巴菲特致股东的信（1995年）①概述

To the Shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.:

Our gain in net worth during 1995 was $5.3 billion, or 45.0%. Per-share book value grew by a little less, 43.1%, because we paid stock for two acquisitions, increasing our shares outstanding by 1.3%. Over the last 31 years (that is, since present management took over) per-share book value has grown from $19 to $14,426, or at a rate of 23.6% compounded annually.

致伯克希尔·哈撒韦公司所有股东：

1995 年本公司的账面价值增加了 53 亿美元，或增长了 45%，但由于去年以发行股份的方式并购了两家公司，使得发行在外股份增加了 1.3%，所以每股账面价值增长了 43.1%(标普 37.6%)。自从现任管理层接手的 31年以来，每股账面价值由当初的 19 美元成长到现在的 14,426 美元，年复合成长率约为 23.6%。

There's no reason to do handsprings over 1995's gains. This was a year in which any fool could make a bundle in the stock market. And we did. To paraphrase President Kennedy, a rising tide lifts all yachts.

对于 1995 年能够有这样的成绩并没有什么值得好高兴的，因为在去年那样的股票市场状况，任何一个笨蛋都可以很轻易在市场上有所斩获，我们当然也不例外，用肯尼迪总统的话说：水涨船高。

Putting aside the financial results, there was plenty of good news at Berkshire last year: We negotiated three acquisitions of exactly the type we desire. Two of these, Helzberg's Diamond Shops and R.C. Willey Home Furnishings, are included in our 1995 financial statements, while our largest transaction, the purchase of GEICO, closed immediately after the end of the year. (I'll tell you more about all three acquisitions later in the report.)

先不管亮丽的财务数字，去年对伯克希尔来说，有许多令人振奋的好消息，我们总共谈成了三件我们渴望已久的公司并购交易，其中两家 Helzberg 钻石店与 R.C.Willey 家具店，将列入伯克希尔 1995 年的财务报表之中，而最大的一项交易是并购 GEICO 保险剩余的全部股权，在年末不久交易完成 (三笔并购在后文会详加叙述)。

These new subsidiaries roughly double our revenues. Even so, the acquisitions neither materially increased our shares outstanding nor our debt. And, though these three operations employ over 11,000 people, our headquarters staff grew only from 11 to 12. (No sense going crazy.)

这些新加入的子公司将使我们的营收增加一倍，然而并购之后公司流通在外的股份或是负债并没有增加多少；另外，虽然这三家公司旗下员工人数合计高达 11,000 人，但我们总部的人员却仅由 11 人增加为 12 人，我们没有因为大笔并购而失去理智。

Charlie Munger, Berkshire's Vice Chairman and my partner, and I want to build a collection of companies - both wholly- and partly-owned - that have excellent economic characteristics and that are run by outstanding managers. Our favorite acquisition is the negotiated transaction that allows us to purchase 100% of such a business at a fair price. But we are almost as happy when the stock market offers us the chance to buy a modest percentage of an outstanding business at a pro-rata price well below what it would take to buy 100%. This double-barrelled approach - purchases of entire businesses through negotiation or purchases of part-interests through the stock market - gives us an important advantage over capital-allocators who stick to a single course. Woody Allen once explained why eclecticism works: "The real advantage of being bisexual is that it doubles your chances for a date on Saturday night."

伯克希尔的副主席兼合伙人查理·芒格，和我一直致力于建立一个拥有绝佳竞争优势，且由杰出经理人领导的企业所组成的集团，其中一部分是 100%持有，一部分则是持有部分股权，当然我们最希望的方式还是通过协商以公平合理的价格取得全部的股权，不过如果我们在股票市场中有机会能够找到以低于并购整家公司所需的平均价格，取得一家好公司一大部分股份的话，我们也很乐于尝试，事实上这种双管齐下的做法，(也就是经由协商买下整家公司或是通过股市买进部分股权)，使得我们比起其它坚持单一做法的资金分配者来说，拥有绝佳的优势。伍迪·艾伦形容折衷主义时说：双性恋者最大的好处就是，在周末约会的机率增加了一倍。

Over the years, we've been Woody-like in our thinking, attempting to increase our marketable investments in wonderful businesses, while simultaneously trying to buy similar businesses in their entirety. The following table illustrates our progress on both fronts. In the tabulation, we show the marketable securities owned per share of Berkshire at ten-year intervals. A second column lists our per-share operating earnings (before taxes and purchase-price adjustments but after interest and corporate overhead) from all other activities. In other words, the second column shows what we earned excluding the dividends, interest and capital gains that we realized from investments. Purchase-price accounting adjustments are ignored for reasons we have explained at length in previous reports and which, as an act of mercy, we won't repeat. (We'll be glad to send masochists the earlier explanations, however.)

多年来，我们的看法一直与伍迪一致，在努力增加我们非凡企业的投资比例的同时，也试着买下一些同样优秀企业的全部所有权，下表充分显示了我们在(经营和投资)两方面的进展，表中列出每十年间，伯克希尔每股所拥有的股票价值(部分持股)，以及除投资外所有经营活动的每股经营收益(扣除利息与费用但未扣除所得税与购买法会计调整数)，换言之，第二列所代表的是在扣除投资所得的股利、利息收入与资本利得之后的经营收益(全资控股部分)，至于购买法会计调整数不列入的原因，在以前的年报中，我们已经花了相当的篇幅解释过了，在这个地方我们就不再重复了，当然如果你有被虐待的倾向的话，我们也不介意再复述一次。

These results have not sprung from some master plan that we concocted in 1965. In a general way, we knew then what we hoped to accomplish but had no idea what specific opportunities might make it possible. Today we remain similarly unstructured: Over time, we expect to improve the figures in both columns but have no road map to tell us how that will come about.

当初在 1965 年时，我们并未刻意规划什么伟大的计划，来达成以上的成果，我们只知道我们应该朝这个方向做，但却不晓得到底会有什么样的机会会出现，时至今日，我们同样是漫无目标，只能够预期这两栏的数字都能够持续地精进，至于应该要如何达成，并没有一个明确的路线。

We proceed with two advantages: First, our operating managers are outstanding and, in most cases, have an unusually strong attachment to Berkshire. Second, Charlie and I have had considerable experience in allocating capital and try to go at that job rationally and objectively. The giant disadvantage we face is size: In the early years, we needed only good ideas, but now we need good big ideas. Unfortunately, the difficulty of finding these grows in direct proportion to our financial success, a problem that increasingly erodes our strengths.

我们拥有两项优势，首先，我们旗下事业的经理人都相当优秀，且大部分的经理人都与伯克希尔保持紧密的关系，第二，查理跟我在资本配置方面拥有相当丰富的经验，可以理性客观地执行这项工作，我们所面临最大的劣势是规模太大，在早年，我们只需要好的投资方案，但是现在我们需要的却是又大又好的投资方案，然而不幸的是，要找到能够与伯克希尔发展速度相匹配的公司的难度日益升高，这个问题持续地侵蚀我们的竞争优势。

I will have more to say about Berkshire's prospects later in this report, when I discuss our proposed recapitalization.

在报告的后段讨论有关公司所提的股权重组提案，我会再详加说明伯克希尔未来的前景。