巴菲特致股东的信（2005年）④受管制的公用事业

Regulated Utility Business

受管制的公用事业

We have an 80.5% (fully diluted) interest in MidAmerican Energy Holdings, which owns a wide variety of utility operations. The largest of these are (1) Yorkshire Electricity and Northern Electric, whose 3.7 million electric customers make it the third largest distributor of electricity in the U.K.; (2) MidAmerican Energy, which serves 706,000 electric customers, primarily in Iowa; and (3) Kern River and Northern Natural pipelines, which carry 7.8% of the natural gas consumed in the U.S. When our PacifiCorp acquisition closes, we will add 1.6 million electric customers in six Western states, with Oregon and Utah providing us the most business. This transaction will increase MidAmerican’s revenues by $3.3 billion and its assets by $14.1 billion.

我们持有中美能源控股公司 80.5%的股权(完全稀释后)，这是一家拥有许多不同种类公用事业企业的控股公司，其中下属最大的三家企业包括：(1)约克郡电力公司与北方电力公司，拥有 370 万电力用户，为英国第三大电力供应商(2)中美能源，主要是为爱荷华的 70.6 万用户提供服务；(3)科恩河与北部天然气，运输了美国消费天然气的 7.8%。并购太平洋能源完成后，我们将在西部 6 州增加 160 万的电力用户，其中大部分业务在俄勒冈州和犹他州。这次交易将使中美能源的收入增加 330 亿美元，资产增加 141 亿美元。

The Public Utility Holding Company Act (“PUHCA”) was repealed on August 8, 2005, a milestone that allowed Berkshire to convert its MidAmerican preferred stock into voting common shares on February 9, 2006. This conversion ended a convoluted corporate arrangement that PUHCA had forced upon us. Now we have 83.4% of both the common stock and the votes at MidAmerican, which allows us to consolidate the company’s income for financial accounting and tax purposes. Our true economic interest, however, is the aforementioned 80.5%, since there are options outstanding that are sure to be exercised within a few years and that upon exercise will dilute our ownership.

2005 年 8 月 8 日，公用事业控股公司法案(PUHCA)被废止，这一里程碑事件，使伯克希尔能够在 2006 年 1月 9 日，将其持有的中美能源优先股转换为拥有投票权的普通股，这次转换结束了公用事业控股公司法案强加于我们的错综复杂的公司制度安排。现在我们同时持有中美能源的 83.4%普通股和投票权，这使得我们在财务会计和税收上能够合并这家公司的报表。可是我们真正的经济权益是前面提到的 80.5%，因为已经发行的期权肯定会在未来几年间执行，这将稀释我们的持股比例。

Though our voting power has increased dramatically, the dynamics of our four-party ownership have not changed at all. We view MidAmerican as a partnership among Berkshire, Walter Scott, and two terrific managers, Dave Sokol and Greg Abel. It’s unimportant how many votes each party has; we will make major moves only when we are unanimous in thinking them wise. Five years of working with Dave, Greg and Walter have underscored my original belief: Berkshire couldn’t have better partners.

尽管我们的投票权大幅度增加，但四方共同持有的股权结构根本不会发生任何变化。我们将中美能源看作是伯克希尔、WalterScott 及其两位超级经理人 DaveSokol 和 GregAbel 四方组成的合伙企业，每一方持有多少投票权并不重要，重要的是，只有我们大家共同认为明智的情况下，我们才会采取重大的行动。与 Dave、Greg 和Walter 共同合作了 5 年，进一步强化了我最初的信念：没有比他们更好的合作伙伴了。

You will notice that this year we have provided you with two balance sheets, one representing our actual figures per GAAP on December 31, 2005 (which does not consolidate MidAmerican) and one that reflects the subsequent conversion of our preferred. All future financial reports of Berkshire will include MidAmerican’s figures.

你会注意到，2005 年我们提供了两份资产负债表，一份是根据 GAAP 规定我们在 2005 年 12 月 31 日的实际数据(不包括中美能源在内)，另一份反映了我们将中美能源优先股转换为普通股的情况。今后伯克希尔所有财务报表都将中美能源合并在内。

Somewhat incongruously, MidAmerican owns the second largest real estate brokerage firm in the U.S. And it’s a gem. The parent company’s name is HomeServices of America, but our 19,200 agents operate through 18 locally-branded firms. Aided by three small acquisitions, we participated in $64 billion of transactions last year, up 6.5% from 2004.

也许看起来与公司主业有些不太协调，中美能源持有美国第二大房地产经纪公司，这可真是一颗掌上明珠。母公司为美国家庭服务公司 HomeServices，但公司的 19,200 个代理人通过 18 家以当地品牌命名的下属企业进行经营，由于三次小规模并购，2005 年我们参与了金额达 640 亿美元的房地产交易，比 2004 年增长了 6.5%。

Currently, the white-hot market in residential real estate of recent years is cooling down, and that should lead to additional acquisition possibilities for us. Both we and Ron Peltier, the company’s CEO, expect HomeServices to be far larger a decade from now.

近年来持续狂热的住宅相关房地产市场目前正在逐步降温，这将为我们带来更多的并购机会。我和公司CEO：Ron Peltier 希望 Home Services 公司在未来十年内能进一步发展壮大。

Here are some key figures on MidAmerican’s operations:

下表是中美能源业务经营的主要数据：