2007年伯克希尔股东会问答：
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello. Burkhardt Whittick (PH) from Munich in Germany.观众:你好。Burkhardt Whittick (PH)，来自德国慕尼黑。
I would like to get some more transparency on how you make investment decisions, particularly how you determine intrinsic value.我想知道你们如何做出投资决策，特别是如何确定内在价值。
You mentioned that the theoretically correct method is discounted cash flow, but at the same time you point out the inherent difficulties of the methodology.您提到理论上正确的方法是贴现现金流量，但同时您也指出了该方法的内在困难。
From other books, I see that you use multiples on operating earnings, or (inaudible) multiples. Your [former] daughter [in law] Mary, in one of her books, describes another methodology where you apply compounding economics to the value of the equity.从其他书中，我看到你在经营收益上使用倍数，或者(听不清)倍数。您的(前)儿媳玛丽在她的一本书中描述了另一种方法，将复利经济学应用于股权价值。
Could you give us a bit more transparency which quantitative approach you use and how many years out you try to quantify the results of the investments you’re interested in?你能给我们透露一下你使用的量化方法，以及你对你感兴趣的投资的量化结果有多少年的时间吗?
WARREN BUFFETT: I understand the question, but I’m going to pretend I don’t and let Charlie answer first. (Laughs)沃伦·巴菲特:我明白你的问题，但我要假装不明白，让查理先回答。(笑)真的。
CHARLIE MUNGER: Yeah. When you’re trying to determine something like intrinsic value and margin of safety and so on, there’s no one easy method that could be simply mechanically applied by, say, a computer and make anybody who could punch the buttons rich.查理·芒格:是的。当你试图确定内在价值和安全边际之类的东西时，没有一种容易的方法可以简单地通过计算机机械地应用，让任何能按下按钮的人变得富有。
By definition, this is going to be a game which you play with multiple techniques and multiple models, and a lot of experience is very helpful.根据定义，这将是一款你需要使用多种技术和多种模式的游戏，而丰富的经验是非常有帮助的。
I don’t think you can become a great investor very rapidly any more than you could become a great bone tumor pathologist very rapidly. It takes some experience and that’s why it’s helpful to get a very early start.我认为你不可能很快成为一个伟大的投资者，就像你不可能很快成为一个伟大的骨肿瘤病理学家一样。这需要一些经验，这就是为什么尽早开始是有帮助的。
WARREN BUFFETT: But if you’re — let’s just say that we all decided we’re going to buy a — or think about — buying a farm.沃伦·巴菲特:但如果你是——这么说吧，我们都决定要买一个——或者考虑买一个农场。
And we go up 30-miles north of here and we find out that a farm up there can produce 120 bushels of corn, and it can produce 45 bushels of soybean per acre, and we know what fertilizer costs, and we know what the property taxes cost, and we know what we’ll have to pay the farmer to actually do the work involved, and we’ll get some number that we can make per acre, using fairly conservative assumptions.我们往北走30英里我们发现那里的一个农场每英亩可以生产120蒲式耳的玉米，每英亩可以生产45蒲式耳的大豆，我们知道化肥的成本，我们知道财产税的成本，我们知道我们需要支付给农民多少钱来实际做这些工作，我们会得到我们每英亩可以做的一些数字，使用相当保守的假设。
And let’s just assume that when you get through making those calculations that it turns out to be that you can make $70 an acre to the owner without working at it.让我们假设，当你完成这些计算后，结果是你可以每英亩为所有者赚取70美元，而不需要工作。
Then the question is how much do you pay for the $70? Do you assume that agriculture will get a little bit better over the years so that your yields will be a little higher?那么问题是你为这70美元花了多少钱?你是否认为农业会在过去的几年里变得更好一些，这样你的产量就会更高一些?
Do you assume that prices will work a little higher over time? They haven’t done much of that, although recently, it’s been good with corn and soybeans. But over the years agriculture prices have not done too much. So you would be conservative in your assumptions, then.你认为价格会随着时间的推移再高一点吗?他们在这方面做得不多，尽管最近玉米和大豆的收成不错。但多年来农产品价格并没有太大变化。所以你的假设是保守的。
And you might decide that for $70 an acre, you know, you would want a — if you decided you wanted a 7 percent return, you’d pay a thousand dollars an acre.你可能会决定70美元一英亩，如果你想要7%的回报，你会支付1000美元一英亩。
You know, if farmland is selling for 900, you know you’re going to have a buy signal. And if it’s selling for 1200, you’re going to look at something else. That’s what we do in businesses.你知道，如果农田卖到900美元，你知道你会有买入信号。如果它的售价是1200，你就会去看别的东西。这就是我们在商业中所做的。
We are trying to figure out what those corporate farms that we’re looking at are going to produce. And to do that we have to understand their competitive position. We have to understand the dynamics of the business.我们正在努力弄清楚我们所关注的那些企业农场将生产什么。要做到这一点，我们必须了解他们的竞争地位。我们必须了解业务的动态。
We have to be able to look out in the future. And like I’ve said earlier, some businesses you can’t look out very far at.我们必须能够展望未来。就像我之前说的，有些生意你无法看得太远。
But the mathematics of investment were set out by Aesop in 600BC. And he said, “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.”但是投资的数学是公元前600年由伊索提出的。他说:“一鸟在手胜过双鸟在林。”
Now our question is, when do we get the two? How long do we wait? How sure are we that there are two in the bush? Could there be more, you know? What’s the right discount rate?现在的问题是，我们什么时候能得到这两个?我们要等多久?我们有多确定灌木丛里有两只?还能有更多吗?合适的贴现率是多少?
And we measure one against the other that way. I mean, we are looking at a whole bunch of businesses, how many birds are they going to give us, when are they going to give them to us, and we try to decide which ones — basically, which bushes — we want to buy out in the future.我们以这种方式相互衡量。我的意思是，我们正在审视一大堆业务，它们会给我们带来多少收益，它们什么时候会给我们带来这些收益，我们试图决定哪些——基本上，哪些业务——我们未来想要买断。
It’s all about evaluating future — the future ability — to distribute cash, or to reinvest cash at high rates if it isn’t distributed.这都是关于评估未来——未来的能力——分配现金的能力，或者在没有分配的情况下以高利率进行现金再投资的能力。
Berkshire has never distributed any cash, but it’s grown in its cash producing abilities, and we retain it because we think we can create more than a dollar present value by retaining it. But it’s the ability to distribute cash that gives Berkshire its value.伯克希尔从来没有分发过现金，但它的现金生产能力在增长，我们保留它是因为我们认为通过保留它可以创造超过一美元的现值。但伯克希尔的价值在于其分配现金的能力。
And we try to increase that ability to distribute cash year by year by year and then we try to keep it and invest it in a way so that a dollar bill is worth more than a dollar.我们试着逐年增加分配现金的能力，然后我们试着以某种方式保留和投资，这样一美元就比一美元更值钱。
You may have an insight into very few businesses. I mean, if we left here and walked by a McDonald’s stand, you know, and you decided, would you pay a million dollars for that McDonald’s stand, or a million-three, or 900,000, you’d think about how likely it was there would be more competition, whether McDonald’s could change the franchise arrangement on you, whether people are going to keep eating hamburgers, you know, all kinds of things.你可能对很少的业务有洞察力。我的意思是，如果我们离开这里，经过一个麦当劳的摊位，你知道，你决定，你是花一百万美元买那个麦当劳的摊位，还是一百万美元，还是90万美元，你会考虑竞争加剧的可能性有多大，麦当劳是否会改变对你的特许经营安排，人们是否会继续吃汉堡，你知道，各种各样的东西。
And you actually would say to yourself this McDonald’s stand will make X — X plus 5 percent — maybe in a couple years because over time prices will increase a little.你可能会对自己说这个麦当劳小摊能赚X - X + 5%也许几年后因为随着时间的推移，价格会上涨一点。
And that’s all investing is. But you have to know when you know what you’re doing, and you have to know when you’re getting outside of what I call your circle of competency, you don’t have the faintest idea.这就是投资的全部。但你必须知道什么时候你知道自己在做什么，你必须知道什么时候你已经超出了我所说的能力圈，你一点概念都没有。
查理。
CHARLIE MUNGER: Yeah. The other thing, you’ve got to recognize that we’ve never had any system for being able to make correct judgments on the values of all businesses.查理·芒格:是的。另一件事，你必须认识到，我们从来没有任何系统能够对所有企业的价值做出正确的判断。
We throw almost all decisions into the too hard pile, and we just sift for a few decisions that we can make that are easy. And that’s a comparative process.我们把几乎所有的决定都扔到太难的那堆里，我们只是筛选出一些我们能做的、容易做的决定。这是一个比较的过程。
And if you’re looking for an ability to correctly value all investments at all times, we can’t help you.如果你在寻找一种随时对所有投资进行正确估值的能力，我们帮不了你。
WARREN BUFFETT: No. We know how to step over one-foot bars. We don’t know how to jump over seven-foot bars.沃伦•巴菲特:不。我们知道怎么跨过一英尺高的栏杆。我们不知道怎么跳过七英尺高的栏杆。
But we do know how to recognize, occasionally, what is a one-foot bar. And we know enough to stay away from the seven-foot bars, too.但我们确实知道如何识别，偶尔，什么是一英尺的栅栏。而且我们也知道远离七英尺高的栅栏。
投资需要经验积累，且不要去挑战七尺栏杆。没有一种方法可以对所有的企业进行估值。以巴菲特买美国运通为例，1963年企业营业税后利润为1100万左右，另外美国运通的账面上还有大量的浮存金和证券投资，1963年有440万投资收益直接计入了股东权益（根据当时的会计准则），而从市盈率上根本看不出这点。现在的会计准则也许更合理，但净利润本身是一个很灵活的数字，市盈率等单一的指标也并不能说明股价便宜还是贵了，投资者需要关注指标背后的经营本身。从另一个角度来看，市盈率和市净率根本就不是估值指标，而只是市场暂时定价的指标。保守的看法是，高市盈率代表贵了，低市盈率并不能代表便宜。在这段对话中，有一个点值得注意。巴菲特说他会研究各种各样的生意，思考它们的现金流，然后决策未来想要买入什么。也就是说，巴菲特是先看好了企业，完成评估后，然后观察、等待企业的价格触达买点。
我有点为那些这两天拿着资金入场的散户担心，他们之前没有研究过公司，甚至连财务指标也不太懂，也不关心商业模式、股权结构或者管理层。
他们被直播间的大V所蛊惑，去买入那些曾经在牛市期间大涨的板块，比如券商，去玩击鼓传花的游戏，当钟声停止时，只会剩下一地鸡毛。希望这次没有人出现在天台上。
如果要参与这场“游戏”，请远离杠杆，用3年以上不用的资金来参与。这样至少你的生活不会受到太大影响。
但我表示悲观，芒格曾说过中国人喜欢赌博，他说得没错。
![]()
延伸阅读：
戳![]()
关注，右上角菜单栏● ● ●键，设为星标
