伯克希尔·哈撒韦（第一部分）

是的。他处于一个高周转的业务中，需要不断去购买新的证券，以高于其价值的价格卖出，再去买另一个，再以更高的价格卖出。他的理念是，永远不要指望能卖个好价钱，而是要让买入价格足够有吸引力，以至于即使是一个平庸的卖出也能带来好结果。但你每次都会产生交易成本，每次都需要缴税。

Yeah. He's in a high velocity business of constantly needing to go and buy a new security, sell it for more than it's worth, go buy another one, sell it for more than it's worth. And you're gonna make you know, his, notion is never count on making a good sale, have the purchase price be so attractive that even a mediocre sale gives good results. But you're gonna incur transaction costs every time. You're gonna need to pay taxes every time.

比如，你每次都需要做实际的工作来确定你想买卖什么。这是一个高成本的业务。

Like, you're gonna have to do the work of actually identifying what you wanna buy and sell every time. It's a high cogs business.

是的。而且这需要很长时间。所以可悲的是，到了第二年，沃伦在这里屈服于格雷厄姆的劝告，沃伦在1952年初以15,259美元的价格卖掉了所有的GEICO股票。他获得了超过50%的内部收益率，这很惊人。但如果他坚持持有那该死的股票，他会赚到，你知道的，数百倍的钱。

Yep. And it takes a long time. So sadly, tragically, by the next year, Warren has succumbed to Graham's exhortations here, and, Warren sells all of his GEICO stock in 1952, early nineteen fifty two for $15,259. He makes over a 50% IRR on it, which is amazing. But if he just held on to the damn thing, he would have made, you know, hundreds of times more of his money.

但是，当然，格雷厄姆分析这家企业的方式是，嘿。它实际上是以

But, of course, the Graham way to analyze that business is, hey. It's actually trading at

高价交易。

a high price.

对。是的。它的价格等于或高于其价值，所以是时候退出了。是的。这太有趣了。

Right. Yeah. The its price is at or above its value, so it's time to get out. Yep. It's so interesting.

我想在这里稍微退一步，反思一下。因为这整个增长与价值的事情。如果你以这种狭义定义的价值概念来思考，就像我们继续使用雪茄屁股的比喻。你捡起雪茄屁股，抽它，然后就结束了。现在你必须扔掉它。

I just wanna take a step back for a second here and just reflect on that for a minute. Because this whole growth versus value thing. If you think about value in this narrowly defined concept of, like, let's just keep using the cigar butt analogy. You you pick up the cigar butt, you smoke it, and it's done. And now you have throw it away.

就像，我们讨论过的所有工作，识别雪茄屁股，捡起它的交易成本，抽它的成本，为抽它获得的收益缴税，然后丢弃它，并不得不重复整个过程。但增长投资的整个概念是，如果那支雪茄实际上变得越来越大，速度比你抽它的速度还快，那不是很棒吗？而且，你不仅不需要承担所有这些交易成本，而且如果你愿意承担一些风险，并聪明地分析你要承担的风险，企业的价值甚至可能比市场定价的方式增长得更快。这有点像是存在于本·格雷厄姆在投资中愿意考虑的范围之外的新颖概念。完全正确。

Like, there's all the work we talked about of identifying the cigar butt, the transaction cost of picking it up, of puffing it, of paying the tax on your gain of the puff, and then discarding it, and having to go through that whole process again. But the whole notion of growth investing is, well, wouldn't it be nice if that cigar actually got larger and larger and larger faster than you could smoke it? And, like, not only do you have to not incur all those transaction costs there, but if you're willing to take some risk and be smart about analyzing what risks you're gonna take, the business could sort of grow the value of the business could even grow faster than the way that it's being priced in the market. That's sort of this, like, novel concept that exists outside the universe of what Ben Graham was willing to consider in investment. Totally.

现在为了对格雷厄姆公平，你知道，他是在大萧条期间做这一切的。如果你活了二十五年，而股市在这二十五年里持平或下跌，当然，你会这么想。

Now to be fair to Graham, you know, he was doing all this through the depression. Like, if you live twenty five years and the stock market is flat to down for twenty five years, of course, you're gonna think this way.

是的。当然，我们都是环境的产物。我认为巴菲特有句话很适用这种情况，我们之前讨论过市场是称重机还是投票机的问题——称重机本质上将价值等同于价格，你花费的金额就是它的价值；而投票机则是人们根据主观判断定价，与实际证券的重量或价值无关。

Yeah. And, of course, we are all a product of our environment. And, I think one of the phrases that is a a Buffettism that sort of applies to this is, you know, we've talked about is the market, a weighing machine, where the market basically if you think about a weighing machine, then it effectively equates value to price. Whatever you are spending is what it's worth. Or is it a voting machine where people are sort of setting price and voting on the price independent of the weight or the value of the actual underlying security?

这时我们就会意识到：长期来看股市是称重机，但短期而言它确实是投票机。

And this is where the realization sort of comes in that in the long run, it is a weighing machine. But in the short run, it's a voting machine, the stock market.

完全同意。有时短期持续的时间会超出你的想象。总之在五十年代，雪茄烟蒂投资法仍是可靠策略，就像盲人国里独眼称王。

Totally. And sometimes the short run lasts longer than you would think. Yep. So all that said, cigar butt investing was still a sound strategy in the nineteen fifties. You're kinda like in the land of the blind, you know, the one eyed person is is king or queen or whatever.

格雷厄姆的方法确实有效，而沃伦就像海绵般吸收着知识。他参加了格雷厄姆的研讨班，成为史上唯一获得A+成绩的学生。顺便说，同班还有位叫比尔·鲁安的股票经纪人（当时在基德皮博迪公司旁听），他意识到：这个叫巴菲特的家伙将来必成大器。

So, you know, the the Graham approach works, and Warren is just, like, lapping it up. So he takes the seminar. Warren becomes the first and only student to ever receive an A plus in the class from Graham. Side note, also in that same class with Warren is one Bill Ruane, who was a stockbroker at the time at Kidder Peabody and was auditing the class. And he realizes, he's like, man, this buffet guy, like, he's going places.

我要和他交朋友。这个决定后来带来了丰厚回报，我们会在节目尾声看到。毕业后，沃伦渴望更多格雷厄姆的教导，于是找到本杰明·格雷厄姆和杰里·纽曼说：

I'm gonna become friends with him. That would pay off handsomely as we will see at the end of the episode. So after graduation, Warren, he wants more Graham. He can't get enough. So he goes to Ben and and to Jerry Newman and says, hey.

我能加入格雷厄姆-纽曼公司吗？虽然那是个小公司（大概只有六七名员工），但经过商议后格雷厄姆拒绝了他：虽然你是我教过最优秀的学生，但我和杰里有严格规定——只雇佣犹太裔员工。

Can I get a job at Graham Newman? Can I can I work for you guys? And it was a pretty small place. I think there were only, like, six or seven people working there. And they talk about it, and Graham though turns him down and says, you know, I'd love to hire you.

几年后格雷厄姆撤销了这个规定并雇用了巴菲特。这其实可以理解，要知道格雷厄姆是英国裔（注：此处应为犹太裔，原文表述有误）。

You're the best student I've ever had, but Jerry and I have a have a pretty strict policy here, and that is that we only hire Jews. And, he would later recant on this and would hire Buffett in a couple years. But it makes sense. Like, know, Graham was British, I think.

这实际上就像是一种平权法案式的表态。对吧？他是在说，完全正确。我们想为那些曾遭受迫害和歧视的人创造机会。

And this is effectively like an affirmative action type comment. Right? Where he's saying Totally. We wanna make an opportunity here for those who have been sort of persecuted and discriminated against.

没错，要知道这是1952年。二战结束才四年，而格雷厄姆，我相信是英裔欧洲人，他出生在欧洲。你看，虽然这是家小公司，但他们表态说，嘿，我们非常致力于给犹太人提供机会。所以沃伦虽然心碎，但并未退缩。

Exact and this is, you know, 1952. World War two ended four years ago, and Graham was, I believe, British European. He was born in Europe. You know, this is like it's a small firm, but they're like, hey, you know, we're we're we're pretty committed to giving Jews an opportunity here. So Warren is heartbroken, but not deterred.

他回到奥马哈老家，决定好吧，既然不能加入格雷厄姆-纽曼合伙公司，我就自己创立一家合伙公司。我要单干。但格雷厄姆和霍华德（沃伦的父亲）都劝他放弃，他们说——

He goes back home to Omaha, decides, okay. Well, if I can't join the Graham Newman partnership, I'm just gonna set up my own partnership. I'm gonna do it myself. But both Graham and Howard, Warren's dad, talk him out of it. They both say, hey.

在自立门户前，你需要先为别人工作积累经验。最自然的选择就是去你父亲的老牌经纪公司巴菲特-福克工作。于是沃伦去了，成为为他父亲工作的股票推销员。他简直痛恨这份工作。深恶痛绝。

You need some experience first working for someone else before you go and do your own thing. And the natural thing to do is why don't you go work for your dad's old brokerage firm, Buffett Fock? So Warren does, and he becomes the dreaded prescriptionist working for his dad. And he just hates it. Hates it.

厌恶至极。他靠销售股票的佣金过活。

Hates it. Hates it. He's getting paid on commission, selling stocks.

想象整个场景：一屋子人的工作就是推高某只股票，然后打电话给所有客户说'你应该买这个'——这简直是我能想到最违背沃伦·巴菲特理念的事了。

The whole idea of there's a room full of people who are tasked with moving a stock and calling all their customers to say, you should buy this thing. It's about the most anti Warren Buffett thing I can possibly imagine.

完全正确。就像器官排斥反应一样。所以他只能硬着头皮打电话，做分内之事，努力推销产品。

Totally. He's just like it's like organ rejection. So he's, you know, he's making his calls. He's doing what he has to do. He's moving the trying to move the product.

但他会直接和客户通电话，表现得像是，你知道的，他会做任何必要的事，然后突然来一句：嘿，有家叫GEICO的公司，他们是无代理保险模式，你真该考虑也买份他们的保险。人们都觉得他疯了。

But he gets on the phone with people, and he's like, you know, he'll do whatever he has to do, but then he's like, hey. But there's this company called GEICO. They're a agentless insurance company. You should really consider buying that as well. And people think he's nuts.

客户反应都是：没有代理人的保险公司？我要找我的代理人咨询。这太奇怪了。所以他成功率很低。

They're like, insurance company that doesn't have agents. I wanna talk to my agent. Like, that's weird. So he doesn't have a lot of success.

直达消费者模式嘛，宝贝。他们有个超棒的网站。

D to c, baby. They got this great website.

没错。不过这两年插曲倒带来两个好处。

Yeah. So there are two good things, though, that come out of his two year interlude.

其实我很好奇，那时候GEICO怎么运作的？通过邮件吗？还是电话？估计整个流程都是电话完成的吧。

Actually, I am curious. How did GEICO work back then? With that is it by mail? Is it by phone? Presumably, the whole thing's done by phone.

这问题问得好。我猜主要是电话，可能还和政府机构有些合作，比如向机关员工投放广告之类的，具体我也不清楚。

That's actually a good question. I assume phone there might have been some tie in with the government agencies that, you know, maybe there was, like, marketing that went out to agency employees. I don't know exactly.

好吧，看来我们得找机会专门做期GEICO的衍生节目了。

Well, we'll have to we'll have to do a spin out GEICO episode at some point.

是的，我们会的。嗯，这个话题会在第二部分再次提到。别担心。可以说，沃伦还有机会再尝试一次。

Yeah. We will. Well, it'll come up again in part two. Don't worry. Warren gets another bite at the apple, so to speak.

所以这次回到奥马哈的小插曲带来了两件好事。第一，他重新联系上了苏茜·汤普森，她的父亲汤普森博士是奥马哈大学的院长，曾负责霍华德的政治竞选活动。沃伦不知怎么说服了苏茜嫁给他，考虑到沃伦·巴菲特当时的性格和为人，这真是令人惊讶。第二，在逃离经纪公司工作一段时间后，他说服父亲与他一起成立了首个沃伦·巴菲特合伙基金，名为巴菲特父子基金。基本上，沃伦投入了一些自己的钱，父亲也投入了一些家庭资金，这样沃伦就有了更多可管理的资本进行投资。

So two good things that come out of this little interlude back in Omaha. One, he reconnects with one Susie Thompson whose father, Doc Thompson, was a dean at the University of Omaha and had managed Howard's political campaigns. And Warren somehow persuaded Susie to marry him, which shocking given, what Warren Buffett was, his personality and what he was like back then. And two, he also after due to flee, you know, working for a while at the brokerage, persuades his dad to set up the first of the Warren Buffett partnerships with him called Buffett and Buffett. And, basically, Warren puts, you know, some of his money in and his dad puts some of, you know, the family's money in, and Warren just gets, like, some more capital under management to invest here.

这是他初次尝到当老板的滋味。

So it's his first sort of taste of being, being a principal.

没错。关于你提到巴菲特当年如何说服苏茜嫁给他的那段评论，我想补充一点细节。他过去是，现在依然是生活中极度专注的人。虽然晚年他开始尝试更多事情，但他从来不是社交达人，也不会为了社交而深入参与他人的兴趣活动。

Yep. And just to add a little more color to that comment you made on on sort of what Buffett was like back then and got Susie to marry him. You know, he was and is a person of singular focus in his life. And he's sort of in his old age started to do more things, but he was never a socialite. He was never someone that was, you know, deeply diving into other people's interests and, you know, socializing to be social.

他始终是个一心只想投资赚钱的人。所以当他认定'我要娶苏茜'时，自然就会想办法实现这个目标。

He he was a person that has always wanted to invest and make money. And so, of course, he did set his eyes on, hey. You know, I wanna marry Susie, and I'm gonna make that happen.

有很多关于这方面的趣闻，比如家庭聚餐时，就算有客人在场，沃伦也会溜到楼上去读年报。没错，他就像个痴迷股票的狂人。但这种性格的另一面是，他异常专注且执着。尽管被格雷厄姆-纽曼公司拒绝，沃伦仍持续给本和杰瑞写信，不断分享他的投资理念和关注的股票。

Well, there are all these stories about it, like, family dinners, even, like, they'd have friends over, and he Warren would just wander off upstairs and start go reading annual reports in the middle of, like, a dinner party. Yeah. He was like a like a wild man who all he did was invest in stocks. However, the flip side of this, these personality, quirks of Warren are he is very singularly focused and he's very persistent. So despite the rejection from Graham Newman, Warren continues to write letters to Ben and Jerry constantly talking about his ideas, talking about stocks he's looking at.

他频繁前往纽约只为见他们。经过两年这样的坚持，杰瑞终于对本说：'我们虽然有反犹雇佣规定，但或许该为这个年轻人破例，他确实很特别。'于是本·格雷厄姆打电话给沃伦说：'好吧，你被录用了。'

He travels to New York frequently just to go see them and drop in. After two years of this, Jerry finally sits down with Ben and is like, you know, we've got this anti antisemitism, rule here, but, maybe we should make an exception and and and hire this kid. He's pretty special. So Ben Relence, he, he calls up Warren. He's like, alright.

你真想来这儿工作？好吧，我们可以安排。沃伦根本不用问第二遍，他当场就答应了。

You really wanna come work here? Fine. We can make it happen. Well, you don't need to ask Warren twice. He accepts on the spot.

我觉得他都没和苏茜商量，尽管他们已经有了女儿小苏茜，当时还住在奥马哈。他直接就答应了，二话不说全家搬回纽约。他甚至比原定入职日期提前一个月出现在格雷厄姆-纽曼公司办公室，就说了句'行'。

I don't think he even talks to Susie about it even though they have their daughter, little Susie at this point, and they're living in Omaha. He just accepts on the spot. They moves them back to New York at a moment's notice. He literally shows up at the Graham Newman office a month before his initial start date. He's just like, yeah.

'这个月不用付我工资，没关系。'我就这样直接上岗工作了。

You're not paying me this month. That's fine. I'm like, I'm here. I'm working.

太厉害了。

That's awesome.

再次强调，他不想承担纽约高昂的住房费用，所以全家搬到了白原市破旧的公寓——尽管他通过之前各种投资已经相当富有，而且当时在全世界最顶尖的对冲基金工作。天知道他每月只花大概50美元，在远离市区的郊区租房。

Once again, he doesn't wanna pay New York City housing prices, so he moves the family into a crappy apartment in White Plains even though, you know, he's, like, pretty rich already from everything he's been doing. And he's now working at, like, the most prestigious hedge fund in the world. And, you know, he's paying, like, you know, god knows how much, like, $50 a month for an apartment way outside the city.

太疯狂了。称它为对冲基金合适吗？对冲基金和机构资产管理人有什么区别？

That's crazy. Is it fair to call it a hedge fund? Like, what differentiates a hedge fund versus just like a institutional money manager?

问得好。其实我觉得区别不大。

That's a good question. I mean, I don't think really.

我是说，我不认为他们在这个历史节点上会采取大规模做空仓位之类的操作。

I mean, I don't think they're taking, like, huge short positions or anything like that at this point in history.

我不这么认为。我觉得他们偶尔会做空股票。沃伦实际上——我本来不打算把这段写进稿子的——他高中时真是个让人头疼的家伙。可以说一辈子都是。高中时他特别讨厌老师，知道教师养老金主要投资在AT&T股票上。

I don't think so. I think they would sometimes short stocks. And Warren would actually famously I wasn't gonna put this in the script, but, he was a real pain in the ass in in high school. Arguably, real pain in the ass for his whole life. And, in high school, he hated his teachers so much that, he knew that they all had the teacher's pension was mainly invested in AT and T stock.

于是沃伦跑去做空AT&T股票，把做空单据带到学校，放在老师桌上，就为了表明他在赌他们的退休基金贬值。

And so Warren went out and shorted AT and T stock and brought the short the slips in and, like, put him on his teacher's desk just to show he was betting against their retirement funds.

哦，在高中时期，人们已经把他看作天才了，所以这种行为肯定让人毛骨悚然。是啊，他到底知道什么我不知道的？

Oh, and in high school, they would have, like he was already sort of seen as sort of a savant, so that probably would freak people out. Yeah. What, like, what does he know that I don't?

没错。他根本不在乎别人的感受，至少高中时是这样。后来他进了格雷厄姆-纽曼公司，毫不意外地，短短两年内就大获成功。本和杰瑞事事都咨询他，大部分投资点子都是沃伦提出的。

Yeah. He was he didn't really care about people's, feelings, at least when he was in high school. So he lands, he's he's at Graham Newman, unsurprisingly he just like crushes it pretty quickly within another two years. You know, Ben and Jerry are consulting him on everything that they do. Warren's coming up with most of the investing ideas that they're doing.

公司每个决策他都参与，状态如日中天。本这个人——我们就不深究了——可以说是个传奇人物，娶过三任妻子。据说晚年儿子去世后，他还和儿子的女友发展过关系。总之是个奇人。

He's involved in every decision that the firm makes and, he's really hitting his stride so much so that Ben at this you know, Ben is a we're not gonna get super into it. He's he's a very colorful character, shall we say. Had three wives, I think. And then the story goes, I think he he started up a relationship after his last marriage with the girlfriend of this is at the end of his life, with the girlfriend of his son after his son died. Anyway, he's a character.

所以他准备退休了，想去加州享受生活。纽曼也老了，杰瑞也在考虑同样的事。

So he is ready to retire. He wants to move to California, live the good life. So he and Newman is also getting old. Jerry's getting old. He's thinking about the same.

他们提议让沃伦成为公司的普通合伙人，让他实质上延续格雷厄姆-纽曼公司的运营。我猜他们会以名誉合伙人或其他类似身份留任。但这次，沃伦让他们大吃一惊，他回答说，好啊。

They offer to make Warren a general partner at the firm and have him essentially continue, Graham Newman. I assume they would sort of stay as, like, you know, partner emeritus or something like that. But this time, Warren shocks them, and he's like, yeah.

不。记得我特别在意的'按我的条件来'那件事吗？

No. Remember that whole on my terms thing that I really care a lot about?

没错。他说，我不确定。我不想经营你们的公司。如果要经营公司，我会创办自己的公司。我来纽约只是为了和你们共事。

Yep. He's like, I don't know. I don't wanna run your firm. If I'm gonna run a firm, I'm gonna run my firm. And, you know, I'm just here in New York to work with you guys.

其实我不喜欢纽约。苏茜想回奥马哈。我可以在奥马哈开展事业。于是他们最终结束了公司，1956年沃伦、苏茜和他们的小女儿苏茜永久搬回了奥马哈。现在计划是这样的。

I don't actually like it in New York. Susie wants to be back in Omaha. I would do it in Omaha. So they end up winding down the firm and Warren and Susie and little Susie, their their daughter moved back to Omaha in 1956, this time for good. So here's the plan.

说说你觉得这个计划可行性如何。沃伦在格雷厄姆-纽曼工作两年后，此时净资产约17.5万美元。

Tell me how how well you think this is gonna work. Warren's net worth is about a $175,000 at this point after working at Graham Newman for two years.

换算到今天大概有几百万美元

So sorry. A few million dollars by today's

是的。当时美国工人的平均年薪是4800美元，而他银行账户里存着17.5万——哇。当时他才26岁。现在他们有两个孩子，霍伊也出生了。

Yeah. So the average yearly salary for a worker in The United States at that point is $4,800 and he has a 175,000 Wow. Saved up in the bank account. And he's 26 years old. So the plan is, and they have two kids now, Howie's been born.

所以计划是他要退休了。他说，你看，我已经赚够了钱。苏茜真的很希望我能，比如，做个称职的父亲，多参与家庭生活，你知道，就是些小要求。好吧。我想我可以退休了。

So the plan is he's gonna retire. And he says, you know, I've made my fortune. Susie really wants me to, like, you know, be a father and all that, be involved at home, you know, just small requests. Alright. I think I I can retire.

而且，如果我在奥马哈设定一个我们能生活的预算，你看，我就能享受美好生活了。这完全不够温馨。他说，我觉得我们可以把年预算定在1万2千美元。记得年均

And, if I set a budget that we can live on in Omaha, you know, I'm gonna enjoy the good life. This is so not warm. He says, I I think we can we'll set a budget of $12,000 a year. Remember the annual average

收入可是这个的三倍。

income three x though.

是啊是啊。差不多是他每年花费的三倍。我们会在奥马哈买栋好房子。这可是大事。

Yeah. Yeah. Like, close to three x that he would be spending every year. We'll buy a nice house in Omaha. This is huge.

我们会过得像国王一样。然后，你看，剩下的钱我会处理。它们会利滚利。会增值的。太棒了。

We'll live like kings. And then, you know, I'll solve the rest of the money. That'll be compounding. It'll grow. Great.

一切都会很好的。

It'll all be fine.

他银行里到底有多少存款来着？

And how much does he have in the bank again?

175千。

A 175 k.

所以那大约是6.8%？这大概是他认为通过被动投资指数基金能获得的收益，因此他——

So that's, what, 6.8%? So that's probably about what he thinks he can generate passively by just leaving in an index fund, and so he's

他实际上——我确信他认为自己能赚更多。对吧。因为你知道，他还会稍微涉猎一下。他会对自己的资金进行一些主动管理。

he's effectively I'm sure he thinks he can generate more. Right. So, you know, because he's he's still gonna dabble a little bit. He's gonna do a little bit active management just on, you know, his own capital.

为什么我感觉这事没发生过？我

Why why do I feel like this didn't happen? I

不记得这个

don't remember this

书里的部分。

part of the book.

这根本没发生。所以尽管他退休了，你知道，他和家人朋友聚在一起时，他们和他聊天。他满脑子还是钱。最后有些人就说，那你要不要帮我管钱？然后沃伦就说，哦，好吧。

This did not happen. So he's, despite his, retirement, you know, he's hanging out with family and friends and stuff, and they're talking to him. All he could talk about is money. And so eventually, some of these people are like, well, you wanna manage my money? And, and Warren's like, oh, okay.

勉强我吧。我甚至不确定他是不是CC的人。

Twist my arm. I don't even know if he's the CC's.

我有些想法。

I got some ideas.

是啊。我有些想法。于是他开始在奥马哈周边为家人设立这些小投资工具。最初是直系亲属，然后是一些密友，除了他自己管理的资金外，还帮他们理财。他构建这些的方式真的很棒，我特别喜欢他的架构设计。

Yeah. I got some ideas. So he starts setting up these little vehicles around Omaha with family. First, like, immediate family and then a few close friends to manage their money in addition to his own money that he's managing. And he structures these things actually real I I really like the way he structures these.

他强调说，记住，这些人都是他真正在乎的，用他沃伦特有的方式。他把这些机构设计成合伙制，设定4%的年回报率门槛。超过4%的收益部分，作为这些合伙企业的普通合伙人，他能分得超额收益的一半。一半？

So he says, remember, these aren't these are people he really cares about, you know, in his own Warren way. He structures them as partnerships where there's a 4% annual return hurdle. And any returns that he generates above 4%, he as the general partner in these partnerships keeps half of the upside of those returns. Returns. Half?

我以为是25%。

I thought it was 25%.

不。至少根据《滚雪球》记载是五五开。哇，那可相当可观。相当于50%的业绩提成。

No. It was half, at least according to the snowball. Wow. So that's pretty huge. I mean, that's, like, 50% carry effectively.

但有个前提——必须达到4%的基准回报率。

But but there's the 4% benchmark return.

所以如果表现低于4%，他就拿不到任何钱。而且他也不支付任何费用，对吧？他连自己那份都不拿。

So if it underperforms 4%, then he gets no no money. And he's not paying there's no fees. Right? He's not paying himself

没有管理费。但这甚至更好。这就是为什么我认为这实际上相当公平，而且我非常喜欢这种结构。他个人承担了四分之一的下跌风险。所以任何亏损，我认为在0到4%的回报率之间，就像是一个中性区域，什么都不发生。

There's no management fee. But it's even better. This is why I think it's actually pretty fair, and I really like this structure. He personally puts himself on the hook for a quarter of the downside. So any money lost, I think between 04% return, it's like a neutral zone where nothing happens.

我认为如果有任何资本损失，他将个人承担合伙人损失的25%，这些是非常好的激励措施。

I think if there's any capital lost, he will personally cover 25% of the losses of his partners, which is these are pretty good incentives.

是啊。他太擅长激励对齐了。完全同意。

Yeah. He's so good at incentive alignment. Totally.

而且那时他甚至还没见过查理。所以他终于实现了梦想。他完全独立。不为任何人工作。他有点像格雷厄姆-纽曼那样的合伙关系，但都是兼职性质的。

And then he hadn't even met Charlie yet. So he's finally living the dream. He's fully independent. He doesn't work for anyone else. He's got the, you know he sort of has a partnership like Graham Newman, but it's it's all part time.

你知道，他没有雇员。都是独立的合伙关系。全是亲朋好友。外部资金总共才10万多美元。所以钱不算多。

You know, he has no employees. They're all separate partnerships. It's all friends and family. It's a a little over a $100,000 total in outside money. So not not that much money.

所有事情都是他亲力亲为。投资、会计、他甚至亲自为合伙公司报税。没有雇员，没有外包服务。1956年他做所有这些事情的总开支——本，你准备好了吗？

And he does everything everything himself. So the investing, the accounting, he he files all the taxes himself for the partnerships. He has no employees, no outside services. His total expenses for doing all of this in 1956 you ready for this, Ben?

尽管说吧。

Lay it on me.

总计22.71美元。

Amount to $22.71.

这就像我们收购公司的会计方式，所有劳动力都是免费的。

That's like our accounting at acquired where all the labor's free.

没错。完全是这样。而且这包括他产生的所有收益和额外吸收的资金。到年底，他用不到23美元的成本管理着超过50万美元的资金。这相当不错，费率结构很合理。

Yeah. Totally. And that's between all of the gains that he generates and taking in some more money. By the end of the year, he's managing over half a million dollars for less than $23 in cost. That's pretty good, pretty good fee load on that.

于是消息开始在奥马哈传开，说，嘿，沃伦回来了。

So word starts going around Omaha that, like, hey. Warren's back in town.

等等，让我快速确认一下。这25%的下行风险，是像普通合伙人承诺那样投入自己的资金并承担风险，还是他额外承诺会补偿你25%的损失？

And so wait. Let let me understand real quick here. So this 25% of the downside, is that, like, GP commit where he was putting his own money in and that money was just at risk, or was he sort of, like, additionally on top of that saying, I will reimburse you for 25% of your losses?

哇，像回拨条款。是的。实际上在这个阶段，起初我觉得很奇怪，但后来明白了。他并没有真正投入自己的资金。

Wow. Like a clawback. Yeah. So he actually at this point in time at first, I thought this was weird, but then I understood it later. He does not really put in any of his own money.

他每次合伙只投入100美元。他把自己的钱分开管理，起初我觉得这很奇怪。但我想他这么做是因为这些都是亲友。目标是帮亲友们获得回报。他实质上是用自己的资金池做着同样的独立投资。

He only puts in a $100 into each partnership. He's keeping his own money separate, which at first I was like, well, that's weird. But I think he did that because these are friends and family. The goal is to make returns for friends and family. He's essentially making the same investments separately with his own pool of capital.

我

I

明白了。后来当他整合资金时，他把所有家族资金也投了进去。所以我认为他并非把这视为某种收费手段。

see. And then later when he consolidates it all, he puts in all of his family's money as well. So I don't think he really thought of it as like, oh, this is a fee generating scheme.

对。只是说，没错，每一笔都是我为朋友们管理的资金池。

Right. It's just that, yeah, each one of these is the pool of capital for my friends.

没错。很快奥马哈开始流传沃伦回城的消息。如果你愿意投资，他已经开始接受资金了。他根本停不下来。

Yep. Yep. So word starts going around Omaha that Warren's back in town. He's taken on money if you wanna invest with him. So he's he can't help himself.

他乐在其中。他在城里到处奔走，与所有人会面，不停地推销，为他的退休活动筹集资金。其中他结识了奥马哈的戴维斯家族，丈夫是当地著名医生。

He starts he's loving this. He's going around town. He's meeting with everybody. He can't stop pitching, he's raising money for his, retirement activities. One family he gets introduced to is the Davis family in Omaha, the husband of which is a prominent doctor in town.

经过家庭讨论后，他们决定向这个项目投资10万美元。当时沃伦在场，他们说：沃伦，你让我们想起一个曾住在隔壁的聪明年轻人，现在住在洛杉矶。你们简直是一个模子刻出来的。那个我们记忆中最聪明的孩子。

They decide to invest a $100,000 in this venture after discussing amongst the family while while Warren is there saying, you know, Warren, you really remind us of a really bright young man who actually grew up next door to us. Now lives out in Los Angeles. You guys are like the spitting image of one another. This really bright guy we remember. He was the smartest kid we ever knew.

他现在已经离开奥马哈，住在洛杉矶。等他什么时候回城，我们得介绍你们认识。他叫查理·芒格。更多相关内容将在下一期节目中揭晓。

He's left Omaha now. He lives out in Los Angeles. We'll have to we have to introduce you when he's back in town sometime. Charlie Munger is his name. More more on that to come in the next episode.

那是很久以前的事了，对吧？就像，这个...是的。种子已经播下，但他们多年后才会相遇。

Was a while. Right? Like, this was Yeah. The seed was planted, but they wouldn't meet for years.

那是在1956年，而戴维斯夫妇组织的晚宴直到1959年才举行。所以，是的，又过了三年，沃伦和查理才会见面。这一切进展得相当顺利。几年后...

So that was in 1956, and the dinner that the Davises would organize would not happen until 1959. So, yeah, three more years before, Warren and Charlie would meet. So this all goes pretty well. And a couple years later.

你知道他向戴维斯夫妇提出的另一个条件吗？之后他对所有人都会沿用这个条件。哦，不知道。这体现了他希望按照自己的方式做生意，不让别人影响他何时分配资金等事务。他每年只对客户开放一天业务，那天就是12月31日。

Do do you know the one other term that he asked of the Davises and then he would ask for everyone else going forward after that? Oh, no. So this gets to his desire for doing business his way and not having other people sort of influence when he does distributions or anything like that. He is open for business one day of the year to his clients. And that day is December 31.

在那一天，他们可以取出资金或投入资金。除此之外，一切都由沃伦秘密管理。因此他无需披露买卖情况，客户也不能中途撤资。

And on that day, they can either take money out or put money in. But other than that, it is managed by Warren and secret. And so he does not have to disclose what he is buying or selling nor can they take money out.

有意思。我知道他显然没有披露合伙企业的持仓，但没想到一年中只有那一天...是的，可以存取资金。真有趣。所以，这一切运作得很顺利。

Interesting. I knew that he obviously didn't disclose what the holdings of the partnerships were, but, I didn't know that it was only that one day that Yep. That you could take money in or out. Interesting. So, this goes pretty well.

很快，沃伦就通过七个不同的合伙企业筹集了近百万美元。运营大约一年后，他的份额——通过这种附带权益设置（利润超过4%基准阈值部分的50%归他），本质上是想增加对这些资金池的股权持有。他不会把这些钱套现，当然不会，毕竟还有交易成本。

Pretty quickly, Warren's rounded up, nearly a million dollars across seven different partnerships. And after the first year or so of running this, his stake so his intention with this effectively carried interest that he sets up the half 50% of the profits above the 4% benchmark threshold is, he wants to essentially grow his equity ownership of these pools. He's not gonna, like, take that money out in cash. Of course, he's not. There's transaction costs.

有税收问题。还有沃伦·巴菲特。

There's taxes. There's it's Warren Buffett.

他就是沃伦·巴菲特。所以，他在第一年左右就做得非常好，他的费用在纸面上是8.3万美元，这几乎是他开始这项事业时净资产的一半。因此，他现在拥有合并合伙企业的9.5%股份，从几乎零开始。他投入的100美元，现在拥有了哇，几乎10%的这些资金池。

He's Warren Buffett. So, he does so well within the first year or so that his fees are on paper $83,000, which is what, like, almost half of what his net worth was when he started this thing. And due to that, he owns 9.5% of the combined partnership, starting from, you know, essentially zero. His $100 that he put in, he now owns Wow. Almost 10% of these pools.

当然，这是因为在第一年，当道琼斯指数年底下跌8.5%时，巴菲特为他的合伙人赚了10.5%。

And that's, of course, because in that very first year when the Dow finished the year down eight and a half percent, Buffett made 10 and a half percent that year for his his partners.

相当不错。相当不错。所以他现在有了足够的资本，控制着100万美元，可以开始做格雷厄姆-纽曼公司过去做的事情。我们之前没有详细讨论这一点，但雪茄烟蒂式投资还有另一个方面。不仅仅是本、杰里以及后来加入的沃伦会寻找账面价值高于交易价值的公司。

Pretty good. Pretty good. So he now has enough capital under with the million dollars at his control that he can start to do the kind of things that Graham Newman used to do. So we didn't we didn't really talk about this, but there was another aspect to the cigar butt style of investing. It wasn't just that Ben and and Jerry and then Warren when he joined would look for companies with book value above trading value.

他们会在这些公司中积累大量股份，试图进入董事会，就像格雷厄姆在GEICO所做的那样，尽管他在GEICO不需要采取激进手段。但对于其他雪茄烟蒂公司，他们会积极推动公司清算资产，并将现金分配给股东。

They would then amass big positions in those companies, try and get themselves on the board like Graham did with GEICO, although he didn't need to be agitated with GEICO. But with the other with the cigar butt companies, they would then, like, agitate actively to get the companies to liquidate assets and distribute the cash out to shareholders.

哦，这听起来确实像对冲基金。

Oh, it does sound like a hedge fund after all.

是的。这些人就像鲍比·阿克塞尔罗德一样。他们就像是企业掠夺者。现在有了100万美元的资金，沃伦可以开始这样做了。他第一个这样做的公司是一家叫桑伯恩地图的公司。

Yeah. These guys are like, they're like Bobby Axelrod out there. They're like corporate raiders. So now with a million bucks at his disposal, Warren can start to do this. So the first of, the companies he does this with is a company called Sanborn Map.

他将合伙企业35%的资本投入其中，获得公司控制权，迫使公司一分为二，并在分拆中迅速获得50%的利润。砰的一声，就像在桶里射鱼一样轻松。他可以整天这么做。到1960年，总资本已达200万美元，沃伦的份额价值整整25万美元，占合伙企业的13%。

He puts 35% of the capital of the partnerships into it, gets control of the company, forces it to split itself in two and makes a quick 50% profit on the spin off. Boom. Like, he's shooting fish in a barrel. He can do this all day. By the 1960, total capital is up to 2,000,000, and Warren's share is worth a cool quarter of a million dollars or 13% of the partnership.

1961年

In 1961

这太疯狂了。在进入1961年之前暂停一下，回顾一下这些年来的回报。第二年，他赚了41%。第三年，他赚了26%。第四年，也就是1960年，他赚了23%。

this is insane. Pause before you go into 1961 just to recap a few of the returns here year over year. The second year, he made 41%. The third year, he made 26. The fourth year, 1960, he made 23%.

道琼斯指数有好年份也有坏年份。所以它有时在亏钱，有时在赚钱。沃伦一分钱都没亏过。他每年都跑赢大盘。

All well, the Dow is having some good years, some bad years. So it's losing money sometimes. It's making money sometimes. Warren hasn't lost a dollar. He's outperformed every single year.

他每年都保持正收益。事实上，如果把前四年的合伙业绩复利计算，整体收益是141%，而道琼斯指数只有43%。所以，你知道，沃伦的做法是有效的。

He stayed positive every year. In fact, the partnership results as a whole so far, if you compound over those four years, are a 141% compared to the Dow's 43%. So, you know, whatever Warren is doing is working.

哇。那么1961年，我没有道琼斯指数的数据，所以不知道这个表现相对有多好。

Wow. So then 1961 I don't have the Dow numbers in 1961, so I don't know relatively how good this performance was.

1961年的道琼斯指数涨幅是22.4%。

The the Dow numbers in 1961 are 22.4%.

'20 2.4.

'20 2.4.

确实是相当不错的一年。

So pretty good year.

相当不错。沃伦在61年取得了46%的收益，这不仅带来了丰厚回报，还实现了资本复利。合伙人们纷纷表示，请收下我们更多的资金。于是大量资金涌入，合伙企业的总管理规模超过了700万美元，这比格雷厄姆-纽曼公司巅峰时期还要庞大。

Pretty good. Warren does 46% in '61, which not only, you know, generates a bunch of returns, compounds the capital. The partners are like, please take more of our money. Bunch more money flows in. The partnerships are managing over $7,000,000 in total, which is larger than Graham Newman ever was.

哇。让我开始引用一些巴菲特年度信件的内容，因为这是个有趣的现象。他是个出色的写作者——他通过参加公开演讲课程和写作培训来锻炼自己。正如许多人能猜到的那样，他每年都会给合伙人们撰写内容丰富的股东信。

Wow. And let me start quoting from some Buffett annual letters here because this is a is an interesting phenomenon. He was a wonderful writer. He he had sort of trained himself both in public speaking, and and taken some classes in that and in writing. And he wrote these, as I'm sure many people would guess, some prolific shareholder letters to his partnership every year.

这实际上不是他早期经营伯克希尔时的做法。他花了多年时间才重新开始撰写这类信件，但在管理这些投资合伙企业时，他确实认为这是自己义不容辞的责任。让我为您读几段：1962年写道'若业绩不佳，我期待合伙人撤资'；1963年写道'我们必将迎来该被扔西红柿的年份'。

That actually is not something that he did in the early Berkshire years. It took him years to start doing that again, but he really felt like it was incumbent upon him to do this when he was running these investment partnerships. So let me just read from you a few of these. 1962, if my performance is poor, I expect the partners to withdraw. 1963, it is a certainty that we will have years when we deserve the tomatoes.

1964年写道'我相信我们超越道指的优势难以持续'；1965年写道'长期保持16.6%的道指超额收益是不可能的'。类似预警贯穿始终，沃伦不断强调'这不可持续'、'我们无法永远保持如此惊人的优势'。

1964, I believe our margin over the Dow cannot be maintained. 1965, we do not consider it possible on an extended basis to maintain the 16.6 advantage we had over the Dow. This goes on and on and on where Warren continues to caution, I don't think this is sustainable. I don't think we can keep crushing it as hard as we are.

直到今天他仍在坚持这样做——无论是英国脱欧时期的年度信件，还是五十年后，不，是六十多年后的今天。令人惊叹。简直不可思议。没错。

And he does this to this day every year in the Brexit letter or fifty years later. Amazing. More than sixty years later. Unreal. Yep.

于是在1962年这个时间点，当他的规模已超越格雷厄姆-纽曼公司鼎盛时期时，他终于拥有了自己的办公室。多年来他一直在奥马哈家中的备用卧室独自处理所有事务。如今他有了办公室，雇了几名员工，并将所有分散的投资工具整合为单一实体——巴菲特合伙有限公司。

So at this point in 1962, when he's now bigger than Graham Newman ever was, he finally gets an office. He'd been working out of their spare bedroom at the Omaha house all these years doing everything himself. He gets an office. He hires a couple people. He consolidates all these various vehicles into just one vehicle, the Buffett Partnership Limited.

这也是他将个人全部资金投入的时期。至此他拥有了统一投资平台。虽然不确定他是否正式宣布结束退休状态，但可以说——

And this is when he puts all of his own money in as well. So he's got a single vehicle. He's now you know, I don't know if he ever said he officially unretired, but, like

他正式复出了。

He's in business.

没错。他还在给合伙人的信中正式制定了所谓的'基本规则'，就像唐·瓦伦丁早年红杉资本对有限合伙人做的那样。其中有几条原则，最后一条堪称巴菲特风格的标志性特征，正如本你刚才提到的：'我无法向合伙人承诺投资回报'。

He's in business. He also codifies in these letters he's sending out a few official, quote, unquote, ground rules for the partnership, just like Don Valentine did back, in Sequoia in the early days to their limited partners. And, there are a few rules in there. The the last one, kinda like you were saying Ben, hallmark of the Buffett style for years to come. I cannot promise results to our partners.

但我能承诺的是：第一，我们的投资选择将基于价值而非市场热度；第二，通过保持足够的安全边际，我们将把本金永久损失（而非短期账面亏损）风险降至最低；第三，我妻子、子女和本人的几乎全部净资产都投入了这个合伙企业。相当不错的基本原则。到1962年年中完成整合时，31岁的沃伦个人净资产突破了百万美元大关。

What I can and do promise is that a, our investments will be chosen on the basis of value not popularity. B, we will attempt to bring risk of permanent capital loss, not short term quotational loss, to an absolute minimum by maintaining a wide margin of safety. And c, my wife, children, and I have virtually our entire net worth invested in the partnership. Pretty good ground rules. By halfway through that year, 1962 when he consolidates everything, Warren is 31 years old and his net worth crosses the million dollar mark.

他实现了自己的梦想。

So he's achieved his dream.

啊，他成功了。

Ah, he made it.

他提前四年做到了。1963年，巴菲特发现了人生中第二笔伟大的投资，同时也犯下了与之相关的第二个重大错误。第一个当然是GEICO（政府雇员保险公司），第二个则是美国运通。这很棒，有些听众可能已经知道这个故事了。

He made it four years early. The next year in 1963, Buffett finds the second great investment of his lifetime and also the second great mistake that he would make on the back end of it. The first, of course, being GEICO, American Express. So this is great. Some listeners probably already know this story here.

在深入这个故事之前，我想为初次收听本内容的听众提供一个理解框架——你们已经听说过GEICO，现在听到的这些案例就像拼图碎片，每个企业都让巴菲特率先领悟到独特之处，这些商业洞察最终能拼合成一个资本效率惊人的飞轮。或许'飞轮'并非最贴切的比喻，更像是拼图碎片或马赛克镶嵌成精美图案。本质上，是他理解了各类企业独有的特质，这些特质未来都能为他所用。

And before we dive into this story, I think the framework that I would use for if you're listening to this and hearing a lot of this for the first time, you know, you heard about GEICO. You know, you're sort of hearing these puzzle pieces where there's a lesson learned from each of these companies that Buffett was sort of the first to figure out that these businesses are each interesting in a puzzle piece way that fits in with other businesses that in the sum of its whole could create this kind of unbelievable capital efficient flywheel. And I don't know if flywheel is the right term. Puzzle pieces put together into a beautiful puzzle or mosaic might be the right term. But it really is, like, him understanding all these unique types of businesses that have these characteristics that he can then use in the future.

我认为美国运通是他继保险业之后的第二个重要课程，是拼图的第一块之后的关键部分。

And American Express, I feel, is sort of, like, the second big lesson for him after he learns about the insurance business that put the first one.

关于拼图组合的观点我非常赞同。这个认知来自他的第三笔重大投资，也是本期节目要讨论的最后一例——这个我们稍后会讲到。现在回到美国运通的话题。

Well, I think you're totally right about the puzzle piece fitting together aspect. He learns that in his third great investment, which will be the last one we'll cover on this episode. So that's that's coming up. Okay. So back to American Express.

1963年的巴菲特仍深陷'雪茄烟蒂'投资法的思维定式。他当时只寻找廉价交易标的，而运通显然不是烟蒂股。

In 1963, you know, Buffett is he's still under the gram spell here. Like, he's looking for cigar butts. That's what he's doing. He's looking for deals, and Amex is no cigar.

或者用查理·芒格后来的话说：'他在寻找价格合理的平庸企业'。

Or as as Charlie Munger would later put it, he's looking for fair businesses at good prices.

是价格超值的平庸企业。

Great prices. Yeah. Fair businesses at great prices.

平庸的企业，公平的价格。

Not great businesses at fair prices.

没错。完全正确。这正是查理的行事方式，后来巴菲特明智地采纳了这一点。你可能不会想到美国运通，要知道，即便在今天，运通仍广受尊敬。但在那时，美国运通堪称最受信赖的金融服务公司。嗯。

Yep. Exactly. Which is the Charlie way of doing things that Buffett would later wisely adopt. So you wouldn't think that Amex you know, Amex is at this point anyway, it's still widely respected today. But back then, American Express is, like, the most trusted financial services company Mhmm.

在美国。它已经存在了近百年。旅行支票业务——可能很多听众不熟悉旅行支票——但当时它绝对是巨头般的存在，是项了不起的业务。其理念是：如果你要旅行（这是在信用卡出现之前）

In America. It had been around already for close to a hundred years. The traveler's checks business, some many listeners are probably not familiar with traveler's checks, but was it just an absolute juggernaut and an amazing business? The idea was if you were traveling, and this was before credit

信用卡也是。我成长过程中。

card too. Growing up.

是啊，我也是。即便我上大学时出国留学，父母也给我办了运通旅行支票。流程是：你去当地运通办事处，给他们现金，他们会给你旅行支票——本质上是由运通担保的等值纸质凭证。

Yeah. Me too. Even when I was in college, when I studied abroad, my parents got me Amex Travelers checks. The idea was you would go to your local American Express office, give them money, cash. They would in return give you travelers checks, which were essentially like a guaranteed paper for that amount of value backed by Amex.

你可以带着这些支票去任何旅行地。如果丢失了，可以找运通补办。更重要的是，国际旅行时，你可以用它在当地兑换任何货币的资金。

And then you could take those checks anywhere where you traveled. And if you, like, lost them, you could go to Amex. But more importantly, when you're traveling internationally, you could use this as a way to get funds in whatever the local currency was.

对。因为旅行地的人不知道你家乡的银行，甚至可能不了解你祖国的银行体系，所以这是让你的信用全球通用的方式。

Right. Because wherever you're traveling doesn't know about your hometown bank and may not even know about your home country bank, and so this is the way to have your credit accepted everywhere.

没错。当时还没有ATM机，信用卡也处于非常早期的阶段，尽管美国运通是这方面的先驱，推出了美国运通信用卡。总之，这是一家镀金时代的机构。1963年，他们旗下有个小子公司，负责运营仓库并签发仓单。这意味着什么呢？

Right. There are no ATMs, and credit cards are still early early days, although Amex was a pioneer there and had the American Express credit card. Anyway, it's this gilded institution. In 1963, they have a small subsidiary of the company that issued operated warehouses and issued warehouse receipts. So what does this mean?

这就像是仓库版的旅行支票。假设仓库里堆满某种商品，比如色拉油——准确来说是大豆油——你可以请美国运通来检查仓库，然后签发文件证明：'没错，这个仓库里有XYZ吨大豆油'。接着你就可以用这份文件作为抵押品去借款。

It's like the equivalent of a traveler's check for warehouses. You would have warehouses full of a commodity of something, say, salad oil, in this case, soybean oil to be exact, and you would get Amex to come in, inspect the warehouse, and issue paper that says like, oh, yes. There are x y z tons of soybean oil in this warehouse. And then you could take that paper and you could collateralize it. You could borrow against it.

你还可以用它进行交易。本质上是在将这个产品金融化。美国运通的这门生意相当高明，但规模很小，远不及他们的消费者业务。本来一切都很顺利，直到新泽西州（当然总是这种地方）出现了一个名叫安东尼·蒂诺·德安吉利斯的 shady 商品交易商，决定要坑美国运通一把。

You could trade against it. You're you're essentially financializing this product. It was pretty brilliant business that Amex was in, but it was small. This was much smaller than their consumer business. So all this is great until a pretty, shady commodities trader named Anthony Tino DeAngeles in New Jersey, of course, of all places, decides that he's gonna pull one over on Amex.

他的仓库由美国运通监管。他决定用海水代替本应装满大豆油的储罐，欺骗检查人员，然后以此作为抵押借款，本质上就是在运作一个庞氏骗局。

He has his warehouses with them. He decides to fill his tanks, which were supposedly filled with soybean oil with seawater instead and defraud the inspectors and then collateralize it and borrow against it and, you know, run a Ponzi scheme, essentially.

他不是还拿这个去赌博吗？比如他拿着那些写着'这批色拉油值多少吨'的支票去做高风险投资，结果最后血本无归？

Didn't he, like, try and bet with it? Like, he then took it and made some risky investment with his check that said, hey. This is worth so many tons of salad oil, and then he ended up, like, basically losing it all.

对。好像还涉及到期货市场什么的，简直疯狂。这种剧情编都编不出来——那年苏联的大豆歉收，人们以为他们会购买美国大豆油，结果他们没买。

Yeah. There was something about, like had to do with the futures market and, like, it was crazy. I mean, you can't make this stuff up. It was something with, like, Russia and the Soviet Union. Their soybean crop failed that year, and people thought they were gonna have to buy US soybean oil, and then they didn't.

于是价格暴跌。总之，整件事荒谬至极。

And so the price collapsed. Anyway, ridiculous stuff.

但无论如何，简而言之，他现在手上有张纸，有人过来对他说，好吧，把这张纸的价值给我。当然，他不仅没有这笔钱，仓库里也没有任何东西能支撑这张纸的价值。

But, anyway, suffice to say, he's now got a a piece of paper that someone's coming and saying, okay. Give me what that piece of paper's worth. And, of course, not only does he not have it, but there's nothing in the warehouse to back it up either.

所以这张纸一文不值。总的来说，这起欺诈案涉及金额超过1.5亿美元。理论上，美国运通要为此负责。从法律上讲，这尚有争议。毕竟，是蒂诺欺骗了他们。

So the piece of paper's worth zero. So all in, it comes to over a $150,000,000 worth of fraud that happens. And theoretically, Amex is on the hook for this. Now legally, it's debatable. Like, Tino defrauded them.

所以，他们是否真的应该承担责任还有待商榷。但作为美国运通，他们的CEO表示，我们会与债权人达成和解，承担这笔损失。这桩丑闻在华尔街引发了美国运通股价的大地震。

So, you know, whether they should actually be on the hook or not is debatable. But, like, they're American Express. They're the CEO says, like, we're gonna, you know, settle. We're gonna with the creditors, we're gonna we're gonna cover this. This scandal, like, rocks Amex stock on Wall Street.

股价暴跌超过50%，分析师和外界都认为公司难以为继。然而巴菲特却持相反看法。他看到了机会。于是他和新员工们走遍奥马哈、纽约等地，开始采访消费者，在银行与他们交谈，询问：嘿，你对美国运通怎么看？

So the share price drops by over 50%, and analysts and people out there think the company's not gonna survive. Buffett, though, thinks otherwise. He sees an opportunity. So he and his new employees, they go around Omaha and New York and a bunch of other places, and they just start, like, interviewing consumers and talking to them at banks and saying, like, hey. What do you think of Amex?

你听说大豆油丑闻（色拉油丑闻）了吗？还在使用旅行支票吗？信用卡还在用吗？消费者们纷纷表示：哦，我根本没听说过这事。

Have you heard about the soybean oil scandal, the salad oil scandal? Are you still using the traveler's checks? Are you using the credit card? And consumers are like, oh, I I haven't heard of this.

丑闻？你在说什么？当然，

Scandal? What are you talking about? Of course,

我信任旅行支票。于是巴菲特判断，美国运通完全能消化这些损失。即便用现金全额赔付，他们手头也有超过2亿美元现金，加上旅行支票业务带来的5亿多美元浮存金。

I trust the traveler's checks. So Buffett figures that Amex can easily absorb all of these losses. Even if they covered the whole thing out of cash on hand, they have over $200,000,000 of cash on hand, plus over $500,000,000 of float from the traveler's checks business.

没错。这也是他从GEICO那里学到的类似一课，即：听着，公司欠这些持有旅行支票的人的所有债务，只要没有丑闻，他们就不会对我们挤兑。他们不会同时来找我们。这是一种分散负债的投资组合。

Yeah. And this is a similar lesson that he learns from GEICO, which is, look. All of this debt that the company has that that they owe out to these people with Travelers checks, as long as there's not a scandal, they're not gonna have a run on us. They're not gonna come at us all at once. It's a sort of portfolio distributed liability.

因此，只要我尽职尽责，假设消费者信心没有被动摇，美国运通不会遭遇挤兑，那么，嘿，我们实际上状况良好。

And so as long as I do my diligence and I assume that there's that consumer confidence hasn't been rocked and there's not gonna be a run on Amex, then, hey. We're actually in good shape.

于是他在美国运通上下了重注。此时，巴菲特的合伙企业BPL（Buffett Partnership Limited）拥有超过1700万美元的资本。巴菲特立即向美国运通投入了300万美元，这在当时是一笔巨大的头寸。最终，他总共投入了1300万美元，拥有公司5%的股份。美国运通在次年以6000万美元和解了此案。

So he makes a huge bet on Amex. At this point in time, the partnership, BPL, Buffett Partnership Limited, has over 17,000,000 in capital. Buffett puts 3,000,000 into Amex right away, like a huge position at this time. And eventually, he puts 13,000,000 in total into Amex and owns 5% of the company. Amex ends up settling the case the next year for $60,000,000.

股价飙升，他们在1300万美元的投资上赚了两倍半。惊人的胜利，这是他职业生涯中第二笔伟大的投资。同样，这也是第二个极其愚蠢的决定——一旦赚到两倍半，他就全部卖掉了。

The stock goes through the roof, and they make two and a half times their money on the $13,000,000 invested. So amazing win, second great investment, you know, of his career. And similarly, second incredibly stupid decision. Once he gets up two and a half x, he sells it all.

太残酷了。太残酷了。

Brutal. Brutal.

确实残酷。他没听我们的红杉资本第一部分节目。

Brutal. He did not listen to our Sequoia Capital part one episode.

他没听。这也是他某种程度上看到的一个与格雷厄姆理念的背离，直到后来可口可乐的例子才真正显现。但这是巴菲特首次隐约认识到品牌带来的防御性和护城河效应。因为品牌不会出现在资产负债表上，但它是一项巨大的资产。所以我认为巴菲特开始稍微展现一些灵活性，他说，嘿...

He did not. And this is something that he sort of saw too that is a departure from Graham and wouldn't really come about until later with, like, Coca Cola. But this is the first sort of twinkle of it, of Buffett really recognizing the defensibility, the moat that comes from brand. Because brand doesn't show up on a balance sheet, but it's a huge asset. And so it's one of these things where I think Buffett's starting to, you know, flex a little bit and say, hey.

实际上，我能够通过一种不同于传统的尽职调查方式，对这些企业进行超越财务报表上黑白数字的分析，并为那些比以往价值投资者所关注的更为无形的资产赋予价值。

I actually can analyze these businesses a little bit beyond the black and white numbers that are showing up on the financial statements by doing a little bit of a a different form of diligence and assigning value to things that are a little bit less tangible than than previous value investors have in the past.

是啊。想想本·格雷厄姆。你能想象和他谈论品牌及其价值吗？他可能会直接把你赶出办公室。

Yeah. I mean, there's Ben Graham. I could you imagine talking to Ben Graham about brand and the value of brand? He would, like, kick you out of his office.

本·格雷厄姆甚至不会和你讨论产品。他会说，如果你要和我谈产品——我对你关于公司产品如何如何的看法没兴趣。给我看它是否相对于账面价值被低估了。我无法想象把这种逻辑套用在品牌上。

Ben Graham wouldn't even talk to you about product. Like, he's he's like, if you're talking to me about pry I'm not interested in hearing your opinion on the how the company's product blah blah blah. Show me that it's underpriced relative to book value. I can't imagine taking that to brand.

我只想知道他们工厂里有多少机器，以及我能以什么价格卖掉它们。没错。完全是这样。这就是美国运通的故事。大约在同一时期，巴菲特还发现了另一支让他欣喜若狂的‘烟蒂股’。

I wanna know how many machines they have in the factory and what I can sell them for. Yep. Totally. So that's the Amex story. Right around the same time in parallel, Buffett finds another cigar butt that he is just over the moon excited about.

这支股票是他从纽约的一个朋友丹·考恩那里听说的。这是一家濒临倒闭的新英格兰纺织厂，其股价远低于资产的账面价值。

And this one he hears about from a friend, I think in New York, Dan Cowan. It's a failing New England textile manufacturer whose stock was selling for well less than the book value of assets.

我记得大概是50%左右。

I think about 50%.

对。具体数字我这里有。这家公司的房产、厂房设备及现金的账面价值是每股20美元，而股价只有7.5美元。所以...

Yeah. I think the I have the numbers here. Yeah. So the book value of all the property plant and equipment and cash on hand at this company is $20 a share, and the stock is trading at $7.50. So Oh.

沃伦就像他的眼睛突然瞪得老大，真的，特别大。那么我们现在讨论的是哪家公司呢？就是伯克希尔·哈撒韦。伯克希尔这家公司其实源自哈撒韦，其历史可以追溯到新英格兰捕鲸时代，就像《白鲸记》那种背景。顺便一提，我曾试着读那本书，心想‘哦，这应该挺酷的’。

Warren is just like his eyes get real big. Real, real big here. So what is the company we are talking about? We are talking about Berkshire Hathaway. So Berkshire, the company, was really Hathaway, had its origins way back in New England whaling times, like like Moby Dick style, which side note, I tried to read that book once and I was like, oh, this be cool.

它像是个捕鲸冒险故事，美国文学经典。那是我读过最难啃的书，看了大概50页就放弃了。

It's like a whaling adventure. It's an American classic. That is the most difficult book I've ever tried to read. I got like 50 pages in and I was like, no.

这就是你的《聪明的投资者》。

It's your intelligent investor.

没错。完全正确。它其实是《证券分析》的简化版，在我需要《聪明的投资者》这个版本之前。

Yeah. Totally. It it was it was the, security analysis before I needed the intelligent investor version of it.

正是如此。我觉得看待新贝德福德的方式是：它曾是个产业城镇，支柱产业就是捕鲸和鲸油。后来当整个城镇需要转型时，纺织业基于当地已有的技术、人才和劳动力资源逐渐兴起。

There you go. Yeah. I mean, I think the the way to think about New Bedford was, they were an industry town, and their industry was wailing and wailing oil. And then when they sort of pivoted as a town and needed a second industry textile sort of cropped up based on all the competency and talent and labor and stuff that they had in the town.

镇上的商业领袖们集体决定将纺织业作为新方向。如今我们看捕鲸业觉得非常野蛮，确实如此。但它曾是美国的支柱产业——在捕鲸鼎盛时期，马萨诸塞州的新贝德福德是全美最富裕的城镇。

The business leaders in town sort of collectively decided that textiles was gonna be the thing. And, you know, we think about whaling now, it seems barbaric, and it totally was. But it was the biggest industry in America. So New Bedford, Massachusetts was the wealthiest town in America during the whaling years.

这个我倒不知道。

I did not realize that.

没错。这可不是小事。梅尔维尔写关于捕鲸的小说是有原因的。1888年，捕鲸业衰退后（谢天谢地，因为这行业很可怕），霍雷肖·哈撒韦和约瑟夫·诺尔斯创立了哈撒韦制造公司，该公司后来陆续收购合并了多家纺织厂。但新贝德福德的长者们制定的商业计划有个致命问题——在新英格兰地区建纺织厂实在是愚蠢透顶的主意。

Yeah. This was not like some little thing. There's a reason why Melville wrote his novel about whaling. So in 1888, after the whaling business was in decline, thankfully because it was horrible, Horatio Hathaway and Joseph Knowles found Hathaway Manufacturing Company, which would then go on to acquire and merge with a bunch of other mills over the years. There's just sort of one problem with this business plan that the elders of New Bedford come up with, which is that building textile mills in New England was a really, really dumb idea.

愚蠢至极的主意。

Really dumb idea.

为什么说

Why is

呢？因为你看，纺织厂是干什么的？它们把原棉——

that? Because, you know, if you think about it, like, what do textile mills do? They take cotton, raw

从南方运来的原棉

cotton From the South.

没错，从南方运来，然后加工成纱线、成品等等。伯克希尔哈撒韦最终成为了——我记得是——最大的或其中之一的最大男装衬里生产商。

You know? From the South, and they turn it into, you know, yarn, finished products, etcetera. Berkshire Hathaway eventually would become, I think, the largest or one of the largest producers of men's suit linings.

对。还包括合成纤维，比如涤纶。

Yep. Synthetics too, like polyester.

是的，人造的。所以你们是从南方进口这种棉花，对吧？这意味着棉花需要装上船运到新英格兰地区。

Yep. Synthetic. So you you're importing this cotton from the South. Right? That means that, like, the cotton's gotta get on ships and come up to New England.

既然要把大量棉花装船运输，你也可以把它们送到比这个曾经美国最富裕的城镇成本更低的地方去。

Well, if you're gonna put a bunch of cotton on ships, you could also send it to places that have a cheaper cost than the former wealthiest town in America.

或者干脆不装船运输。

Or just not put it on ships.

嗯，最初不是这样的。在1880年代，由于南方的气候湿度问题导致生产存在困难，你不得不通过船只运输。

Well, not not in the beginning. In the eighteen eighties, you had to put it on ships because the climate in the South, the humidity was such that you couldn't like, there were problems with with producing the

所以他们需要把棉花运到气候更凉爽的地方。

So they needed to send it to some cooler climate.

确实需要运到更凉爽的地方，但不必非送到马萨诸塞州的新贝德福德。虽然一开始情况不算太糟。但到了20世纪初，工业空调发明后，就完全不需要用船运输了——直接在南方建造纺织工厂就行，后来人们也确实这么做了。

You needed to send it to a cooler climate, but you didn't need to send it to New Bedford, Massachusetts. It's still like, okay. It's not great off the bat. But then in the early twentieth century, industrial air conditioning is invented, and now you don't need to put it in ships at all. Like, just build the factories, the textile mills there, which people did.

所以这个行业勉强维持着，毕竟已经运营了很久。拥有大量工厂和设备，手头也有可观的现金储备。到了六十年代，公司由诺尔斯的后代西伯里·斯坦顿经营，他就像是新英格兰纺织业的堂吉诃德式人物。

So the business is kinda limping along, but it's been operating for a long time. So there's, like, a lot of mills, lot of plant and equipment. There is a decent amount of cash on hand. By this time in the sixties, it's run by a descendant of Knowles named Seabury Stanton. And Stanton, he's like the Don Quixote figure of, like, the New England textile business industry.

他完全活在自己构建的愿景里——誓要守护新英格兰地区辉煌纺织制造业的遗产与伟大传统。他倾尽所能要让这个行业重现荣光，每年豪掷数百万美元为所有工厂配备最新技术，竭尽全力试图复兴那个黄金时代。

He is all he sees himself as, like, preserving the legacy, the wonderful institution of great textile manufacturing in New England. And he is gonna do everything he can to protect and bring the industry back to his glory days. So he is every year just spending millions of dollars outfitting all the mills with all the latest technology, doing everything he can to, like, bring back the glory days.

没错。他压根没考虑过所谓的...比如...资本回报率这类概念？完全没有。

Yes. He he has not once heard of the sort of, like, notion of, you know, what's your return on invested capital in the business? No.

不。不。不。如果需要资金，只管

No. No. No. If we need capital, spend

投入。源源不断地注入企业。

it. Just pour it into the business.

倾注进去——他就像个履行贵族义务的领主。沃伦从科恩那里听说这事后兴奋不已，心想'天啊这简直太棒了，我要赚翻了'。他开始买入股票。而当西伯里发现巴菲特在收购股票时，自己也跟着疯狂增持。

Pour it into he's he's like a noblesse oblige. So Warren hears about this from Cowen, and he's just like, oh, this is gonna be amazing. I'm gonna make so much money here. He starts buying the stock. Seabury, once he finds out that Buffett is is buying the stock, he starts buying the stock himself.

他就像在说'休想让人夺走我的宝贝'，更别提对方还是恶名昭彰的企业狙击手。起初巴菲特对此很满意，因为他并不真想控股，觉得'股价上涨正好，等涨到某个点位我就抛售'。

He's like, oh, I don't want anybody taking my baby away from me. And let alone, you know, these guys that have a reputation of being corporate raiders. And at first, Buffett is happy about this because he doesn't really wanna own this company. He's like, oh, good. The price is going up.

他甚至想'要是接盘的是西伯里就更好了，我无所谓'。于是他去和斯坦顿会面，商议让公司发起要约收购流通股——特别是沃伦持有的那些股份。

Once it gets to a certain point, I'll sell. And if I sell to Seabury, like, all the better. I don't really care. So he goes and he meets with Stanton. They discuss the company making a tender offer to buy outstanding shares, in particular Warren's shares.

据沃伦所说，他们以每股11.50美元达成了口头协议。沃伦表示很好，如果按此价格发起收购要约，他将出售所持股份。他回到奥马哈后，收到一封信件，宣布的收购价却是11又3/8美元。

And they have according to Warren, they have a handshake deal at $11.50 a share. And Warren says, great. If you launch a tender offer at that price, I will sell my shares. He goes back to Omaha, gets a letter in the mail, tender offer is announced at $11 and 3 eights. 11 and 3 eights dollars.

那相当于多少？

So what's that?

约合11.3738美元左右。

$11.11.3738, something like that.

嗯，也就是比约定价格每股少了12.5美分。

Yep. So 12 and a half cents a share less than what

比他们商定的价格低。这件事至今让我困惑——我查阅过大量资料，包括沃伦本人在内，似乎没人能真正解释为何他如此激动，这不符合他的性格。他确实看重金钱，但通常不会对股票交易情绪化。

Than what they talked about. And this is, like, I still don't understand. I've read a lot about this. Nobody, including Warren, can really seem to explain why Warren gets so worked up about this because that's not in his personality. Like, he cares a lot about money, but it's not in his personality to get worked up about things or to get emotional about stocks.

但他当时彻底失控，异常愤怒。我看到最合理的解释是，不幸的是，他父亲霍华德当时正处于弥留之际，并在同期去世，这肯定对沃伦造成了影响。

But he goes off the deep end. He is, like, pissed. The best explanation I've seen is, sadly, his father, Howard, was was dying around this time Mhmm. And passed away right around this time and must have been affecting Warren.

而且巴菲特一生都建立在信守承诺、诚信交易的名誉之上。可以想象，面对一个缺乏诚信、违背协议的人，这种行径绝对令他难以接受。

Well and and Buffett is also, you know, he's he's built a lifetime reputation on doing right by his word and in dealing in good faith. And I have to imagine that, you know, facing off against someone who is not dealing in good faith and is sort of Yeah. Reneging on an agreement, that can't sit well.

完全同意。不过，你知道，芒格对此的处理方式会是：当有人不诚信时，直接终止合作。沃伦本可以很合理地表示‘好吧，随便吧’然后退出。

Totally. Although, you know, the Munger version of what to do here would be when somebody deals in bad faith, you just don't deal with them. Warren, you know, it would have been completely understandable to say, alright. Fine. Whatever.

我打算以11又3/8美元的价格抛售股票，彻底了结这事。这样还能赚不少。如果你想抗争，坚持持股并声明‘我绝不卖出’也是完全理性的选择。

I'm just gonna sell my stock at eleven and three eights. Get out of this. Be done with it. Still make a lot of money. If you wanna, you know, fight, it would be also totally rational to just hold the stock and say I'm not selling.

但沃伦却说‘去你的’，他发起股权收购要约——这完全不符合他的性格。他开始游说全体股东求购股票，像着了魔一样决心掌控伯克希尔·哈撒韦，把斯坦顿踢出他自己的公司。

Instead, Warren says, screw you. I'm gonna launch a tender offer for your shares, which is so uncharacteristic for him. He starts canvassing the entire shareholder base trying to get anybody to sell him shares. He is on a mission like a man possessed that he wants to get control of Berkshire Hathaway and kick Stanton out of his company.

当时这算是个规模不小的公司吧？我记得纺织厂员工约有1.5万人。

And this is, like, a big ish company at this point. I think it's something like 15,000 people work in the mills.

没错，确实不是小企业。

Yeah. It's it is not a small company.

虽然它后来会萎缩，但当时仍是个大公司。

It would become a small company, but it is currently a large company.

如今除了名字外已不复存在。1965年4月，沃伦获得足够席位进入董事会。次月，他发动了一场董事会政变——同样极不符合其作风——逼退斯坦顿，自己出任董事长。

It's now a nonexistent company, except in name. So by April 1965, Warren gets enough shares to get himself elected to the board. The next month, he stages a boardroom coup essentially. Also, very uncharacteristic of him. He forces Stanton out and installs himself as chairman.

他赢了，而他的奖品就是这家糟糕透顶的公司。问题是，他能怎么办？他可以关闭工厂，但那样就得解雇大约15,000人，让整个新贝德福德镇的人都恨他。可那些厂房又该怎么处理？他能把厂房卖给谁呢？

He's won, and his prize is this super crappy company. And it's not like like, what's he gonna do? He he could shut down the mills, but then he's gotta lay off, like, 15,000 people and have the whole town of New Bedford hate him. But then what what's he gonna do with the buildings? He's gonna sell the buildings to whom?

那些设备又能卖给谁？

He's gonna sell the equipment to whom?

没错。捕鲸业已经完蛋了，其他纺织厂这时候也都半死不活。这资产简直烂透了——除非真能按账面价值清算，那倒不错。但老实说，他做不到。

Right. The the whaling industry is done. Every other textile manufacturer is also not doing great at this point. Like, it's a pretty terrible asset to own other than if he really could have liquidated it for book value, then awesome. But frankly, he couldn't have.

而且他还得顾及声誉问题——这点在后续情节里会越来越明显，第二集尤其如此。巴菲特极其看重声誉，最终这也为他创造了巨大价值。所以他不想被人视作掠夺资产、摧毁当地经济、关停工厂的野蛮人。于是他基本上...（叹气）就像和自己、和公司其他成员达成了某种默契：听着，我们不会再疯狂投资，只做明智决策，最终彻底停止注资——但至少让公司维持运转。

And he's got this reputational thing, which I think we're seeing come into play here, and we'll definitely see more of it in the the second episode in the series, which is Buffett deeply cares about his reputation and will ultimately derive a tremendous amount of value from his reputation. And so he doesn't wanna be seen as this raider who comes in and destroys the local economy and shuts down the mills. And so he basically doesn't. Like, he makes a deal with himself, with the rest of the company, with other and he's like, look. We're just gonna I think, like you probably know better than I do, but basically not continue to invest like crazy, only make very smart investments, eventually make no additional investments into the company, but at least keep it running.

对。他在《滚雪球》里对爱丽丝这样描述伯克希尔：'我买了支湿漉漉的烟屁股想抽一口。想想看——你在街上看到个让人恶心的烟头，但它免费啊，说不定还能嘬最后一口。可伯克希尔连这一口都没有了。'

Yes. So, he would say to Alice in the snowball about this about Berkshire, quote, so I bought my cigar butt and I tried to smoke it. This is amazing. You walk down the street and you see a cigar butt and it's kind of soggy and disgusting and repels you, but it's free and there may be one puff left in it. Berkshire didn't have any more puffs.

所以1965年的伯克希尔·哈撒韦，就像你嘴里叼着个发霉的烟屁股。我把大笔资金套在这支烟屁股上，要是当初压根没听说过它该多好。

So so all you had was a soggy cigar butt in your mouth. That was Berkshire Hathaway in 1965. I had a lot of money tied up in that cigar butt. I would have been better off if I'd never heard of it in the first place.

嘶...节目开头你怎么说的来着？这让他付出了复合机会成本的代价。

Oof. What did you say at the top of the show? It cost him in terms of compounded opportunity capital.

所以，2010年他做了计算并声称，购买伯克希尔不仅是他投资生涯中最严重的错误，而且如果他把投入伯克希尔的资金直接投到一家保险公司，到2010年他估计能多赚约2000亿美元的额外收益。唉。但就像史蒂夫·乔布斯说的，你只能在回顾时连点成线，无法前瞻未来。

So, yeah, in 2010, he did the math and claimed that not only was purchasing Berkshire the worst biggest mistake of his investing career, but had he taken the money that he put into Berkshire and instead just invested it directly in an insurance company, by 2010, he he figures he would have made about $200,000,000,000 in incremental returns. Oh. But like Steve Jobs said, you can only connect the dots looking backwards, not looking forwards.

现在有一家以它命名的能源公司、一家以它命名的房地产经纪公司，诸如此类，层出不穷。

And now there's an energy company that bears its name and a real estate brokerage that bears its name and on and on and on.

不仅如此，我认为如果他没有买伯克希尔，他可能不会发现或至少不会以同样方式完成他的第三笔伟大投资，并从中领悟到真正推动他整个职业生涯和伯克希尔·哈撒韦未来发展的关键教训。接下来的几年，尽管有这些伯克希尔的糟心事，情况依然很好。得益于美国运通，到1965年底，合伙企业的资产达到3700万美元。巴菲特的净资产约为700万美元。

So not only that, but I do think if he hadn't bought Berkshire, I don't think he would have figured made his third great investment or at least wouldn't have made it in the same way and figured out the same lesson from it that really drove the entire rest of his career and and what Berkshire Hathaway would become. So the next couple years, despite all this Berkshire nonsense, things go great. Thanks to American Express at the end of sixty five, the partnership has $37,000,000 in assets. Buffett's net worth is about $7,000,000.

那年（1965年）道指上涨14%，而巴菲特的合伙企业收益率高达47%。所以不仅持续跑赢道指，且自成立以来每年都保持正收益。

And that year, 1965, the Dow did 14%, and, of course, Buffett's partnership did 47%. So still, not only beating the Dow, but positive every year of its existence so far.

疯狂。所有这些成功逐渐累积，给沃伦带来压力。1966年1月，由于现在从你那里得知12月31日是合伙人可以撤资或注资的日子——1965年12月31日，合伙人又向合伙企业投入了680万美元。

Crazy. So all this success is sort of building up and and weighing on on Warren. So in January '66, thanks to now knowing from you that on December 31 was the day that partners could take money out or put money in. On 12/31/1965, partners invest another $6,800,000 in the partnership.

换你也会这么做吧？确实。

Wouldn't you? Like, yeah.

全押上了，伙计。这是沃伦第一次不知道如何处理这么多资金。他开始留出部分现金储备——他以前从未这样做过，总是100%投资。他开始担心可能找不到足够好的投资来消化现在需要运作的所有资本。

All in, baby. So for the first time, Warren doesn't know what to do with all the money. He starts setting aside some cash reserves. Like, he's never done this before. He's always been a 100% invested, and he starts to worry that he might not be able to find enough good investments for all the capital he now needs to play.

正如他每年在信中告诫的那样。

As he is cautioning in his letters every year.

没错。于是他那时停止接受新的合伙人资金。他说，不再吸纳更多资金了。继续用这些钱进行复利投资，但规模过大会有风险。我可能无法保持同样的表现。

Yep. So he closes the partnership to new capital at that point. Says, not gonna take any more capital. Continue to invest this in compounding, but, like, there's danger in getting too big. I might not be able to perform in the same way.

这就像一个自律的种子期风险投资家说的，不，我不想扩大基金规模。我不想被迫改变策略去投资不同的东西。我想坚持做自己擅长的事。

This is like a disciplined seed stage venture capitalist saying, no. I don't wanna grow my fund size. I don't wanna have to change my strategy and invest in different things. I wanna stay true to the the thing that I'm good at.

对。所以在谈到他三年级水平的投资之前，我认为部分原因正是这种'坚持做自己'的心态，让他错失了可能是史上最大的机会。这几天我一直在调侃本，发短信说这期节目有个你绝对想不到的惊人内幕。

Yep. So this is, before we get to his third grade investment, I think maybe in part because of this mindset of like, I'm gonna stay true to do what I'm gonna have. He makes like the biggest missed opportunity ever, maybe in history. This I was teasing Ben over the last couple days, texting him saying, I've got something in this episode that I I don't know if you know, but it's just the most unbelievable thing that you will never imagine.

快告诉我吧。

Lay it on me.

1967年他给合伙人写信，宣布新增一条基本原则——这条简直与唐·瓦伦丁背道而驰。他说：'我们将不涉足那些需要我完全搞不懂的技术来做投资决策的行业。我对半导体或集成电路的了解，就跟对波兰甲虫交配习性的认知差不多。'

In 1967, he writes his partners saying that he's introducing a new ground rule to the partnership. And this one is quite literally the opposite of Don Valentine. He says, we will not go into businesses where technology which is way over my head is crucial to the investment decision. I know about as much about semiconductors or integrated circuits as I do about the mating habits of the trancht. It's a Polish word.

波兰语里这个词意思是甲虫。典型的巴菲特式幽默。这实在太遗憾了。非常

It means beetle in Polish. Typical, you know, Warren way with words here. This is very unfortunate. Very

哎呀，是哪家公司？

Uh-oh. What was the company?

对我来说这是个非常不幸的决定。

Very unfortunate decision to me.

看，1967年。它比微软早七年，比苹果还早。远在IBM之后。那个时期还有什么？

See. 1967. It predates Microsoft by seven years, predates Apple. It's way after IBM. What's around this time?

Deck？不对，是在Deck之后。

Deck? Or no. It's post Deck.

哦，不。只要你多想想就会明白的。

Oh, no. You'll get it if you think about it enough.

我是说，是不是

I mean, is it

硅谷的起源，我们在很多早期红杉投资中都讨论过？就在红杉成立前夕。红杉成立于72年，但这些都是唐·唐斯的团队

Silicon Valley origins, we've talked about it in a lot of Early Sequoia investment? Just pre Sequoia. Sequoia started in '72, but this is all the the crew that Don Downs

洛克投资？

Rock investment?

这是亚瑟·洛克的投资。

It is an Arthur Rock investment.

是英特尔吗？

Is it Intel?

我们这里说的是英特尔。哦，对了，听着。那时候巴菲特在爱荷华州格林内尔学院的董事会里。他是格林内尔学院的受托人，顺便说一句，是苏茜介绍他去的。

We're talking about Intel here. Oh, way. Get this. So Buffett at this point is on the board of Grinnell College in Iowa. He's a trustee of Grinnell College, which, by the way, he was introduced to by Susie.

苏茜成为了一位了不起的民权活动家，而格林内尔学院也参与了民权运动。马丁·路德·金在被杀前六个月曾在格林内尔学院演讲。苏茜带沃伦去学院听金演讲，沃伦当时觉得，哇，深受金博士的感动。于是之后他决定加入董事会。

Susie became an incredible civil rights activist, and Grinnell College was involved in the civil rights movement. And, Martin Luther King spoke at Grinnell College six months before he was killed. And Susie brings Warren to the college to listen to King speak, and, like, Warren is, like Wow. Incredibly moved by doctor King. And so he decides after that to join the board.

他们当时正试图招募他加入董事会。于是他加入了。你知道还有谁在董事会吗？格林内尔学院最著名的校友之一，和沃伦·巴菲特一起？

The they were trying to recruit him to to join the board. And so he does. Do you know who else was on the board, one of Grinnell College's most famous alumni alongside Warren Buffett?

诺伊斯还是？

Noyce or Yes.

Earthmore还是Bingo。罗伯特·诺伊斯。哇。格林内尔学院的校友，集成电路的发明者，背叛肖克利半导体公司的“叛逆八人帮”成员之一，随后与戈登·摩尔和安迪·格鲁夫共同创立了英特尔，如今与沃伦一同担任格林内尔学院的董事。不仅如此，沃伦当然还负责格林内尔学院捐赠基金的投资委员会。

Earthmore or Bingo. Robert Noyce. Wow. Alumni of Grinnell College, inventor of the integrated circuit, part of the traitorous eight who left Shockley Semiconductor to start Fairchild, and then cofounder of Intel with Gordon Moore and Andy Grove is on the board of Grinnell with Warren. Not only that, but Warren, of course, chairs the endowment investment committee at Grinnell.

对吧？这当然说得通。嗯。当诺伊斯离开去创办英特尔，阿瑟·洛克正在为英特尔的融资做安排时，诺伊斯把这个机会带到了格林内尔学院的投资委员会。

Right? Of course, that would make sense. Mhmm. When Noyce leaves to start Intel and Arthur Rock is putting the deal together to finance Intel, Noyce brings it to the investment committee at Grinnell College

哦，天哪。

Oh, man.

他说，嘿。这里有一个10万美元的投资机会。我认为格林内尔应该投资这家公司。我觉得这真的会大有可为。我知道我在做什么。

Says, hey. There's a $100,000 piece. I think Grinnell should invest in this company. I think this is really gonna be big. I know what I'm doing.

他看到了这个交易。

He saw the deal.

沃伦批准了这项投资，格林内尔实际上在英特尔的种子轮投资了10万美元，但沃伦自己却从未为合伙关系涉足其中。事实上，他说，我永远不会投资科技公司。难以置信。这太不可思议了。

Warren approves the investment, and Grinnell does invest a $100,000 in the Intel seed round effectively, but Warren never goes near it for the partnership for himself. And in fact, says, I will never invest in technology companies. Unreal. This is unreal.

而且基本上在接下来的四十五年多里都坚持了这一原则。

And basically held to that for another forty five plus years.

完全同意。直到苹果出现之前都不是。我想我们...我还没做相关研究。我认为苹果在伯克希尔内部是由托德·库姆斯而非沃伦发掘的。我是说，这真是令人惊叹。

Totally. Not until Apple. And I think we'll we'll I haven't done the research yet. I think Apple bubbles up within Berkshire from Todd Toombs, not not from Warren. I mean, talk about Wow.

错失的机遇。这是在红杉资本之前。想象一下如果沃伦当年投资了英特尔。沃伦·巴菲特本可以成为沃伦·巴菲特加红杉资本的结合体。

Sins of omission. Like, this is before Sequoia. Imagine if Warren had financed Intel. Warren Buffett could have been Warren Buffett plus Sequoia Capital.

哇。现实地说，如果他真的投资了会怎么处理？毕竟他从未投资过初创企业。首先，他至今从未投资过科技企业，也从没在那么早期阶段就投资。

Wow. And what realistically, what would he have done with it if he did invest in it? Like, he's never invested in business. So first of all, he's never invested in technology business to this point. He's never invested in something that early.

对吧？他收购的都是...没错。这些都是上市公司的股份。

Right? Everything he's bought has been Yep. These public you know, they're they're pieces of public companies.

没错。已经建立稳定现金流的成熟企业。

Yep. Established ongoing cash flow businesses.

对。巴菲特合伙公司并不完全拥有任何企业，所以它甚至不持有任何私有资产。对吧？每一项投资都是SEC注册的

Yep. The Buffett partnership doesn't wholly own any businesses, so it's it's it doesn't even own anything private. Right? Every single thing is a SEC registered

不过现在伯克希尔本身已经是私有性质了。

Well, Berkshire is now private at this point.

好的。我只是想稍微算一下，比如他会不会持有？会持有多久？你知道的。

Okay. I'm just trying to do a little bit of math on, like, would he have held it? How long would he have held it? You

所有这些事情。但问题是，沃伦总是用他的能力圈理论——这其实是查理·芒格的观点——来为不投资科技领域辩护，说什么‘我只做自己懂的，清楚能力边界’。

know, all of these things. But, here's the thing. Like, this this whole, like, Warren always justifies not doing technology investments by, you know, his whole circle of competence thing that really is a Charlie Munger thing, but that weren't adoptively. I stay within what I know, my circle of competence. I know the boundaries of my confidence.

这根本说不通，因为他最初投资过许多完全不了解的行业，比如纺织、保险、零售等等。

This doesn't make any sense to me because he invests in plenty of businesses that he doesn't know anything about at the beginning, like textiles, like, insurance, you know, like, retail.

没错。问题在于，这些行业的运作模式是否比科技行业更相似？像我们这种高增长、未达产品市场匹配或规模化前的科技企业，情况截然不同。

Yeah. And the question is, like, are the dynamics in those businesses more closely related to each other than they are to technology businesses? Like, our our high growth pre product market fit or, like, prescale technology business is just so completely different.

对。我觉得沃伦可能是这么想的。但他似乎有某种心理障碍。比如英特尔，诺伊斯、摩尔和安迪·格鲁夫都来自仙童半导体——你应该知道仙童吧？

Yep. I think that's maybe what Warren thinks. But I he's got some kind of mental block here. Because, like, with Intel, you got Noyce and Moore and Andy Grove coming from Fairchild. Like, you know what Fairchild is.

那是个传奇企业。他们当时手握技术，基本上要颠覆...具体我也说不清。总之读到这段历史时，我震惊到下巴都掉了。

It's a stab like, it's an amazing business. And they've, like, we've got the thing. We're gonna basically dethrone I I don't know. Anyway, I just read this, and I was, like, jaw on the floor.

这也符合他独立思考的理念——他不在乎别人对公司的评价，如果不能从第一性原理出发、基于基本面来理解，就不是他的菜。虽然这很‘巴菲特’，但结果证明这是个错误决定。

It also goes along with his notion of independence of thought that, like, he doesn't really care what other people think about a company, that if he doesn't understand it from first principles in a way that he's sort of gonna build it up from fundamentals, then it's not his cup of tea and he's not investing. I mean, that is a very all this sounds like Warren Buffett to be, but it turned out to be a bad decision.

确实如此。我是说，这就是沃伦的风格。那么，回到故事上来。我只是觉得那太不可思议了。与此同时，伯克希尔与英特尔不同，正迅速成为一个大问题。

It does. I mean, that's Warren for you. So, anyway, back to the story. Just thought that was so amazing. So Berkshire, meanwhile, unlike Intel, is quickly becoming a major problem.

当然，巴菲特阻止了斯坦顿继续投资业务。但一旦停止投资，他们就已经失去竞争力了。现在他们完全不具备竞争力，只是在亏损。所以他说，天哪，我得做点什么。如果不采取行动，伯克希尔会耗尽所有的数百万美元现金储备，而我们之前也说过，我不想关闭这家企业。

Buffett, of course, stops Stanton's, you know, investing in the business. But once he stopped investing, like, they were already uncompetitive. Now they're wholly uncompetitive, and they're just, you know, losing money. So he says, like, gosh, I gotta do something. Like, Berkshire is gonna burn through all of its millions of dollars of cash reserves if I don't do something here, and I don't wanna shut the business down as we were saying.

没错。于是他开始思考，嗯，我能不能在伯克希尔内部收购其他公司，利用现有的资金，从根本上围绕它转型业务？他开始四处寻找，发现奥马哈有一家他关注已久的公司，叫国民赔偿公司。这是第三个重大投资，也是我们即将结束这个故事投资部分的地方。

Right. So he starts thinking about, like, well, could I just buy something else within Berkshire, use the money that's sitting there, and essentially just kinda transform the business around it? So he starts looking around, and there's a company right there in Omaha that he's been eyeing for a while called National Indemnity. And this is the third great investment and where we're essentially gonna leave the investing portion of this story.

大卫，国民赔偿公司听起来像是一家保险公司，对吗？

And National Indemnity, David, to me sounds like an insurance company. Would that be right?

没错。它由杰特·杰克·林沃特经营。

That would be right. It is run by Jet Jack Ringwalt.

好了，听众朋友们。现在来聊聊我们另一家喜爱的公司Statsig。自从上次我们提到Statsig后，他们有个激动人心的新进展——完成了C轮融资，估值达到11亿美元。

Alright, listeners. It's time to talk about another one of our favorite companies, Statsig. Since you last heard from us about Statsig, they have a very exciting update. They raised their series c, valuing them at $1,100,000,000.

是啊。重大里程碑。祝贺团队。时机也很有趣，因为实验领域现在确实越来越火热了。

Yeah. Huge milestone. Congrats to the team. And timing is interesting because the experimentation space is, really heating up.

是的。那么为什么投资者对STAT SEG的估值超过十亿美元？因为实验已成为全球顶尖产品团队产品栈中至关重要的一部分。

Yes. So why do investors value STAT SEG at over a billion dollars? It's because experimentation has become a critical part of the product stack for the world's best product teams.

没错。这一趋势始于Web 2.0时代的公司，如Facebook、Netflix和Airbnb。这些公司面临一个问题：如何在员工规模扩张至数千人的同时，保持快速、去中心化的产品与工程文化？实验系统正是解决方案的核心部分。

Yep. This trend started with web two dot o companies like Facebook and Netflix and Airbnb. Those companies faced a problem. How do you maintain a fast, decentralized product and engineering culture while also scaling up to thousands of employees? Experimentation systems were a huge part of that answer.

这些系统让公司所有员工都能获取全局产品指标，从页面浏览量到观看时长再到性能表现。每当团队发布新功能或产品时，他们都能衡量该功能对这些指标的影响。

These systems gave everyone at those companies access to a global set of product metrics, from page views to watch time to performance. And then every time a team released a new feature or product, they could measure the impact of that feature on those metrics.

因此Facebook可以设定诸如增加应用使用时长的公司级目标，并让各团队自行探索实现路径。当数千名工程师和产品经理同时开展这类实践时，就会带来指数级增长。难怪实验现在被视为关键基础设施。

So Facebook could set a company wide goal like increasing time in app and let individual teams go and figure out how to achieve it. Multiply this across thousands of engineers and PMs, and boom, you get exponential growth. It's no wonder that experimentation is now seen as essential infrastructure.

对。如今Notion、OpenAI、Rippling和Figma等顶尖产品团队同样依赖实验系统。但他们不再自建系统，而是直接使用Statsig。Statsig不仅提供实验功能——过去几年还整合了快速产品团队所需的所有工具，如功能开关、产品分析、会话回放等。

Yep. Today's best product teams like Notion, OpenAI, Rippling, and Figma are equally reliant on experimentation. But instead of building it in house, they just use Statsig. And they don't just use Statsig for experimentation. Over the last few years, Statsig has added all the tools that fast product teams need, like feature flags, product analytics, session replays, and more.

如果您想帮助团队的工程师和产品经理加速开发并做出更明智的决策，请访问statsig.com/acquired，或点击节目说明中的链接。他们提供非常慷慨的免费套餐、5万美元的初创企业计划，以及适合大公司的实惠企业合约。只需告诉他们是本和大卫推荐您的。

So if you would like to help your team's engineers and PMs figure out how to build faster and make smarter decisions, go to statsig.com/acquired, or click the link in the show notes. They have a super generous free tier, a $50,000 startup program, and affordable enterprise contracts for large companies. Just tell them that Ben and David sent you.

好的。让我们回到国民赔偿保险公司和杰克·林沃尔德。国民赔偿的业务与GEICO截然不同——他们承保极其冷门的风险类型。你知道，GEICO想要的是那些无聊的安全驾驶员，低风险、大数法则的保险业务。

Okay. So back to National Indemnity and Jack Ringwald. So what National Indemnity does, they're very different than GEICO. Indemnity National, they ensure super esoteric risks. Like, you know, GEICO wants the boring, safe driver, you know, low risk, wide aggregate insurance.

这些人想要的就是那种一杆进洞的保险政策，对吧？就像我们在维珍银河那集节目里讨论的X大奖那样？

These guys want, like, the hole in one policies. Right? Like what we were talking about on the, the Virgin Galactic episode with the x prize?

他们本可以为X大奖承保。正如杰特·杰克常说的名言——没有糟糕的风险，只有不合适的费率。当然他是对的，只要定价合理，任何风险都可以承保。而他们恰恰精于此道。

They would be insuring the x prize. They want the riskiest, craziest, wildest stuff out there as Jet Jack was famous for saying, there's no such thing as a bad risk, only bad rates. And, of course, he's right. You could price anything as long as you price it right. So and they were very good at pricing risks.

有个著名故事说杰克曾亲自调查一桩谋杀案赔偿保险，他像侦探般评估案情走向的可能性后精准定价。这家公司就凑巧在奥马哈，与沃伦的办公室仅一街之隔。

And and Jack famously, he would personally go dig into they once there's some story about they're once insuring, like, a settlement on a murder case or something like that. And Woah. Maybe it a murder case or maybe it was something. And, like, he went personally and, like, did a bunch of detective work to figure out, like, how likely it was that the case was gonna go one way or the other, and then he praised the risk. So and they happened to be, like, right down the street from Warren's office in Omaha.

感觉伯克希尔系公司半数都是沃伦在奥马哈偶遇的行业翘楚，这种聚集效应简直不可思议。

I feel like half of, like, the Berkshire orbit companies are like, oh, Warren happened upon them in Omaha, and they happen to be these, like, best in class businesses. It's like it's unbelievable, little nexus.

特别有乡土气息对吧？但运作方式与GEICO不同。国民保险公司能长期使用浮存金，因为他们承保的多是长尾风险——那些几乎不会发生的极端事件。

It's so folksy. Yeah. It's hilarious. And differently in how they did this than GEICO, but similar to GEICO, National got to use its float for a super long time because most of the policies they were writing never cashed in. Like, they were the type of things they were insuring where, like, it was long tail stuff, like stuff that was very unlikely to happen.

于是资金在他们手里沉淀了很久很久。但随着杰克年事渐高，他开始纠结是否出售这个视如己出的公司，态度反复无常。

So they just got used to the money for a long, long, long time. Jack though, he's getting older. He's considering selling the business, but it's his baby. He's super, super fickle about it. Like, you know, he wants to sell, he doesn't really wanna sell.

他时而流露出出售意向。沃伦洞悉这一切，终于在1967年2月趁他情绪低落时，在一顿午餐间用不到十五分钟谈成了收购。

And he'd make noises about it every now and then. Warren knows all this. So in February 1967, he catches him in sort of a dour mood. They're, like, having lunch or something at at some point. Warren's courting him, and they work out a deal in fifteen minutes, fifteen minutes or less to sell your company.

沃伦当时的态度是，我要以伯克希尔的名义而非合伙企业的名义收购这家公司。就是它了。我要把伯克希尔转型成保险公司。于是他们按林沃尔特要的价格敲定了一页纸的协议。没有审计财务报表。

And Warren's like, I'm gonna buy this company for Berkshire, not the partnership. This is it. I'm gonna transform Berkshire into insurance company. So they hammer out a one page deal at the price Ringwalt wanted. No audited financials.

承诺将公司留在奥马哈。承诺不裁撤任何员工。基本上满足了杰特·杰克的所有要求，他根本没有理由拒绝，于是交易达成。杰克甚至留下来继续经营业务，因为他无法抽身——他太痴迷于此了，而这正是沃伦希望看到的。

Promise to keep the company in Omaha. Promise not to fire any employees. Every literally gives Jet Jack everything he wanted, like, no reason to say no, and they do it. And Jack even sticks around and continues running the business because he can't, like, disengage. He's obsessed, which Warren wanted anyway.

所以这很棒。

So it's great.

关键拼图。这是沃伦日后会运用的小技巧。

Puzzle piece. That's like a little little learning Warren's gonna employ later.

没错。他只是在不断充实自己的商业策略锦囊。于是这成为伯克希尔的一部分。在做这笔交易时，不清楚沃伦事先考虑了多少，更像是他在为伯克希尔寻找收购目标。

Yep. Yep. He's just adding to his, adding to his quiver of tricks of the trade here. So it becomes part of Berkshire. In doing this deal, it's unclear how much Warren thought about this ahead of time or more like he was just looking for something to buy for Berkshire.

但他偶然发现的这个洞见，可能是巴菲特整个职业生涯中最伟大的——将保险业务与伯克希尔首个实业公司（后来扩展到多家）结合。运作原理是：他从GEICO时期就明白，保险业务会产生浮存金，可以投资这些浮存金，这很棒。本质上可以免费让资本复利增长。但问题（或者说限制）在于，保险公司必须保留部分现金储备，因为随时可能需要理赔支付。

But he sort of stumbles upon this is probably, like, the single greatest insight that Buffett has across his entire career of marrying an insurance business with first one in Berkshire, but then many operating companies. And so how it works is so he know he already knows going back to GEICO that within the insurance business, you have float, you can invest the float, that's great. And then you can compound your capital for free essentially. The problem though, not that it's a problem, but the limiter on this is that you do need to keep some cash on hand as an insurance company because, like, you gotta pay out some policies. Like, you know, at any given month, you might need to pay some stuff out.

所以你不能把所有资本都投到其他领域。但如果将保险业务与其他非保险实业结合，就可以全额投资所有资本和浮存金。

So you can't just go invest all of your capital Mhmm. Into other things. But if you actually combine an insurance operation with other, you know, non insurance operating businesses, you can invest all of your capital, all of your float.

因为运营中的企业既消耗资本，又能产生现金流。

Because an operating business both consumes capital but also spits off cash.

同时还能创造资本。这样你就可以将浮存金资本持续投入到运营企业的运作中，再收购更多运营企业进行整合。当需要偿付理赔时，只需每月从诸如铁路公司等可预测性强的业务（比如糖果店、冰雪皇后之类的）现金流中抽调少量资金即可。这一洞见堪称绝妙，它让沃伦得以构建一个双向飞轮：越来越多的保险业务和运营企业产生越来越多的浮存金，这些资本又能投资更多运营企业，进而产生更丰厚的月度现金流，从而承接更多浮存金——这个良性循环就此形成。他在收购国民保险公司后专门撰文，阐述了这一洞见下保险公司的资本运作要求。

Also produces the capital. And so you can keep the capital from the float tied up in the operations of operating businesses and then buying more operating businesses to attach. And then if you ever need to pay off claims, well, you just pull a little capital over from the cash flow every month that's coming out of, say, a railroad or say, like, you know, anything that's very predictable, like a candy store or a Dairy Queen or, you know, what have you. This is brilliant because this now enables Warren through this insight to start building up a a two sided flywheel of more and more insurance businesses and operations that generate more and more float that he can then invest that capital in more operating businesses, which generate more monthly cash flow, which enables him to take on more and more float and you can start to see how this ping pongs back and forth. He actually writes a paper after the national acquisition where he talks about the capital requirements for insurance companies in this insight.

他写道：'按大多数标准衡量，国民赔偿公司正在高强度运用其资本。正是伯克希尔·哈撒韦提供的额外资源，使我们能够执行激进运用资本的策略——从长远看，这将为国民赔偿公司创造最大利润。若承保业务恶化，伯克希尔可向国民公司注入额外资本。'瞧，虽然伯克希尔当时仍是烂摊子，但这个洞见意义非凡。

He says, by most standards, national indemnity is pushing its capital quite hard. It is the availability of additional resources in Berkshire Hathaway that enables us to follow the policy of aggressively using our capital, which on a long range basis should result in the greatest profitability within national indemnity. Berkshire could put additional capital into national should underwriting turn sour. So boom. Berkshire is still a dog, but the insight was huge.

就像他可以整天反复运用这个策略手册，太不可思议了。

Like, he can go out and just run this playbook all day long. It's amazing.

没错。这就是伯克希尔从纺织厂集群转型为控股公司的开端，其内部开始运转这些惊人的现金流飞轮。

Right. So this is the beginning of Berkshire morphing from a series of textile mills into a holding company that has all these incredible cash flow fly flywheels happening inside of it.

对。而且它不仅是控股公司。不像六十年代那些'漂亮50' conglomerates（ conglomerates为英文原文，中文常译为

Yep. And it's not just a holding company. Unlike the, you know, nifty 50 conglomerates of the sixties, which were just, like, holding companies for the sake of being holding companies. Right. It's a holding company with a purpose.

正是。这些企业真正实现了协同效应，而不是单纯地说：'嘿，我们有一大堆资本，所以要收购一堆毫不相干的公司。'

Right. Like, these companies actually benefit each other rather than just, hey. We have a whole bunch of capital, so we're gonna roll up companies that never really interact at all.

是的，是的。这太棒了。

Yep. Yep. It's brilliant.

而且我要说的是，这些产品之间并不互动，经理们也没有实质性的交流。这里稍微做个铺垫，伯克希尔最终会以这样的方式运营：资本由中央总部管理。当企业需要资金或产生资金时，会流向总部，资本配置在那里完成。但所有实际的业务运营都在企业内部进行。

And I should say, it's not like the products interact. It's not like the managers meaningfully interact. The way that and this a little foreshadowing here, but the way that Berkshire will eventually run is capital is managed by the central head office. And when a business, you know, needs cash or produces cash, it go goes to the head office, and the capital allocation is done there. But all the actual operations of the businesses are done inside the business.

所以关键在于，协同效应、飞轮效应或连接性——无论你怎么称呼——不必通过企业经理之间的实际互动来实现，它可以在资本配置的层面上发生。

And so it's this insight that the synergies or the flywheels or the connectivity, whatever you wanna call it, don't have to happen from the managers of the businesses actually dealing with each other. It can happen at the capital allocation level.

没错。这也给了沃伦——你看，沃伦已经是资本配置方面一代人中的天才了——但这给了他巨大的安全边际，回到本·格雷厄姆的概念，他不必再追逐‘烟蒂股’了，因为他的资本成本远低于其他任何人。

Yep. And it also gives Warren you know, look. Warren is already a what's in a generation talent when it comes to capital allocation, but it gives him this huge margin of safety because back to the Ben Graham, you know, concept, he doesn't have to chase cigar butts anymore because his cost of capital is way lower than anybody else out there.

他有所有这些保单持有人以非稀释的方式免费借给他钱。这既不是真正的债务，也不是真正的股权，只是他可以自由支配的现金。

He's got all these policyholders lending him money for free in a nondilutive way. Like, it's not really debt. It's not really equity. It's just free cash that he gets to play with.

是的。所以他可以去收购企业，并将它们嫁接到这个飞轮上。而且他有这种安全边际，即使他没有——你知道，他确实做了很多伟大的投资和收购——但即使他没有，他仍然从中受益，因为他正在为这个资本飞轮添砖加瓦。

Yep. So he can go buy businesses and graft them onto this flywheel. And he has this margin of safety where, like, even if he doesn't you know, he does make great investments and great purchases. But even when he doesn't, it's he's still benefiting from it because he's adding on to this capital flywheel.

是的，是的。而且国民赔偿公司对巴菲特来说是个绝佳的选择，因为他是概率大师。我是说，如果我们回顾美国运通，市场因为可能发生挤兑而恐慌。但沃伦从概率角度分析，认为实际发生的可能性很低，评估了预期价值，将概率乘以潜在结果，然后觉得，哦，这是一个预期价值为正且带有安全边际的赌注。

Yep. Yep. And it's this national indemnity is such a good pickup for Buffett too because he's the master of probability. I mean, if we go back and look at AmEx, you know, the the market was scared off because there could have been a run on AmEx. But Warren looked at it probabilistically, out the probability of it actually happening was low, assessed the expected value, multiplying the probability by the sort of potential outcome, and was like, oh, this is an expected value positive bet with a margin of safety.

而他恰恰是一位概率思维的天才。当这样一个人经营保险公司时，他不仅拥有卓越的概率思维能力，还能独立决策，无需第三方提供社会认同来判断某个想法是否可行。现在还有第三个关键因素，那就是他堪称资本配置大师。资本配置、概率思维以及独立决策——他手握这三项超凡工具，经营保险公司对这样的人来说简直是如鱼得水。

And he's just a genius probabilistic thinker. And so when you apply someone like that to owning an insurance company, not only is he a brilliant probabilistic thinker, an individualistic decision maker who doesn't need third parties to give him social proof that if something is a good idea. Now there's this third leg of the stool also, which is sort of this, master capital allocator. So the capital allocation, the probabilistic thinking, and the individualistic decision making, he's now got these, like, three crazy tools at his disposal, and owning an insurance company is awesome for someone like that.

没错。就像他手里握着一副必胜的牌，根本不可能输。难怪他能成为有史以来最伟大的投资者。

Yeah. It's like he and he's playing with a stacked deck here. Like, he can't lose. You know? So no wonder he becomes the best investor of all time.

接下来我们将看到1967至1968年间惊人的回报率。道指在67年表现优异，涨幅达19%。市场上开始出现一些投机热潮。1968年稍显平淡，但仍有7.7%的涨幅。

Well so we're about to see some pretty excellent returns here through 1967 and 1968. The Dow does well in '67. It's at 19%, 19% return that year. We're starting to kinda see some go go action going on in the market. Nineteen sixty eight's a little cooler, but it's 7.7%.

这些年里，巴菲特合伙公司在1967年获得36%的收益，随后在1968年创下59%的历史最佳战绩。简直无人能敌。

Across those years, Warren did 36% in the Buffett partnerships in '67, then had its best year ever with a 59% return in 1968. Like, he's untouchable.

他就像斯蒂芬·库里，三分球百发百中。

He's just like he's like Steph Curry. He's just draining threes here.

从1957到1969年整体来看，道指的复合收益率是153%，而合伙企业的复合收益率高达2795%。这意味着在巴菲特合伙公司运作的十二年间，他的收益是道指的28倍。

It's, I mean, if if we look all the way from '57 through '69, the Dow, the compounded results of the Dow were a 153. The compounded results of the partnership were 2795%. That's a 28 x of that Warren did over the twelve years of the Buffett partnership.

他的表现简直超乎想象。太不可思议了。不过正如本期节目试图展现的，关于巴菲特最贴切的评价——可能我们开头没提到——应该出自《福布斯》的一篇报道，时间大概就在这个时期。文章说：'巴菲特不是个简单的人，但他的品味很简单。'

He's just, like, playing out of his mind. Yeah. Unreal. Wow. But as hopefully we've painted on this episode, you know, there's, probably the best quote, I don't think we said this at the top of the episode, but probably the best quote about Buffett that has ever most apt quote that has ever been said about him was in a Forbes piece that came out, I think, right around this time, which and it says, Buffett is not a simple person, but he has simple tastes.

因此，希望我们在此描绘出的是一个极其复杂的人物形象。他表面看似朴实无华——喝可乐、嚼花生糖，但

And so, hopefully, we painted a picture here of, like, he's a really complex dude. Like, you know, he comes across folksy. He drinks his Coke. He eats his peanut brittle. But

他虽不用电脑进行分析，但其分析却极为深刻透彻。

He doesn't use a computer for his analysis, but, like, there is deep, deep analysis.

没错。他脑海中充斥着大量心理学运作。想想看，关于保险业务的浮存金、飞轮效应与运营企业的这个洞见，本应也确确实实驱动了他后续整个职业生涯——接下来五十年都该围绕这个展开，但他却视而不见。此刻他真正焦虑的是，几年前就开始困扰他的问题：我不确定能否将所有合伙资金有效投资。

Yeah. And there's a lot of there's a lot of psychology going on in his head. So you think, like, I mean, this insight, this whole thing about insurance, the float, the flywheel, and the operating businesses, this insight should have and did drive the entire rest of his career. Like, the next five decades is this, but he doesn't see it. Like, he's really worried at this time, you know, what started a few years ago of, I don't know that I can invest all this capital in the partnership.

我不确定能否持续创造这样的回报，所以决定停止接纳新资金进入合伙体系。

I don't know that I can keep generating these returns, close the partnership to new capital.

要配置如此庞大的资金，我必须收购大型企业或全资买断，但我没有这样的渠道。我们目前能收购的只有这类企业，而且只能购入较小份额。

I'd have to go buy really big businesses or buy businesses outright to deploy this much capital, and I don't have access to that. You know, these are the types of businesses we can buy, and we buy smaller shares of them.

是的。于是在1967年，他给合伙人写信明确表示：'我与当下环境格格不入。但有一点我很清楚——我不会放弃原有的雪茄烟蒂投资策略，尽管在当前环境下难以实施。即便这可能意味着放弃唾手可得的巨额利润，转而采用我尚未完全理解、未曾成功实践，甚至可能导致资本永久性重大损失的方法。'他此刻正深陷这种矛盾的心理挣扎中。

Yep. So in '67, he writes a letter to the partners saying, quote, I am out of step with present conditions. On one point, however, I am clear, I will not abandon a previous approach, the cigar butt investing strategy whose logic I understand, although I find it difficult to apply in the current environment. Even though it may mean foregoing large and apparently easy profits to embrace an approach which I don't fully understand, have not practiced successfully, and which possibly could lead to substantial permanent loss of capital. He'd like he's he's, like, mentally struggling here with this dichotomy.

时代从未如此繁荣，而他也从未如此忧虑。

Times have never been better, and he's never been more worried.

是的。我是说，在他生命的这个阶段，他完全是本·格雷厄姆的化身。首要原则是，不要亏钱。第二条原则是，参见第一条。而且由于一切都与买入价格紧密相关，而非押注能获得正向结果，他的情绪也随买入价格波动。

Yeah. His I mean, he is Ben Graham through and through at this point in his life. It's rule number one, don't lose money. Rule number two, see rule number one. And then you also have this thing going on where because everything is so tied to the purchase price rather than the betting that you'll be able to generate a positive outcome, his mood is tied to purchase prices.

所以尽管市场全面上涨，他却觉得这糟透了。像是找不到任何值得买入的标的，他的情绪几乎与市场走势完全相反。

So even though everything's going up, he's looking at it like, this sucks. Like, I can't find anything attractive to buy, and it's all you know, he's almost his mood is very much inverse of the market.

我觉得他现在的心态是：我可能会失去太多。没错，他已经积累了这么多收益。要知道，他现在不再像一无所有时那样冒险，而是像随时可能失去一切般谨慎行事。

And he's feeling, I think, like, I've got so much to lose now. Yeah. I've got all these gains. You know, he's not playing like he's got nothing to lose anymore. He's playing like he's got everything to lose.

没错。他的处境如此糟糕，以至于在1968年伯克希尔成功收购国民赔偿公司后，他竟试图抛售伯克希尔。他想把整个公司打包卖给芒格和大卫·戈特斯曼（合伙基金的投资人）。幸运的是，这两人要么太聪明要么太迟钝——以典型的查理风格，芒格审视了这个提议。

Yep. So he's in such a bad place that even after this brilliant national indemnity pickup for Berkshire, in 1968, he tries to unload Berkshire. He tries to wholesale sell it to Munger and David Gottesman, who was an investor in the partnership. And, fortunately for Warren, they're either too smart or too dumb to take him up on it. They put in typical Charlie fashion, Charlie's looks of it.

查理说：'你想卖掉这玩意儿，还让我明知你想卖的情况下接盘？我凭什么要买你急着脱手的东西？'沃伦只能支支吾吾。

He's like, you're telling me you wanna sell this thing, and you want me to buy it knowing that you wanna sell. Why on earth would I buy something knowing that you wanna sell? And Warren's like, uh-huh.

这种相互欣赏与尊重实在太能说明问题了。

The mutual admiration and respect there is so telling.

太能说明了。到了1969年年中，沃伦彻底心灰意冷，开始计划解散合伙基金，整个人都颓丧不已。

So telling. So telling. So by mid nineteen sixty nine, Warren's like, he's done. He starts making plans to wind down the partnership. He's he's, like, dejected.

他准备要挂靴退休了。

He's gonna hang up his spurs.

就在他创下史上最佳业绩之后。

After his greatest year ever.

就在他创下史上最佳业绩之后，你知道，显然和苏西之间也有些紧张关系，苏西当时的态度是，我们身价已经高达数千万美元了。你还在这里折腾什么？

After his greatest year ever, you know, definitely, there was some tension with Susie as well where Susie was like, we're worth, like, many, many millions of dollars. Like, what are you doing here? Like

有趣的是，虽然身价数千万美元，但他在某种程度上仍是个无名之辈。华尔街当时还不像未来几十年那样熟知沃伦·巴菲特这个名字。他没有受到追捧，不是明星投资人，也不向公众传授投资之道。这完全就是保持低调闷声发财的阶段。

And interestingly, many millions of dollars, but he's still kind of an unknown person. Like, Wall Street doesn't yet know the name Warren Buffett the way that they would in the next couple decades, And he's not sort of being called on. He's not a celebrity investor. He's not informing the public on investing. This is very much just about staying private and making money.

没错。于是在1969年阵亡将士纪念日那天，他给合伙人写了封信，信中说：如果我要公开参与投资事业，就难免陷入竞争。我知道自己不愿终生疲于奔命地追赶投资界的兔子。唯一能慢下来的方式就是停下脚步。

Yep. Yep. So on Memorial Day nineteen sixty nine, he writes a letter to the partners and he says, if I am going to participate in the investment business publicly, I can't help being competitive. I know I don't want to be totally occupied without pacing an investment rabbit all my life. The only way to slow down is to stop.

接着他宣布将在年底正式退休。他将逐步结束合伙关系，在1970年初将所有证券分配给合伙人。就这样。他功成身退。

And then he says he's giving notice of his formal retirement at the end of the year. He's gonna wind up the partnership, distribute out all the securities to the partners in the beginning of 1970. That's it. He's done. He's walking away.

他就像乔丹一样，准备去打小联盟棒球了。

He's like Jordan. He's going to play minor league baseball.

这是个非常贴切的比喻。

That's a it's a very apt analogy.

确切地说，这就是最后一舞，只不过并非真正的最后一舞。合伙人们震惊不已，他们从未想过沃伦会放弃这场游戏——当然他不可能放弃，我们下回分解。他们询问沃伦该如何处理。

That's exact this is the last dance, except it's not really the last dance. The partners are shocked. They rightly never thought Warren could give up the game. Of course, he can't give up the game as we'll see next time. They ask Warren what to do.

他考虑过推荐给查理，但此时的查理表示：'我也不确定，我也不想接收大批新投资者，同样对市场感到担忧。'于是他将大客户引荐给纽约第一曼哈顿银行的大卫·加蒂斯曼（该机构擅长管理大客户），而小投资者则转介给刚从本·格雷厄姆课堂归来的比尔·鲁安。

He thinks about recommending them to Charlie, but Charlie at this point is like, I don't know. I don't want a bunch of new investors either. I'm worried about the market too. So he sends the big investors to David Gattisman at First Manhattan Bank in New York, which is big farm can manage big clients. And the small one, the small investors, he ships over to Bill Ruane, who had back from his class with Ben Graham.

比尔刚离开基德·皮博迪公司，正在筹建自己的红杉基金（切勿与红杉资本混淆），该基金在过去六十年间同样创造了惊人业绩。事情就此告一段落——1970年1月，他清算了所有公开证券，解散了合伙公司。此时他持有合伙公司26%的股份。

Bill had just left Kidder Peabody and was setting up his own fund, the Sequoia Fund, not to be confused with Sequoia Capital, but equally incredible performance over the last sixty years. And that's kinda where he leaves it. So January 1970, he liquidates all the public securities. He unwinds the partnership. At this point, he owns 26% of the partnership.

他获得1600万美元现金、伯克希尔18%股权、多元化零售公司20%股权（这是他与查理合资经营的百货公司项目，实属投资败笔）。

He gets 16,000,000 in cash, 18% of Berkshire, 20% of Diversified Retail Company, which was a joint venture he had with Charlie owning, department stores, ill advised place to invest.

我们频频提及查理，请别着急。敬请期待，我们将在第二部完整讲述芒格的故事。

And we we keep mentioning Charlie here. Do not worry. Stay tuned. We will have the full Munger story in part two.

在第二部中。此外还有蓝筹印花公司2%股权（另一项与查理的合资），以及《奥马哈太阳报》——这份报纸更像是他为重拾新闻业初心的虚荣心收购。合伙人们需要就这些私有企业（伯克希尔、多元化零售、蓝筹印花和太阳报）的股权去留作出决定。

In part two. And, 2% of Blue Chip Stamps, which was another Charlie JV. And that's it. He also owns the Omaha Sun, which was like a vanity purchase, to get back to his newspaper roots. And the partners have to decide with these private companies, Berkshire Diversified Blue Chip and the Sun, whether they wanna sell their stake.

巴菲特表示，如果他们想出售或保留股份，他很乐意从他们手中买下这些股份。于是他给合伙人写了一封长长的FAQ，其中包括‘我是否应该持有私人公司的股票？’对此他写道，我只能说我会这么做，持有股票，而且我计划买更多。说完这句意味深长的话，他放下话筒，转身离去。

And Buffett says he's happy to buy their stakes from them if they wanna sell or if they wanna keep them. So he writes a long, FAQ to the partners, including should I hold my stock in the private companies? To which he writes, all I can say is that I'm going to do so, hold the stock, and I plan to buy more. So with that cryptic statement, he drops the mic. He's out.

退出

Out of

这场游戏。此时他拥有伯克希尔哈撒韦多少股份？18%

the game. And he owns how much of Berkshire Hathaway at this point? 18%

当他策马消失在夕阳中。

as he rides into the sunset.

我认为这个小悬念可能是结束伯克希尔哈撒韦上半段历史和事实的绝佳节点。

And I think that little cliffhanger is probably a great place to leave it on history and facts for this first half of Berkshire Hathaway.

我不确定。我们已经讲了大约三小时。你觉得够了吗？要不要再加一小时？

I don't know. We're at about three hours. Do you think that's enough? Should we go another hour?

我们可以聊聊之后的部分——当市场疯狂波动时他如何寻找人生方向，或者他和查理以及联邦调查局之间的小摩擦。不过或许...或许先保留这些内容，我们将在第二部分开始时讲述那些他全力投入伯克希尔之前的徘徊岁月。

We could talk about the part after this where he tries to figure out what to do with his life while the market is doing crazy things or, you know, the little bit of warm water that he gets into with Charlie and the the feds. But maybe maybe let's hold on that, and and we'll, we'll start part two off with some of that wandering pre going all in on Berkshire Hathaway.

像乔丹一样归来。我们身处四五号位。

Back like Jordan. We're in the four five.

没错。好吧，伙计们，这期节目我们有些有趣的战术手册内容要深入探讨。我准备的第一个例子，实际上我决定暂时跳出伯克希尔领域来说明观点。我想表达的是，当然，沃伦·巴菲特对复利效应非常着迷——这么说可能都算轻描淡写了，如果听众跟我们一起听到这里，估计都在会心一笑。

Yep. Well, boy, do we have some fun playbook things to dive into this episode. The first one that I have, I actually I decided to leave Berkshire Land for a moment to illustrate the point. So the point that I wanted to make is, sure, Warren Buffett is really into compounding. Like, I think that would be an understatement, and then everyone in the audience is probably chuckling if they've made it with us that far.

另一个耐人寻味的细节是，大卫，你刚提到他在清算结束时选择了现金分配。我在想，天啊，那些交易成本和税款肯定让他心如刀割。他一定是铁了心要结束合伙关系才这么做。为了说明交易成本和税款如何破坏美妙的复利效应，我参考了耶鲁管理学院2020年5月由AJ·瓦瑟斯坦、马克·阿格纽和布莱恩·奥康纳合著的论文——这几位是我们LP节目某位嘉宾的合作者。大卫，你知道是谁吗？

The another fascinating thing is, David, you just mentioned he took this distribution in cash at the end of the wind down. And what I'm thinking is, ah, that's gotta kill him to have to take these transaction costs, these taxes. Like, he must have really wanted to wind down the partnership to make that happen. And to illustrate the point of how much transaction costs and and taxes can interrupt the beautiful thing that is compounding, I went to a a paper that was written in May 2020 from the Yale School of Management by AJ Wasserstein, Mark Agnew, and Brian O'Connor, who are, collaborators with someone that we have had on the LP show. David, do you know who that person is?

汉密尔顿？

Hamilton?

威尔·桑代克。是威尔·桑代克。

Will Thorndyke. Will Thorndyke.

我早该猜到的。

I should have gotten that.

《局外人》的作者，参加过我们的读书俱乐部。

Author of the outsiders who came on on our book club.

当然。他们做了一些了不起的事情。

Of course. They did some Awesome.

这篇关于长期持有本质的论文进行了精彩分析，他们基本上运行了一个小模拟，展示了如果你持有某样东西连续复利二十五年，并在第二十五年一次性缴税，或者每五年缴税一次并持续复利的情况。基本上，就是你提取现金然后重新投资于完全相同或同等收益的资产。

Great analysis in this paper called on the nature of long term holds, where they basically ran a little simulation and showed what would happen if you held something that had continuous compounding for twenty five years and you paid taxes once in year twenty five, or if you had continuous compounding happening where you paid taxes every five years. Basically, you withdrew in cash and then reinvested in the exact same or an equally producing asset.

这是否假设所有税收都是长期资本利得税？

And is is this assuming taxes are all long term capital gains?

是的。假设税率为25%，这将是联邦资本利得税和一些州税的组合。所以如果你投资一美元，让复利自行运作二十五年，最终你将得到24.9美元。这是在假设复利率为15%的情况下。

Yep. Yep. It's assuming 25%, which would be some combination of federal capital gains and some state tax as well. So if you invested one dollar and just let compounding do its thing for twenty five years, you would end up with $24.9 at the end. And this is, assuming a compounding rate of 15%.

所以，你拿出一美元。二十五年后，它价值25美元。如果你每五年缴税一次，同样的美元价值16.8美元。因此，如果你不通过做所有人类都想做的事情——管理资金、采取行动、保持活跃——来打断复利，你最终剩下的金额将增加50%。我认为这是沃伦在这里开始领悟到的深刻见解。

So you, you know, you take your dollar. Twenty five years later, it's worth $25. Now if you pay taxes every five years, that same dollar is worth $16.8. So it's a 50% increase in the amount that you are left with at the end if you just don't interrupt compounding by doing the thing that all humans wanna do, which is manage the money, do stuff, be active. And I think that it's this brilliant insight that Warren has sort of, like, begun to have here.

我认为在巴菲特合伙公司时期，他比后来在伯克希尔哈撒韦时更频繁地调整投资。但这种不受干扰的复利力量，你知道，税收、交易成本等等，如果你能找到赢家并坚持下去，那是最好的策略。在我看来，在这个故事的结尾，他似乎真的开始理解这一点了。

I think in the Buffett partnership, he moves stuff around much more than he later would in Berkshire Hathaway. But this sort of uninterrupted power of compounding, you know, taxes, transaction costs, whatever the things are, if you can find yourself betting on a winner and just let it ride, that is the very best strategy you can possibly employ. And I it it feels to me at the end of this story, he's like he's really starting to grasp that.

是的。嗯，这有点像，所以有一本很棒的书叫《转变》由威廉·布里奇斯所著，非常精彩。它讲述了心理上如何处理生活中的转变，即使是好的转变，比如结婚或生孩子，或者不好的转变，比如生活中的重大变化。

Yep. Well, it's kinda like, so there's this great this is we go way out there in left field, but, you know, hey, we're three hours into this episode. Who knows how many people are still listening? There's this great book called transitions by William Bridges, and it's wonderful. And it it's about psychologically dealing with transitions in your life even if it's like a good transition like getting married or or having a kid or, you know, bad transitions too, like big changes in your life.

整本书的主题是，当你经历转变时，旧的自我需要先消亡，新的自我才能诞生。在阅读这部分故事时，我不断思考这一点——沃伦曾是如此成功，他是本·格雷厄姆门下最出色的弟子，成就甚至超越了格雷厄姆本人。嗯。但那条路已经行不通了。

And the whole theme of it is that when you have a transition, like, the old you needs to die before the new you can arise. And to my I kept thinking about this through this story here in this part one of, like, Warren was so successful. He was the most successful Ben Graham disciple that there was, more successful than Ben himself. Mhmm. But that wasn't gonna work anymore.

他需要开始理解你所说的这些理念，象征性地让旧沃伦'死去'，新沃伦才能诞生。我认为关闭合伙公司正是这种转变的体现——无论他当时是否意识到（几乎可以肯定他并未意识到）。嗯。他需要为那段人生画上句号，才能开始接纳这些截然不同的哲学思想。

And he needed to get to start to understand these things that you're talking about, and he needed to symbolically, you know, die the old Warren to have the new Warren arrive. And I think that's what happened here with the closing down of the partnership. Whether he knew it or not, almost assuredly, did not. Mhmm. He needed to close the chapter on, like, that part of his life to start to embrace some of these very different philosophies.

确实。这个观点太精彩了。我从未如此思考过这种'让旧我消亡'的具象化隐喻。

Yeah. It's fascinating. That's a really good point. I've never thought about that sort of, like, literal let the old you die thing that way.

这是本非常棒的书。推荐给所有人阅读。

It's a really good book. Recommend it to anyone.

说到本·格雷厄姆，关于独立思考的理念——他有个名言：股票投资者正确与否不取决于他人是否认同，而取决于其事实与分析是否正确。作为风险投资者，我认为这极难践行，因为初创企业的成功很大程度上取决于短期内能否从其他投资人处募资。这助长了从众心理：大家是否都认为这是家热门公司？而格雷厄姆关注的完全是光谱另一端——零增长企业，只寻找'雪茄烟蒂'式的投资机会。

Well, speaking of Ben Graham, this notion of independence of thought, there's a Ben Graham quote that the stock investor is neither right nor wrong because others agreed or disagreed with him. He is right because his facts and analysis are right. And this is something that I think as a a venture investor is so difficult because so much of the success of a company when you're investing in it depends on its ability to, in the near term, raise future capital from someone who is not you. So it encourages this sort of herd mentality of do other people perceive this to be a, you know, hot company in the in the same way? Whereas what Ben Graham is looking at is the complete opposite side of this spectrum, no growth at all, exclusively looking at cigar butts.

这要求你完全依赖独立分析——当账面价值清晰可见，且只需完成一次性交易时容易得多。但这种独立思考精神值得我们每个人在生活中借鉴。有趣的是，外界反馈会以不同方式影响你：当别人说你正确时，你很容易接受；当别人说你错误时，你会想——也许我该逆势而行相信直觉。讽刺的是，人们常说'别人说我错不等于我真错'，却认为'别人说我对那我肯定对'。

It's like you have to hang your hat exclusively on your independent analysis, which is way easier to do when you have a book value staring you in the face, and you're only gonna do basically a onetime transaction on it. But it is, I think, a thing, this sort of independence of thought and is something that we can all bring a little bit of Ben Graham into our lives. And it's funny because the positive and the negative hit you in different ways. When other people are telling you you are right, it's very easy to accept the idea that you are right. When other people are telling you you are wrong, you know that, hey.

或许这时候就该逆势而为，相信自己的直觉。有趣的是，人们总说'别人说我错不代表我真错'，却觉得'别人说我对那我肯定对'。

Maybe what I'm supposed to do is be contrarian here and trust my gut. And it's funny how you wanna say, well, look. Just because other people are telling me I'm wrong, it doesn't mean I'm wrong. But if other people are telling me I'm right, I'm definitely right.

确实。我认为你提出了两个非常好的观点。第一，我们生活中都可以多些本杰明·格雷厄姆的智慧，但人们总在风险投资中谈论价值投资等等，有些人尝试实践，有些人则抱怨为何难以实现。你指出了一个极其关键的问题——这几乎不可能单凭一己之力完成，因为需要其他人也相信。

Totally. I I think you raise a really good point in there too. Two good points. One, yeah, we could all use a little more Ben Graham in our lives, but people talk about value investing in venture and blah blah blah and, like, you know, some people try to do it, other people bemoan why it doesn't happen. You raise a really, really good point, which is that it kinda can't because you'd need other people to believe too.

除非你愿意完全独自资助一家公司，但即便如此，这也是个危险的滑坡。更重要的是，公司需要招募员工、合作伙伴和客户。你不能孤军奋战，必须把他人纳入你的阵营。

And unless you're gonna be willing to just wholly finance a company yourself, but even then, like, that that's a, a slippery slope. But but, b, the company needs to recruit employees. It needs to recruit partners. It needs to recruit customers. Like, you can't just be you gotta be bringing people into the fold.

要在初创企业界成功，你必须成为传教士般的存在。

You gotta be a missionary to succeed in the startup world.

没错。有趣的是，在成长型公司尤其是小型成长公司里，你不能是唯一的信徒，否则注定失败。

Right. Yeah. It's funny how, basically, in in a growth company and in a very small growth company especially, you cannot be the only believer. Otherwise, it won't work.

是的。这或许解释了为何巴菲特投资英特尔等科技公司从一开始就行不通——他根本不具备那样的思维方式。

Yep. Which maybe is a reason why as painful as it is to go back and talk about it, maybe is why Buffett investing in intel and technology never would have worked in the first place. He just wasn't in a mindset to be able to think like that.

对，这完全是另一种思维方式。说到不匹配的心态，巴菲特在其合伙公司创下历史最佳业绩后选择解散，就像在繁荣时期撤退——而这正是沃伦最不该买入的时机。这让我想起他那句经典格言：别人贪婪时恐惧，别人恐惧时贪婪。但说易行难，毕竟他是在众人贪婪时收手的。

Yeah. It is a completely different way of thinking. Well, speaking of, not being in the right mindset, you know, Buffett spinning down the partnership in its very best year ever or after its very best year ever. This is sort of like there's there's a a boom time going on, and that's a terrible time for Warren to be buying. And I think that the classic Warren Buffett aphorism, be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful, springs to mind, where it's easy to say this guy shut down his investment partnership when everyone else was being greedy.

明白吗？他确实没有...

You know? Like, he did not

当他当时获得了超过50%的回报时。

When he returned 50 plus percent then.

对吧？这太疯狂了。就像大多数人会说的，让我们筹集更多资金去投资。这其实是一种非常坚持原则的做法，你知道，如果你真的相信‘别人贪婪时我恐惧，别人恐惧时我贪婪’这句话，没有比这更好的例子了。

Right? It's crazy. Like, what what most people would say, let's go raise so much more capital to deploy. It it is like a a really adherent to principles approach of, you know, if you truly do believe the fearful when others are greedy and vice versa comment, there is no better illustration than that.

是啊。不过有趣的是，我打赌他可能也会说那是个错误的决定。我是说，长远来看是正确的决定，因为它成就了伯克希尔，但单独来看，他当时简直是疯了，他应该继续投资的。

Yeah. And interestingly, though, I bet he would probably also say it was the wrong decision. You know, I mean, like, the right decision in the long run because it enabled Berkshire, but, like, in a vacuum, like, he was crazy. He should've kept going.

也许吧。我是说，这就是比尔·格利那套理论——享受上涨的每一分钟。你永远不知道衰退何时来临，所以必须穿越所有周期进行投资。除非你是沃伦·巴菲特，真的能预测周期，否则这话没错。

Yeah. Maybe. I mean, that's the whole sort of Bill Gurley, enjoy every last minute of the upside. You never know when the downturn's gonna happen, so you have to invest through all cycles. That's true unless you're Warren Buffett and you can actually pick the cycles.

就像迄今为止他所证明的，未来几年我们也会看到。他极其擅长在需要大量现金时持有大量现金，在需要全力投资时全力投资。

Like, so far, he has proven, and we will see in future years too. He is remarkably good at having a lot of cash when he needs a lot of cash and being fully invested when he needs to be fully invested.

没错。确实如此。确实如此。

Yep. That is true. That is true.

不要试图择时——除非你是奥马哈的先知，我想这句话的后半部分是这样的。

Don't time the market unless you're the Oracle of Omaha, think is the second part of that phrase.

嗯，他确实有句名言——我最初是从查马斯那里听到的，虽然他与沃伦的投资理念截然不同，但各有千秋。那句话是：‘重要的不是择时，而是持有时长’，用你的话来说就是‘听其言而观其行’。他还建议投资指数基金，但自己却高度集中持股。

Well, he does have a saying that, I actually first heard from Chamath of all people very different approach than than Warren although great in in his own way but, the quote from him, it's not timing the market, it's time in market which to your point would be like a do as I say, not as I do. He also says invest in index funds and goes out and is incredibly concentrated himself.

对。说起来挺有趣的，我最近在看1994年他和查理的首场年度会议录像。当时他就提到——

Right. Yeah. I mean, it's it's funny listening. I was watching the I'm gonna flash forward here a little bit, but I was watching the first recorded annual meeting, the ninety four annual meeting with he and Charlie. And he's remarking on, well, sure.

如果你对投资毫无洞见，那你在选股上不比随便哪个傻瓜强，就该尽可能分散持股。必须多元化，以防市场下跌。但如果你确信自己投资的是能穿越周期的优秀管理者，就该把资金集中在极少数企业上。

If you have no conviction, then you're any better than any fool at picking stocks. You should go own as many stocks as possible. You gotta be diversified. You gotta, you know, be covered in case of downturns. If you feel like you're investing in managers who are excellent and have fortified their businesses so that they'll be excellent through all cycles, then you should own as few businesses as you possibly can.

我只投一家公司，因为我完全信任管理层。这很巴菲特式。我们都被教导要分散投资，其实那等于承认自己只能取得平均收益。如果你相信自己真有天赋或优势，就该押注于超越常人的能力——这正是他的做法。

I own one. I I trust the managers implicitly. It's just a very Warren Buffett quip. But for all of us who are taught diversification, that's another way of saying that we should all be reverting to the mean. And, if you believe you actually have a gift and or have an edge, then, you know, bet on your ability to perform superiorly, which he has done.

而且做得登峰造极。这里还有几点值得强调（更多精彩内容留到第二部分），但我想重点说的是：巴菲特毕生的痴迷就是以最道德的方式，按照自己的规则获取并滚雪球般积累财富。我们见证的正是这种极致专注的成果——当这种偏执般的专注力与天才般的投资禀赋相结合，再加上他刻意训练出的顶级沟通能力。

Incredibly well. Yeah. A couple others here that I think are worth highlighting, and I'll save a lot of these that are better illustrated in part two. I think the one that I really wanna harp on here is Buffett's singular life focus and obsession is getting as much money as possible and watching it grow and doing it in the most ethical stand up way possible on his own terms. And what we're witnessing is just the result of that singular focus, of that complete maniacal singular focus when applied by someone who is a genius savant at that and also has trained himself to become a master communicator.

世界上很少有人能在某个领域达到世界级水平并保持绝对专注。正是这种特质造就了那些超常规事件——不知偏离均值多少个标准差——但这份业绩确实惊人且持久。稍后我们会用评级说明：这是连续12年复合年化29.5%的合伙基金表现。

And I think there's just very few examples in the world where someone truly is world class at something and is singularly focused on it. And I think that when you have that, that is when you have these, you know, 10 sigma events where or I don't know how many, standard deviations from the bean this is, but it is this performance is remarkable and enduring. And we'll talk about this in grading, but this is a 29.5% compounded return every year for twelve years. Partnerships.

确实。

Yeah.

你知道，你提到了迈克尔·乔丹。我不认为这是个荒谬的类比。我认为乔丹对胜利的极致专注，是一个非常、非常合理的比较。他天生就是世界最佳，同时又是最勤奋的，并且一心一意专注于这一点。

It is you know, you mentioned Michael Jordan. I don't think that's a ridiculous analogy. And I I think Jordan's singular focus on winning, I think, is a very, a very reasonable comparison. He's naturally the best in the world. He is the hardest working, and he's singularly focused on it.

所以我觉得这个比喻非常贴切。

So I think that's very apt.

完全同意。我刚查到一个迈克·莫里茨的精彩语录，出自他与亚历克斯·弗格森爵士合著的《领导力》一书，我非常喜欢。他说：'伟大之人会排除一切干扰，只专注于重要之事。屏蔽无关紧要的东西，不让时间被偷走。'

Totally. There's a, I just pulled up. There's a wonderful quote from, Mike Moritz that, I love that, was in, the book leading that he wrote with sir Alex Ferguson. And it says, the great ones eliminate all distractions and focus only on what matters. Shut out the things that don't matter and don't let their time get stolen away.

人们常忘记一年中真正可利用的时间何其有限。你必须聚焦于重要之事，而非徒劳无功。我们还没讨论过他的工作习惯，但沃伦就是这种理念的完美化身——他整天坐在办公室里阅读年报，仅此而已。对吧？

People forget how few hours there are in a year. You must focus on what's important and not do what's not. I mean, we haven't talked about his work habits, but, like, Warren is the singular embodiment of that. Like, he sits in his office all day, and he reads annual reports, Period. Right.

每天至少六个小时，他都在阅读。其余时间则用来和查理交谈。

For, like, six plus hours a day, he's just reading. And the other hours, he's talking to Charlie.

没错。但这种生活方式需要巨大的取舍。如果你认定这就是你想做的事且能让你快乐，那很好。但别假装这不需要代价，因为对于那些追求全面发展生活的人来说...

Right. And there's massive life trade offs to that. Like, if you've decided that that's the thing you wanna do and that's what makes you happy, great. But do not pretend that it doesn't come without trade offs because, like, for someone who wants a well rounded life

是啊，那可不是理想状态。

Yeah. That's not it.

你不会明白的。

You're not gonna get it.

完全同意。

Totally.

最后我要强调的一点——剩下的我会留到第二部分再讲，因为这里还有太多值得讨论的内容，但我认为通过伯克希尔·哈撒韦现今的完整形态能更好地说明——就是他对自己想法的保密程度。我不想过多涉及权力话题，但我认为他实际上与所有其他短线选股人形成了对立，那些人靠短期内显得聪明来获取报酬。沃伦根本不在乎短期内看起来是否聪明。他的生意不是那样的。他想要长期赚最多的钱，所以他对自己的想法守口如瓶，几乎到了宗教般的程度。

The last one that I'll highlight here, and then I'll save the rest for part two because there's so many other things here worth discussing, but I think they'll be better illustrated by the full embodiment of Berkshire Hathaway as it is today, is the secrecy of his ideas. Not to get too much into power, but I think he was actually counter positioned to every other stock picker who got paid to look smart in the short term. Warren did not care about looking smart in the short term. His business was not that. He wanted to make the most money long term, so he stayed quiet about his ideas to, like, a religious extent.

而且他从来不想通过过早透露意图或试图显得聪明来影响市场，或是消耗掉那些罕见且真正的好点子。他没有那种全国性的品牌。他从不靠佣金或交易赚钱。他将商业模式与长期目标对齐，这与市场完全背道而驰。

And he never ever wanted to move the market or cannibalize that rare, really good idea that he had by sort of showing his hand too early and trying to appear smart. And he didn't have that national brand. He was never paid on commission or transactions. He aligned the business model with his long term goal, and that was totally counter positioned to the market.

没错。完全同意。商业模式的对齐。是的。非常重要。

Yep. Totally agree. Aligning the business model. Yep. Huge.

我只补充一点，可能第二部分也会提到，但我认为在第一部分已经很明显了，就像我常说的——红杉资本的理念：让赢家继续奔跑。卖掉GEICO，卖掉美国运通，这些都是巨大的错误。尽管沃伦所做的一切都如此出色，尽管他职业生涯前半段的表现如此辉煌，但我不禁会想，天啊，如果他没有犯那两个非常简单的错误，结果可能会好上十倍。

Only one I throw in there, which will probably also come up in part two, but, but I think it really came out here in part one is just like the I say this all the time. It's the Sequoia capital. Let your winners run. Like, selling GEICO, selling Amex, those were massive mistakes and as brilliant as all the things that Warren did and as brilliant as his performance was in this first part of his career, it's just impossible for me to look at it and think, man, it could have been 10 times better had he not made two very simple mistakes.

当你说到红杉资本时，你指的是他们卖掉苹果股票获利600万美元的惨痛教训吧。是的。太真实了。现在正是感谢我们节目的好朋友ServiceNow的好时机。

And when you're saying just like Sequoia, you're talking about, like, the hard learned lesson of selling Apple and making a $6,000,000 profit on it. Yep. Yep. So true. Now is a great time to thank good friend of the show, ServiceNow.

我们曾向听众讲述过ServiceNow令人惊叹的创业故事，以及它如何成为过去十年表现最佳的企业之一。但有些听众提问：ServiceNow究竟是做什么的？今天，我们就来解答这个问题。

We have talked to listeners about ServiceNow's amazing origin story and how they've been one of the best performing companies the last decade, but we've gotten some questions from listeners about what ServiceNow actually does. So today, we are gonna answer that question.

首先，最近媒体常用一个说法：ServiceNow是企业级的'AI操作系统'。具体来说，22年前成立的ServiceNow最初专注于自动化，将纸质流程转化为IT部门的软件工作流。随着时间推移，他们在这个平台上构建了更强大复杂的功能。

Well, to start, a phrase that has been used often here recently in the press is that ServiceNow is the, quote, unquote, AI operating system for the enterprise. But to make that more concrete, ServiceNow started twenty two years ago focused simply on automation. They turned physical paperwork into software workflows initially for the IT department within enterprises. That was it. And over time, they built on this platform going to more powerful and complex tasks.

其服务范围从IT部门扩展到HR、财务、客服、现场运营等部门。过去二十年间，ServiceNow完成了连接企业各部门所需的繁琐基础工作，为实现自动化铺平了道路。

They were expanding from serving just IT to other departments like HR, finance, customer service, field operations, and more. And in the process over the last two decades, ServiceNow has laid all the tedious groundwork necessary to connect every corner of the enterprise and enable automation to happen.

当AI时代来临，本质上AI就是高度复杂的任务自动化。而谁早已搭建好支持这种自动化的企业级平台和连接网络？正是ServiceNow。所以回答'ServiceNow做什么'——他们确实如自己所言：连接并赋能每个部门。

So when AI arrived, well, AI kinda just by definition is massively sophisticated task automation. And who had already built the platform and the connective tissue with enterprises to enable that automation? ServiceNow. So to answer the question, what does ServiceNow do today? We mean it when they say they connect and power every department.

IT和HR用它管理全公司的人员、设备和软件许可；客服部门用它检测支付失败并内部转接处理；供应链部门用它进行产能规划，整合各部门数据确保协同。不再需要在不同系统重复录入数据。最近ServiceNow还推出AI助手，任何岗位都能创建AI代理处理繁琐工作，让人专注宏观事务。

IT and HR use it to manage people, devices, software licenses across the company. Customer service uses ServiceNow for things like detecting payment failures and routing to the right team or process internally to solve it. Or the supply chain org uses it for capacity planning, integrating with data and plans from other departments to ensure that everybody's on the same page. No more swivel chairing between apps to enter the same data multiple times in different places. And just recently, ServiceNow launched AI agents so that anyone working in any job can spin up an AI agent to handle the tedious stuff, freeing up humans for bigger picture work.

ServiceNow去年入选《财富》全球最受尊敬公司榜单和《快公司》最佳创新者职场，正是源于这种愿景。若您希望在业务各环节运用ServiceNow的规模与速度，请访问servicenow.com/acquired，只需提是本和大卫推荐的。

ServiceNow was named to Fortune's world's most admired companies list last year and Fast Company's best workplace for innovators last year, and it's because of this vision. If you wanna take advantage of the scale and speed of ServiceNow in every corner of your business, go to servicenow.com/acquired and just tell them that Ben and David sent you.

感谢ServiceNow。在评分前，我们先快速分析价值创造与获取比例——就像每期节目那样，比较企业创造的价值与实际获取的价值。比如维基百科就是典型的价值获取比例极低的案例。

Thanks, ServiceNow. Well, alright. As a little precursor to grading here, let's do a quick value creation, value capture. On these episodes, we always compare how does the value that they create compare to the value that they actually capture. You know, is it very little like Wikipedia?

它们是否像谷歌那样大量获取价值？当然，第二部分问题是，为世界创造的价值（而不仅是为股东）与任何价值破坏相比如何？所以从伦理道德的角度来讨论。关于第一个问题，大卫，你可能会说，沃伦·巴菲特是个纯粹的投资人。因此，默认情况下，这意味着他获取的价值与他创造的价值相当。

Do they capture a lot like Google does? And then, of course, a second part, how does the value created for the world, not just for shareholders, compare to any value destruction? So sort of talking from, like, an ethical moral perspective. On the first one, David, you might say, well, Warren Buffett, he's a pure play investor. So that, by default, means he's just capturing as much value as he's creating.

比如，他并没有在创新或为世界创造新产品。他不是那种创造价值类型的人。所以我很好奇你对这点的看法。关于第二部分，那肯定不成立。我认为伯克希尔·哈撒韦从现在开始将有很多关于价值创造的话题可谈。

Like, he's not out there innovating and creating a new product for the world. He's not a value creation type person. So I'm curious your thought on that. Like, on part two, that will definitely not be true. Like, I think Berkshire Hathaway, from this point forward, will have lots of value creation to talk about.

但截至1970年为止呢？你知道，有哪些公司因为沃伦的参与而为世界创造了原本不会产生的净新价值？

But what about up to this point to 1970? You know, what companies created value for the world that otherwise wouldn't have created net new value because Warren was involved?

是的。我是说，甚至退一步看本·格雷厄姆那套雪茄烟蒂投资法，你可以非常真实地论证那全是破坏价值的投资。收购公司然后拆解清算它们。比如

Yeah. Well, I mean and even stepping back and looking at the whole Ben Graham entourage and cigar butt investing, like, you could make a super real argument that it's all that is value destructive investing. Coming after companies and breaking them up and liquidating them. Like

原本持续经营并为客户提供价值的企业就此不复存在。

There was a going concern providing value to customers that is no longer going.

哦，还有不再雇佣员工，确实。这里显然存在一些价值破坏。不过我认为你也可以为本·格雷厄姆的雪茄烟蒂投资辩护，说在他之前，市场充斥着纯粹的投机行为，那对所有人来说同样是价值破坏。所以他确实为基本面投资、基于价值的投资奠定了基础——这里‘价值’取其最纯粹的意义，而非反增长，而是真正投资于价值而非投机。这对世界大有裨益。

Oh, and not employing people and, like yeah. There was definitely some value destruction here. Now I think you could also argue about the cigar butt investing in Ben Graham that before him and them, there was just rampant speculation that was happening, and that's ultimately value destructive for everybody too. So he did lay the groundwork for fundamental investing, value based investing in the purest sense of the word value, not as anti growth, but as, like, true investing in value as opposed to speculating. So that's all great for the world.

没错。想想从格雷厄姆时代至今，所有那些为养老金投资并为其受益人赚取收益的案例。只要他们能接触到不再被当作彩票对待的公开股票，那就非常了不起。

Right. If you think about all the, like, pensions that invested from the Graham era through today that, you know, generated money for their the the people whose pensions they support. Like, that's awesome to the extent that they had access to public equities that were no longer sort of just treated as lotteries.

是的。所以，嗯。然后沃伦，你知道，天哪。我不确定。他的参与对伯克希尔·哈撒韦来说可能是中性的。

Yep. So yeah. And then Warren, you know, gosh. I don't know. It was probably neutral to Berkshire Hathaway, his involvement.

比如，他停止了对企业的投资，但这家企业本来就要倒闭了。

Like, he stopped investing in the business, but the business was gonna die

更快。这是个好问题。有趣的是，因为我对投资者最不客气的看法是，纯粹的投资者只是在重新分配资金堆。所以你没有为世界创造新的价值。这在很多方面都是最不客气的。

any faster. That's a good question. It is interesting because I the the least charitable view that you can take on investors, like pure investors, is that you're just reallocating piles of money. So you're not creating new value for the world. And that's, like, the least charitable in lots of ways.

我是说，如果你想想伟大的风险投资者是如何增值的，是的，除了资金之外，他们确实带来了更多的东西。如果你考虑到我们将在第二部分讨论的一些情况，一个有很强声誉的人可以介入并拯救一家正在崩溃的企业，比如所罗门兄弟之类的。这远远不只是把钱从一个地方挪到另一个地方。所以你确实在为世界创造新的价值。不过有趣的是，在我们目前讨论的1970年之前，我不确定你能说巴菲特合伙公司所做的任何事属于价值创造。

I mean, if you think about the ways that great venture investors are value add, like, yes, there's something there to bringing a lot more than capital. If you think that some of the things we'll talk about in part two where someone with a really strong reputation can sort of come in and save a business who, you know, has has is sort of in the midst of blowing up, like a Solomon Brothers or something like that. Like, that is much more than reallocating money from one pile to another. So you are legitimately creating new value for the world. It's interesting, though, in up to 1970 where we've sort of covered here, I'm not really sure you could make an argument that what the Buffett partnerships were doing was in any type of value creation.

是的。我不这么认为。它为很多价值创造奠定了基础，但确实如此。

Yeah. I don't really think so. It laid the groundwork for a lot of value creation, but yeah.

是的。实际上，审视金融领域纯粹的投资者非常有趣。还有什么是有价值创造的？嗯，如果你增加了市场的流动性，那就是价值创造。如果你发明了更创新的工具，让公司能更快获得资金，或者以更低的费用获得资金，那就提供了价值。

Yep. The the it's actually very interesting to examine, like, in the financial sector, pure play investors. What else is value creative? Well, you can if you increase liquidity in markets, that's value creative. If you come up with more innovative instruments that allow for, I guess it's, again, companies to get funded faster or companies to get funded with fewer fees, that provides value.

不过，沃伦在这一点上并没有做任何这些事。

Warren's not really doing any of this at this point, though.

不。不。完全没有。是的。完全没有。

No. No. Not at all. Yeah. Not at all.

这只是从另一个角度来看。因为通常当我们谈论一个新科技产品时，我们是从这样一个角度出发：他们创造了这么多价值，他们是否捕获了这些价值？而在纯粹的投资和纯粹的金融领域，你是从这样一个角度出发：好吧，他们肯定是在把价值从一个地方转移到另一个地方，但他们是在哪里把饼做大的呢？

It's just coming at it from the other side. Because normally, when we're talking about a new tech product that's created, we start from a place of, well, they created all this value. Did they capture it? And with pure investing and pure finance, you're starting from this place of like, well, alright. They definitely were moving value from one place to another, but where did they grow the pie?

是的。我认为在这一点上他们并没有真正做到。

Yeah. I don't think they really did at this point.

没有。好吧。那么评分。巴菲特的合伙企业在十二年间复合年化收益率为30%。所以这是28倍。

Nope. Okay. So grading. The Buffett partnerships returned 30% for twelve years compounded. So that's a 28 x.

大卫，你怎么看这个？是的。这是一个A吗？还是一个C？

David, how do you think about that? Yeah. Is is that an a? Is that a c?

嗯，这很有趣。对吧？我们在节目之前就在讨论如何解决这个问题。我认为这取决于，就像所有事情一样，取决于你通过什么视角来看待它。如果你把巴菲特的合伙企业看作一个基金，它们本质上就是，它本质上是一个对冲基金。

Well, it's interesting. Right? We were talking before the show about how we're gonna approach this question. And I think it depends, like, everything, the lens through which you look at it. If you look at the Buffett partnerships like a fund, which they essentially are, it's essentially a hedge fund.

嗯。

Mhmm.

任何一只基金在十二年标准生命周期内实现28倍回报，这简直不可思议。这是有史以来最伟大的成就之一。虽然红杉和Benchmark可能有几只基金接近这个数字，但我不认为有哪只真正达到了。

Any fund that returns 28 x over, you know, twelve year standard ish lifetime of a fund, That's incredible. That's one of the greatest of all time. You know, the I there may be some Sequoia and benchmark funds that are approaching that, but I don't think any of them hit that number.

是的。我记得最近Benchmark表现最惊人的那支基金是25倍回报。

No. I think the super fantastic recent benchmark fund was, a 25 x.

没错。即便是那支基金——它包含了哪些项目来着？Uber和WeWork，WeWork和Snap好像都在同一期基金里。对。

Right. So even that and that had what? Like, Uber and WeWork. WeWork and Snap in the same fund, I think. Yep.

对。所以从基金评级的角度来看，绝对是A+级别。不过有意思的是，如果硬要把它和单笔公司投资作比较——虽然我觉得这种比较有点牵强。

Yep. So yeah. From a fund grading it through that lens, a plus. No doubt. Now interestingly, though, if you were to look at it relative to a individual company investment, which I think would be a stretch.

它本质上更像一支基金。完全就是基金运作模式。如今单笔投资十二年赚28倍已经不算惊艳了，要知道现在有些加密货币投资六个月就能实现28倍回报。

I think it is much more like a fund. It is a fund Totally. Company. It's not that impressive these days, you know, that you would, return 28 x on an individual investment over twelve years. I mean, there are individual investments in crypto these days that are returning 28 x in six months.

比如

Like

比特币诞生至今十二年，涨幅达到62...抱歉是620万倍。加密货币完全是另一个维度。

Well, I mean, it's been twelve years since Bitcoin was invented, and it's returned 62 no. I'm sorry. 6,200,000 x. So crypto is a whole different.

没错。这简直让人难以置信。不过真的很有意思。我是说，在那个年代，可能根本没有什么投资能达到这种回报水平，这种个人风格的投资。当然英特尔算一个，但像风险投资或投资私营公司这种概念，全世界大概只有15个人在做。

Right. So that just blows it out of the water. It's really interesting though. Like, I don't back in these times, there probably wasn't anything that was returning on this level, an individual style. I mean, intel for sure, but like the concept of, you know, venture investing or investing in private companies, we're talking about like maybe 15 people in the world that did that.

是的。说得好。我确实没考虑过按时代背景来标准化数据。因为当我看到这些数字时，最直观的感受是——天啊，这个十二年期的基金内部收益率。

Yeah. That's a great point. Yeah. So it's a I hadn't thought about normalizing for the time period. Because, I mean, I thought about when I looked at this, the numbers sort of jump out at me of, like, oh, I have an IRR number on a twelve year fund.

太酷了。让我们和风投对比下。这个十二年期基金的现金回报率，十年基金带两年延展期就达到28倍。这简直是顶尖的0.1%风投基金水平。

Like, cool. Let's compare it to venture. Oh, I have a cash on cash on a twelve year fund. So, like, a 28 x on a ten year fund with a two year extension. Like, this is a top point 1% venture fund.

要知道，人们总说想进入前十分之一，想要三倍五倍回报。但基金很少能达到28倍，尤其是考虑到巴菲特当时投资金额经通胀调整后的价值。这实在是令人震撼的成就。

You know, this is like people say, I wanna be top decile. I want a three x. I want a five x. Like, funds don't 28 x, especially with the inflation adjusted millions that Buffett was investing then. So it's a it's a crazy impressive feat.

如果要评级的话，这绝对是A+。事实上他们不仅从未亏损，每年都跑赢道指且保持正收益——在允许投资者随时赎回的情况下做到这点，简直不可思议。

I mean, I to like, just to assign a letter. This is an a plus, and frankly, the fact that, a, they never lost money. They they not only beat the Dow, but they had a positive return every single year. Crazy impressive. And a positive return with the option to take your money out.

所以这里不存在类似风投的流动性溢价。更疯狂的是，虽然伯克希尔哈撒韦存续时间更长、管理资金规模更大，但这个29.5%的年化收益率完全碾压了伯克希尔...

So the there's not an illiquidity premium unlike venture. You know? It's just crazy. And actually beats the now granted Berkshire Hathaway has been around a lot longer and it, today, and they're managing way more money than the Buffett partnerships ever were. But, you know, this 30% or 29.5% definitely beats the pants off of Berkshire's Yeah.

自沃伦全职经营后的所有回报率。这个话题我们留到下期节目再详谈。

Returns, you know, ever since Warren went full time, which we'll talk about in the next, next episode.

什么是全职？我认为沃伦只是领先于他的时代。没错，A+。我们兜着圈子试图理解，但确实，这是个A+。

What is full time? I think Warren was just a man ahead of his time. Yep. A plus. We're dancing around trying to figure, but, yeah, it's an A plus.

毫无疑问。是的。

No doubt. Yep.

好吧。剥离部分？剥离部分。

Alright. Carve outs? Carve outs.

我的思维方式、投资视角、世界观截然不同，但非常吸引人。巴拉吉·斯里尼瓦桑在蒂姆·费里斯秀上的三小时播客，几周前发布的。极其引人入胜。巴拉吉是科技圈许多人都知道的独特人物，曾担任安德森·霍洛维茨基金的合伙人。

Mine is a very, very, very different way of thinking, investing, looking at the world, but fascinating. Balaji Srinivasan on the Tim Ferriss show, another three hour podcast that came out a few weeks ago. Wildly fascinating. Balaji is a very interesting character that many people in tech know. He was a partner at Andreessen Horowitz for a while.

他创立了Council公司，还是earn.com的创始人（后被Coinbase收购），之后担任Coinbase首席技术官。他是加密货币布道者、超人类主义倡导者，跨国界思想者。总之这期播客非常有趣，讨论了许多看似超前的理念，但总值得思考。

He founded Council. He was, founder of a company called earn.com, I think, that Coinbase acquired, then he became the CTO of Coinbase. He's a crypto evangelist, transhuman evangelist, transnational, you know. Anyway, very interesting podcast. Lots of seemingly out there ideas discussed, but always worth considering these things.

我真的很喜欢。

I really enjoyed it.

是啊，我已经把它排在我待听清单的下一位了。就在我听完所有伯克希尔研究资料之后。

Yeah. I gotta it's it's, like, next on my queue to check out. I I it's, like, right after all the stuff that I was listening to to do the Berkshire research.

是啊。我们最近确实没太多时间做其他专项事务。

Yeah. We haven't had a lot of time for, other carve outs recently.

我得说这是我第一次提前几个月就开始准备研究，兴奋得像个孩子似的等着做这期节目。所以

I will say this is the first time I've started research, like, months in advance, just, like, giddy to do this episode. So

我知道。这次真的太有趣了。

I know. This was so fun.

好吧。我推荐的也是通过音频形式接触的内容。虽然文字版也能阅读，但作为重度音频消费者，我选择聆听。而且直接从当事人嘴里听到这些，比阅读体验好得多——尤其是这个案例。Paki McCormack写了篇精彩文章《Not Boring一周年记》，我强烈推荐阅读，特别是听他用原声朗读的版本。

Alright. Mine is also something that I listen to via audio. You can read it via text text as well, but since I'm such a big audio consumer, I chose to listen. And, hearing it straight from the horse's mouth, I much prefer it to reading, especially in this case. Paki McCormack wrote a wonderful piece called Not Boring One Year In, and I can't recommend reading it and especially the narration and hearing it in his voice enough.

不确定是特别触动我，还是因为和Packy是朋友见证了他的历程，又或者他的经历与《Acquired》惊人相似。听着听着我就在车里激动大喊，某些段落简直感同身受。这是对他第一年最坦诚的内心剖白，难以置信才过去一年。

I don't know if it just particularly resonated with me because, you know, we're friends with Packy, and we've been watching his journey, or if his journey is just, like, remarkably similar to Acquired. So just reading it, I'm, like, just screaming in my car while listening to it, yes, like, at certain moments. But it is the most awesome open book cathartic telling of his first year. I can't believe it's only been a year.

太疯狂了，我知道。

What a crazy I know.

他完成的壮举令人惊叹。最引发我共鸣的是：既有固定流程又没流程。他说为了每周稳定输出内容，必须遵循时间表，但实际创作时完全不知道内容会是什么样，需要等待灵感的闪电劈中。

Crazy thing he's accomplished. And the biggest thing that resonated with me is that, like, there's both a process and not a process. And he's like, I have certain things that I do because I need to get the content out once a week or twice a week. And so I I have a set schedule that I need to follow. But I don't I never actually know, like, what the content's going to be, and I need these lightning bolts of creativity.

我想说的是，大卫和我所涉猎的范围并没有那么广，比如，你知道的，一个不无聊的作品可能与Acquired的常规模式大相径庭，尽管最近谁知道呢。但我非常清楚的是，我需要做一系列活动来激发创意，然后在某个时刻，我需要缩小范围并挑选一个，然后坚持执行其中一个想法。我认为，对于任何定期创作的人来说，无论是制作产品、撰写博客、录制播客还是其他形式，这种情感都是非常真实且容易产生共鸣的。而Package在描述这一点上做得非常出色。

And I would say that David and I aren't quite as wide in the gamut that we run of, like, where the you know, a not boring piece can look quite different than the sort of what Acquired's mold is, although recently, who knows. But I definitely know that thing of, like, okay. There's a set of activities that I need to do to go generate ideas, and then I can at some point, I need to narrow and pick one, and then I need to run with one of those ideas. And I think that's a for a person who is creating on any sort of regular schedule, be it creating in products you're making, creating in the blog stuff you're writing, creating in podcast, whatever it is, like, that is such a real emotion to identify with. And, Package does such a great job writing about it.

我认为任何从事创作的人都应该去读读《Not Boring One You're In》。

I think anyone who makes stuff should go read Not Boring One You're In.

是的，那篇文章太棒了，我非常喜欢。

Yeah. It was so good. I loved that piece.

Paki，我的朋友，你真是个天才。确实如此。好了，在我们结束之前，我们要提一下，2021年伯克希尔·哈撒韦年度股东大会将于5月1日举行。所以，如果你和大卫一样，正逐渐成为巴菲特的粉丝，那这是个不容错过的活动，可以在那个美好的周六通过雅虎财经观看。我们很快也会推出第二部分的内容。

Paki, my friend, you are gifted. Indeed. Well, as we wind down here, we should say there is a a Berkshire Hathaway twenty twenty one annual shareholder meeting that will be coming up on May 1. So if you, like David and I, are becoming sort of a converted Buffett head, that is a great thing to tune into and watch on, that lovely Saturday on Yahoo Finance. We will have part two coming out here in the near future.

我们非常期待与大家讨论关于伯克希尔的一切，无论是过去我们在节目中提到的，还是即将在第二部分中涉及的现在，以及展望未来的伯克希尔年度股东大会。所以，如果听起来有趣的话，请关注。沃伦和查理会在台上连续几个小时回答问题，应该会非常精彩。

We definitely look forward to talking about all things Berkshire with you, both past as we've covered on this show, up to the present as we'll do on part two and looking into the future with the Berkshire annual meeting. So, tune into that if, if it sounds interesting. It's Warren and Charlie on stage just fielding questions for hours and hours and hours on end, so it should be pretty good.

在后疫情时代，我们真的应该去参加。明年就去。就像所有的艺术家和钢铁侠一样，做同样的事情。我们应该这样做，我们应该上台，然后邀请所有的赞助商和合作伙伴。

We should totally, in post COVID times, a Go. Go next year. B, be like all, you know, artists and steel and just do the same thing. We should, like, we should totally do this. We should just, like, get up on stage, and then we should have all of our sponsors, all of our partners

哦，天哪。就在大厅里。

Oh my gosh. Out in the concourse.

在大厅里。我们将摆放沃伦和查理的青铜半身像。

Out in the concourse. We'll have bronze busts of Warren and Charlie.

感谢我们Tiny公司的好朋友们。

Thank you to our good friends at Tiny.