2015年伯克希尔股东会问答：
CAROL LOOMIS: This question comes from Mona Dyan (PH). And it concerns two indicators, Warren, that you have discussed in the past about the general level of the stock market.
CAROL LOOMIS:这个问题来自Mona Dyan (PH)。这涉及到两个指标，沃伦，你过去讨论过的关于股票市场总体水平的指标。
The first one is the percentage of total market cap relative to the U.S. GNP, which you have said is probably the best single measure of where valuations stand at any given moment.第一个是总市值相对于美国国民生产总值的百分比，你说过，这可能是衡量任何给定时刻估值水平的最佳单一指标。
This indicator is at about 125 percent. That is the ratio of total market cap to U.S. GNP, and that’s about what it was when Warren talked about this back in 1999 just before the — shortly before — the bubble broke.这个指标大约是125%。这是总市值与美国国民生产总值（GNP）的比率，这与沃伦在1999年谈论这个问题时的情况差不多，就在——泡沫破裂前不久——的情况差不多。
The second indicator, which you mentioned in a famous 1999 speech that subsequently became an article in Fortune, is the corporate profits — is corporate profits — as percent of GNP.第二个指标，你在1999年的一次著名演讲中提到过，后来在《财富》杂志上发表了一篇文章，那就是企业利润占国民生产总值的百分比。
You had said at the time that that number ranged between 4 percent to 6 1/2 percent over a long period of time, which I believe was 1951 to 1999.你当时说过，在很长一段时间内，这个数字在4%到6.5%之间，我认为是1951年到1999年。
Well, as of Friday, it is about 10 1/2 percent, according to the St. Louis Federal Reserve site. That is way above the range you had mentioned.根据圣路易斯联邦储备银行网站的数据，截至周五，数字约为10.5%。这远远超出了你提到的范围。
Are the current levels of either one, or both, of these indicators a matter of concern for the general investing public?这些指标中的任何一个或两个目前的水平都是普通投资公众关注的问题吗?
WARREN BUFFETT: Yeah. Well, the — it might be — the second figure, which is the profits as a percentage of GDP, might be a concern for other segments of society because what it indicates is that American business has done wonderfully well in recent years.沃伦·巴菲特:是的。第二个数字，即利润占GDP的百分比，可能会引起社会其他部分的关注，因为它表明美国商业近年来做得非常好。
And I know it says how — what a terrible disadvantage it has, because of U.S. tax rates and a host of other things, you know, the facts are that American business has prospered incredibly.我知道这说明，由于美国的税率和许多其他因素，它有多么可怕的劣势，你知道，事实是美国的商业非常繁荣。
And the first comparison is very much affected by the fact that we live in an interest rate environment, which Charlie and I probably would have thought was almost impossible, not too many years ago.第一个比较很大程度上受到我们所处的利率环境的影响，几年前，查理和我可能认为这几乎是不可能的。And, obviously, profits are worth a whole lot more if the government bond yield is 1 percent, than they’re worth if the government bond yield is 5 percent.很明显，利润在政府债券收益率为1%时比在政府债券收益率为5%时更值钱。
So it gets back — and, you know, Charlie in that movie talked about alternatives and opportunity cost. And for many people, the opportunity cost is owning a lot of bonds, which pay practically nothing, or owning stocks, which are selling at fairly high prices historically, but they weren’t selling at those historic prices with interest rates like this.所以它回到了，你知道，查理在那部电影中谈到了选择和机会成本。对很多人来说，机会成本是持有大量债券，这些债券几乎不支付任何费用，或者持有股票，这些股票在历史上的价格相当高，但在利率这样的情况下，它们并没有以历史价格出售。
So I would not — I look at those numbers, but I also look at them in the context of the fact that we’re living in a world that has incredibly low interest rates, and the question is how long those are going to prevail. Is it going to be something like Japan that goes on decade after decade, or will we be back to what we thought was normal interest rates?所以我不会——我看这些数字，但我也会考虑到我们生活在一个低得令人难以置信的利率世界的背景下，问题是这种情况会持续多久。是会像日本那样，几十年如一日地持续下去，还是会回到我们认为正常的利率水平?
If we get back to what are normal interest rates, stocks at these prices will look pretty high. If we continue with these kinds of interest rates, stocks will look very cheap. And now I’ve given you the answer and you can take your pick. (Laughs)如果我们回到正常的利率水平，目前的股价看起来会相当高。如果我们继续保持这样的利率，股票将看起来非常便宜。现在我已经给了你答案，你可以选择。(笑)
查理?
CHARLIE MUNGER: Well, since we failed to predict what happened, and what exists now, why would anybody ask us what our prediction is in the future? (Laughter)查理·芒格:既然我们没能预测发生了什么，以及现在存在什么，为什么会有人问我们对未来的预测是什么?(笑声)
WARREN BUFFETT: Yeah, yeah. We — incidentally, the one thing I can assure you, Charlie and I, to my knowledge, or my memory, I can’t recall ever us making an acquisition or turning down one based on macro factors that — you know, and we talk about deals when they come along, but whether it was See’s Candy, or whatever it might have been, the Burlington Northern we bought at a terrible time, in general economic conditions.沃伦·巴菲特:是的，是的。我们——顺便说一句，有一件事我可以向你保证，查理和我，据我所知，或者我的记忆，我不记得我们曾经因为宏观经济因素而进行收购或拒绝收购——你知道的，当交易出现时我们会讨论它们，但无论是See's Candy，还是其他任何可能的交易，我们购买伯灵顿北方铁路公司（Burlington Northern）的时候，从一般经济状况来看，那是一个糟糕的时机。
But we don’t — it just doesn’t come up, because we don’t — we know we don’t know what the next 12 months, 24 months, 30 — we know we don’t know what that’s going to look like. But it doesn’t really make any difference if we’re buying a business to hold for a hundred years.但我们不——它只是没有出现，因为我们不——我们知道我们不知道未来12个月，24个月，30个月会是什么样子。但如果我们买的是一家要持有100年的公司，这并没有什么区别。
What we have to do is figure out what’s likely to be the average profitability of the business over time and how strong its competitive mode is and that sort of thing.我们必须做的是计算出企业随时间的平均盈利能力以及它的竞争优势有多强等等这类事情。
So, people have trouble believing that. They think we talk about it. We think any company that has an economist, you know, certainly, has one employee too many. (Laughter)所以人们很难相信这一点。他们认为我们会谈论它。我们认为任何一家拥有经济学家的公司，肯定是多了一个员工。(笑声)
Charlie? Can you think of anything rude to say that I haven’t said? (Laughter)查理?你能想到什么我没说过的无礼的话吗?(笑声)
CHARLIE MUNGER: Well, it would be hard to top that one. (Laughter)查理·芒格:嗯，很难超越这个。(笑声)
WARREN BUFFETT: I know. OK. (Laughter)
在这段对话中，股东所提到的第一个指标非常有名，就是所谓的“巴菲特指标”，它经常被用来给整体股票市场估值。
对于投资个股的人来说，这个指标没有什么意义。对于股票整体市场估值，它确实有一定的参考作用，但我个人认为这个指标的作用也很有限，因为投资者即便是买指数基金，也不会去买整个股票市场指数，而是会进行挑选，决定投资者回报的是某个指数基金本身。真正重要的宏观指标只有一个，那就是国债利率，它直接关系到现金流的贴现价值和股票市场的估值水平。遗憾的是，这个指标无法被精确预测，对于投资者来说，重要的是采取保守的贴现率来对抗这种风险。
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