levels. Democracies are not normal. Tyranny is the historical norm. If we stopped doing all of the continuous hard work that is needed to maintain our distinctiveness in that regard, we would quickly come into equilibrium with tyranny.
这种现象存在于所有层面。民主制度并不是常态，历史上专制才是常态。如果我们不再为维持这方面的独特性持续努力，很快我们就会与专制趋于平衡。
We all know that distinctiveness – originality – is valuable. We are all taught to “be yourself.” What I’m really asking you to do is to embrace and be realistic about how much energy it takes to maintain that distinctiveness. The world wants you to be typical – in a thousand ways, it pulls at you. Don’t let it happen.
我们都知道，与众不同、独创性是有价值的。从小我们就被教导要“做自己”。但我真正想告诉你的是，要正视并接纳：维持这种与众不同需要付出巨大的能量。世界千方百计地想让你变得平庸普通——不要让它得逞。
You have to pay a price for your distinctiveness, and it’s worth it. The fairy tale version of “be yourself” is that all the pain stops as soon as you allow your distinctiveness to shine. That version is misleading. Being yourself is worth it, but don’t expect it to be easy or free. You’ll have to put energy into it continuously.
保持独特是要付出代价的，但这是值得的。童话版本的“做自己”是：一旦你展现出与众不同，所有的痛苦都会消失。但这只是误导。做自己确实值得，但不要指望这条路轻松或没有代价。你必须不断地投入能量，才能维持它。
The world will always try to make Amazon more typical – to bring us into equilibrium with our environment. It will take continuous effort, but we can and must be better than that.
世界永远会试图让亚马逊变得更“典型”——与环境趋于平衡。这需要我们持续不断的努力，但我们可以，也必须，比这更出色。
8、《2021-05-01 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting》
43. Top “risk factor” for any business is getting the wrong management
任何企业的首要“风险因素”是管理层不当。
WARREN BUFFETT: The biggest danger — they have that section in the prospectus called, what do they call that? About — certain —
沃伦·巴菲特：最大的危险——他们在招股说明书中有一个部分，叫什么来着？关于——某些——
GREG ABEL: Risk factors. 格雷格·阿贝尔：风险因素。
AJIT JAIN: Risk factors. 阿吉特·贾因：风险因素。
WARREN BUFFETT: Risk factors, yeah.
沃伦·巴菲特：风险因素，是的。
The number one risk factor — you never see it — the number one risk factor is that this business gets the wrong management. And you get a guy or a woman in charge of it that are — they’re personable, the directors like them. They don’t know what they’re doing, but they know how to put on an appearance.
首要风险因素——你永远看不到——首要风险因素是这个企业得到了错误的管理。你可能会让一个人或一个女人负责这个企业，他们很有亲和力，董事们喜欢他们。他们不知道自己在做什么，但他们知道如何营造一种表象。
That’s the biggest single danger that a business — and that that person stays and runs it for 10 or 15 years, and either stays in the textile business or department store business and expands. (Laughs)
这对一个企业来说是最大的单一危险——那个人在那里待了 10 或 15 年，要么继续留在纺织行业或百货商店行业并扩展。 （笑）
讽刺拥抱并扩展的说法。
And, you know, I’ve looked at a lot of businesses. And that’s what’s caused the number one problem. And it isn’t the kind of thing where they list them all because the lawyers tell them to list them.
而且，你知道，我看过很多企业。这就是造成头号问题的原因。这并不是他们因为律师告诉他们要列出所有问题而列出的问题。
9、《2023-05-08 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting》
And now, with 330 million people, all brands in the United States have, like, 18,000 dealers or something. It’s just a business where you’ve got a lot of worldwide competitors, they’re not going to go away. And it looks like there are winners in any given time, but it doesn’t get you a permanent place. Although, as I mentioned, I would say Ferrari is in a special place.
现在，美国有 3.3 亿人，所有品牌大约有 18,000 个经销商。这只是一个有很多全球竞争对手的行业，他们不会消失。在任何给定的时间，看起来都有赢家，但这并不能让你获得一个永久的位置。尽管如此，正如我提到的，我会说法拉利处于一个特殊的位置。
巴菲特不喜欢汽车制造业，但他喜欢Ferrari。
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