巴菲特致股东的信（2014年）附录二：伯克希尔50周年过去现在和未来 ④未来50年的伯克希尔

The Next 50 Years at Berkshire

未来50年的伯克希尔

Now let’s take a look at the road ahead. Bear in mind that if I had attempted 50 years ago to gauge what was coming, certain of my predictions would have been far off the mark. With that warning, I will tell you what I would say to my family today if they asked me about Berkshire’s future.

现在让我们看看前方的道路。请记住，如果我在五十年前试图预测将来发生的事，我的某些预测将会大大偏离目标。有了这个告诫之后，我将会告诉你们，如果今天我的家人问我伯克希尔的未来，我会对他们说些什么。

● First and definitely foremost, I believe that the chance of permanent capital loss for patient Berkshire shareholders is as low as can be found among single-company investments. That’s because our per-share intrinsic business value is almost certain to advance over time.

1，首先，也是最为重要的一点，我相信，对于耐心的伯克希尔投资者而言，永久性的资本损失的机率，是单一公司投资中最低的。这是因为我们的每股内在商业价值，随着时间推移几乎确定会增加。

This cheery prediction comes, however, with an important caution: If an investor’s entry point into Berkshire stock is unusually high – at a price, say, approaching double book value, which Berkshire shares have occasionally reached – it may well be many years before the investor can realize a profit. In other words, a sound investment can morph into a rash speculation if it is bought at an elevated price. Berkshire is not exempt from this truth.

然而，这个乐观的预言伴随着一个重要的警告：如果伯克希尔投资者的买入点异常高，比如价格接近账面价值的两倍，伯克希尔股票偶尔会达到这个水平，那么投资者可能需要很多年才能实现盈利。换句话说，一项明智的投资，如果以高价买入，也可能演变成一种鲁莽的投机行为，伯克希尔也不例外。

Purchases of Berkshire that investors make at a price modestly above the level at which the company would repurchase its shares, however, should produce gains within a reasonable period of time. Berkshire’s directors will only authorize repurchases at a price they believe to be well below intrinsic value. (In our view, that is an essential criterion for repurchases that is often ignored by other managements.)

然而，投资者以略高于公司回购股份的价格水平购买伯克希尔的股票，应当会在一个合理的时期内产生收益。伯克希尔的董事们只会在股价远低于他们认为的内在价值时授权回购。(在我们的观念中，这是回购的基本标准，这个标准经常被其他管理者忽视。)

For those investors who plan to sell within a year or two after their purchase, I can offer no assurances, whatever the entry price. Movements of the general stock market during such abbreviated periods will likely be far more important in determining your results than the concomitant change in the intrinsic value of your Berkshire shares. As Ben Graham said many decades ago: “In the short-term the market is a voting machine; in the long-run it acts as a weighing machine.” Occasionally, the voting decisions of investors – amateurs and professionals alike – border on lunacy.

对于那些打算在买入后一两年内出售股票的投资者，无论买入价格如何，我都不能保证。在如此短的时间内，股市的走势变动对于你投资结果的影响，可能比伯克希尔内在价值的变化的影响更重要。就像本杰明格雷厄姆几十年前说的："短期而言，市场是台投票机；长期而言，市场是台称重机"。有时投资者(业余人士和专业人士)的投票决定都近似于神经病。

Since I know of no way to reliably predict market movements, I recommend that you purchase Berkshire shares only if you expect to hold them for at least five years. Those who seek short-term profits should look elsewhere.

由于我不知道如何可靠地预测市场走势，因此我建议，只有你打算持有伯克希尔股票至少五年的情况下，你才应该购买，那些谋求短期利润的人应当到别处看看。

Another warning: Berkshire shares should not be purchased with borrowed money. There have been three times since 1965 when our stock has fallen about 50% from its high point. Someday, something close to this kind of drop will happen again, and no one knows when. Berkshire will almost certainly be a satisfactory holding for investors. But it could well be a disastrous choice for speculators employing leverage.

另一个警告是：不应当借钱购买伯克希尔的股票。自从1965 年以来，我们的股价是从高点下跌约50％的情况有过三次。将来某天，这类下跌会再次发生，但没人知道是什么时候。对投资者来说，伯克希尔几乎肯定是一个令人满意的持有标的。但对于使用杠杆的投机者来说，它同样可能是一个灾难性的选择。

● I believe the chance of any event causing Berkshire to experience financial problems is essentially zero. We will always be prepared for the thousand-year flood; in fact, if it occurs we will be selling life jackets to the unprepared. Berkshire played an important role as a “first responder” during the 2008-2009 meltdown, and we have since more than doubled the strength of our balance sheet and our earnings potential. Your company is the Gibraltar of American business and will remain so.

2，我认为，任何事件导致伯克希尔遭遇财务问题的可能性基本为零。我们将永远为千年的洪水做好准备；事实上，如果它发生了，我们将把救生衣卖给那些没有准备的人。在2008-2009 的金融危机中，伯克希尔作为"第一反应者"发挥了重要作用，从那以后，我们的资产负债表强度和盈利能力增加了一倍多。贵公司是美国商业的直布罗陀并将继续如此。

Financial staying power requires a company to maintain three strengths under all circumstances: (1) a large and reliable stream of earnings; (2) massive liquid assets and (3) no significant near-term cash requirements. Ignoring that last necessity is what usually leads companies to experience unexpected problems: Too often, CEOs of profitable companies feel they will always be able to refund maturing obligations, however large these are. In 2008-2009, many managements learned how perilous that mindset can be.

财务持久力要求一家公司在任何情况下保持三个优势：1)庞大且可靠的收入流；(2)大量的流动资产；(3)近期没有重大的现金需求。忽视了最后一条的必要性，常常导致公司遇到意想不到的问题：太多时候，盈利的公司的CEO 们感觉他们总是能够偿还到期债务，不论债务规模多大。在2008-2009 年，许多管理层认识到这种思维方式有多么危险。

Here’s how we will always stand on the three essentials. First, our earnings stream is huge and comes from a vast array of businesses. Our shareholders now own many large companies that have durable competitive advantages, and we will acquire more of those in the future. Our diversification assures Berkshire’s continued profitability, even if a catastrophe causes insurance losses that far exceed any previously experienced.

以下是我们无论如何将始终坚持的三个原则：首先，我们的收益流是巨大的，并且来自各种各样的业务。我们的股东现在拥有许多具备持续竞争优势的大型公司，我们将在未来收购更多这样的公司。我们的多元化确保了伯克希尔持续的盈利能力，即使一个大灾难导致的保险损失远远超越过去任何一次。

Next up is cash. At a healthy business, cash is sometimes thought of as something to be minimized – as an unproductive asset that acts as a drag on such markers as return on equity. Cash, though, is to a business as oxygen is to an individual: never thought about when it is present, the only thing in mind when it is absent.

接下来是现金。在一个健康的企业中，现金有时候被认为是需要最小化的东西，作为非生产性资产，会拖累股本回报率等指标。然而，现金对于企业而言，就像氧气对于人一样：当它存在的时候从来不会想它，但当它不存在的时候，脑海中唯一想的就是现金。

American business provided a case study of that in 2008. In September of that year, many long-prosperous companies suddenly wondered whether their checks would bounce in the days ahead. Overnight, their financial oxygen disappeared.

美国企业在2008 年提供了一个研究案例。那年9 月，许多长期繁荣的公司突然想知道，它们的支票在未来几天是否会被拒付。一夜之间，它们的财务氧气消失了。

At Berkshire, our “breathing” went uninterrupted. Indeed, in a three-week period spanning late September and early October, we supplied $15.6 billion of fresh money to American businesses.

在伯克希尔，我们的"呼吸"不受干扰。事实上，在9 月末、10 月初的三个周内，我们为美国企业提供了156亿美元的新资金。

We could do that because we always maintain at least $20 billion – and usually far more – in cash equivalents. And by that we mean U.S. Treasury bills, not other substitutes for cash that are claimed to deliver liquidity and actually do so, except when it is truly needed. When bills come due, only cash is legal tender. Don’t leave home without it.

我们能够做到这点，因为我们始终保持至少200 亿美元的现金等价物，而且通常远多于此。这里我们指的是美国国债，而不是其他声称可以提供流动性，但只有真的被需要的时候才能实际提供流动性的现金替代物。当债务到期，只有现金才是法定货币。没有它寸步难行。

Finally – getting to our third point – we will never engage in operating or investment practices that can result in sudden demands for large sums. That means we will not expose Berkshire to short-term debt maturities of size nor enter into derivative contracts or other business arrangements that could require large collateral calls.

最后是我们的第三点，我们永远不会参与可能导致突然需要大额资金的运营或投资活动。这意味着我们不会让伯克希尔暴露在短期债务到期的风险中，也不会签订衍生品合约，或者其他可能需要大量抵押物的业务安排。

Some years ago, we became a party to certain derivative contracts that we believed were significantly mispriced and that had only minor collateral requirements. These have proved to be quite profitable. Recently, however, newly-written derivative contracts have required full collateralization. And that ended our interest in derivatives, regardless of what profit potential they might offer. We have not, for some years, written these contracts, except for a few needed for operational purposes at our utility businesses.

几年以前，我们参与了某些衍生品合约，我们认为这些合约定价严重错误，并且只有很少的抵押品要求。这些已经被证明相当地有利可图。然而，最近新签订的衍生品合约要求提供充分的抵押物。这终结了我们对于衍生品的兴趣，不论它们可能提供何种的盈利潜力。我们已经好几年没有签订这类合约了，除了少数我们的公用事业运营需要的合同。

Moreover, we will not write insurance contracts that give policyholders the right to cash out at their option. Many life insurance products contain redemption features that make them susceptible to a “run” in times of extreme panic. Contracts of that sort, however, do not exist in the property-casualty world that we inhabit. If our premium volume should shrink, our float would decline – but only at a very slow pace.

此外，我们将不会签订那些客户可以选择取出现金的保险合约。许多人寿保险产品都包含赎回功能，这使得它们在极端恐慌的时期很容易遭到"挤兑"。然而，在我们所经营的财产意外险世界中，这类合同并不存在。如果我们的保费数量下降，我们的浮存金将会减少，但是速度会非常缓慢。

The reason for our conservatism, which may impress some people as extreme, is that it is entirely predictable that people will occasionally panic, but not at all predictable when this will happen. Though practically all days are relatively uneventful, tomorrow is always uncertain. (I felt no special apprehension on December 6, 1941 or September 10, 2001.) And if you can’t predict what tomorrow will bring, you must be prepared for whatever it does.

我们这种保守主义可能会给一些人留下极端的印象，其原因是，人们偶尔地会恐慌，但何时会恐慌则是完全无法预测的。尽管几乎所有的日子都相对无事，但明天总是不确定的。(在1941 年12 月6 日或2001 年9 月11日，我没有感到特别恐惧)。如果你不能预测明天会发生什么，你必须为无论发生什么做好准备。

A CEO who is 64 and plans to retire at 65 may have his own special calculus in evaluating risks that have only a tiny chance of happening in a given year. He may, in fact, be “right” 99% of the time. Those odds, however, hold no appeal for us. We will never play financial Russian roulette with the funds you’ve entrusted to us, even if the metaphorical gun has 100 chambers and only one bullet. In our view, it is madness to risk losing what you need in pursuing what you simply desire.

一位64 岁且计划65 岁退休的CEO，在评估1 年内发生几率极小的风险时，可能有他自己的特殊计算。事实上，他可能99％的时间都是"正确"的。然而，那些赔率对我们没有吸引力。我们将永远不会用你们托付给我们的资金，玩财务的俄罗斯轮盘，即使这把隐喻的枪有100 个枪膛且仅有一发子弹。在我们看来，冒着失去你所需要的东西的风险，去追求你仅仅渴望得到的东西，是愚蠢的。

● Despite our conservatism, I think we will be able every year to build the underlying per-share earning power of Berkshire. That does not mean operating earnings will increase each year – far from it. The U.S. economy will ebb and flow – though mostly flow – and, when it weakens, so will our current earnings. But we will continue to achieve organic gains, make bolt-on acquisitions and enter new fields. I believe, therefore, that Berkshire will annually add to its underlying earning power.

3，尽管我们保守，但我认为我们每年都能继续增加伯克希尔潜在的每股盈利能力。这并不意味着经营收益每年都会增长，事实远非如此。美国经济将起起伏伏，尽管主要是上涨，当经济衰退的时候，我们当前的盈利也会减少。但是我们将继续取得逐步的收益增长，进行补强收购，并不断进入新的领域。所以，我相信伯克希尔每年都会增加它的潜在盈利能力。

In some years the gains will be substantial, and at other times they will be minor. Markets, competition, and chance will determine when opportunities come our way. Through it all, Berkshire will keep moving forward, powered by the array of solid businesses we now possess and the new companies we will purchase. In most years, moreover, our country’s economy will provide a strong tailwind for business. We are blessed to have the United States as our home field.

在某些年份，收益将会是巨大的，而在其他时候，收益将很少。市场，竞争和机会将会决定何时机会出现在我们面前。总而言之，伯克希尔将由我们现在拥有的一系列坚实的业务，以及我们将收购新业务的推动下继续保持前进。此外，在多数年份里，美国经济将为企业提供强烈的助力。上帝保佑，我们有幸有美国作为主场。

● The bad news is that Berkshire’s long-term gains – measured by percentages, not by dollars – cannot be dramatic and will not come close to those achieved in the past 50 years. The numbers have become too big. I think Berkshire will outperform the average American company, but our advantage, if any, won’t be great.

4，坏消息是，伯克希尔的长期回报率不会很大(以百分比而非美元衡量)，也不会接近在过去50 年里取得的水平。规模数字已经变得过于庞大。我想伯克希尔将超越美国普通公司的平均表现，但我们的优势不会太大(如果有的话)。

Eventually – probably between ten and twenty years from now – Berkshire’s earnings and capital resources will reach a level that will not allow management to intelligently reinvest all of the company’s earnings. At that time our directors will need to determine whether the best method to distribute the excess earnings is through dividends, share repurchases or both. If Berkshire shares are selling below intrinsic business value, massive repurchases will almost certainly be the best choice. You can be comfortable that your directors will make the right decision.

最终，可能从现在起10-20 年的时间，伯克希尔的收益和资本资源将到达一个水平，将使得管理层无法明智地将公司所有收益进行再投资。在那时，我们的董事会将需要决定，分配超额收益最好的方式是通过派发股息，股份回购，还是二者皆有。如果伯克希尔的股份是低于内在商业价值的价格出售，大规模的回购几乎肯定是最佳选择。你可以放心，你的董事会将会做出正确的决定。

● No company will be more shareholder-minded than Berkshire. For more than 30 years, we have annually reaffirmed our Shareholder Principles (see page 117), always leading off with: “Although our form is corporate, our attitude is partnership.” This covenant with you is etched in stone.

5，没有哪家公司比伯克希尔更加注重股东利益。30 多年来，我们每年都会重申我们的股东原则，并总是以此开头：虽然我们的形式是公司制，但我们的态度是合伙制。这个与你们之间的承诺是刻在石头上的。

We have an extraordinarily knowledgeable and business-oriented board of directors ready to carry out that promise of partnership. None took the job for the money: In an arrangement almost non-existent elsewhere, our directors are paid only token fees. They receive their rewards instead through ownership of Berkshire shares and the satisfaction that comes from being good stewards of an important enterprise.

我们有一个知识渊博、以商业为导向的董事会，随时准备履行合伙制的承诺。没有人为了金钱而接受这份工作：在其他地方几乎不存在这种安排，我们的董事仅仅得到象征性的薪酬。相反，他们通过持有伯克希尔股份，以及成为一家重要企业的优秀管理者而获得的满足感，来作为回报。

The shares that they and their families own – which, in many cases, are worth very substantial sums – were purchased in the market (rather than their materializing through options or grants). In addition, unlike almost all other sizable public companies, we carry no directors and officers liability insurance. At Berkshire, directors walk in your shoes.

他们和他们的家族所拥有的股份(在很多情况下价值巨大)是从市场中购买的，而不是通过他们的期权或者补助实现的。另外，与几乎所有其他大型上市公司不同，我们没有董事和高管责任险。在伯克希尔，董事们站在你的立场看问题。

To further ensure continuation of our culture, I have suggested that my son, Howard, succeed me as a non- executive Chairman. My only reason for this wish is to make change easier if the wrong CEO should ever be employed and there occurs a need for the Chairman to move forcefully. I can assure you that this problem has a very low probability of arising at Berkshire – likely as low as at any public company. In my service on the boards of nineteen public companies, however, I’ve seen how hard it is to replace a mediocre CEO if that person is also Chairman. (The deed usually gets done, but almost always very late.)

为了进一步确保我们文化的延续性，我建议我的儿子Howard 接替我担任公司的非执行主席。我希望如此的唯一原因是，如果聘用了错误的CEO，并且需要懂事长强制解聘他，改变起来会更加简单。我可以对你们保证，这个问题在伯克希尔出现概率非常低，可能跟任何上市公司一样低。然而，在我为19 家上市公司的董事会服务的过程中，我曾见过如果一个平庸的CEO 同时还是董事长，要换掉他是多么的困难。(换人通常会完成，但几乎总是非常晚。)

If elected, Howard will receive no pay and will spend no time at the job other than that required of all directors. He will simply be a safety valve to whom any director can go if he or she has concerns about the CEO and wishes to learn if other directors are expressing doubts as well. Should multiple directors be apprehensive, Howard’s chairmanship will allow the matter to be promptly and properly addressed.

如果Howard 当选，除了所有董事必须做的工作外，他将不会得到任何报酬，也不会再工作上花费任何时间。如果任何董事对CEO 感到担忧，并希望知道其他董事是否也同样表示出疑虑，那么任何董事都可以去找他，他将仅仅成为一个安全阀。如果多个董事表示担忧，霍华德的主席地位将使得此事得到快速和合理地解决。

● Choosing the right CEO is all-important and is a subject that commands much time at Berkshire board meetings. Managing Berkshire is primarily a job of capital allocation, coupled with the selection and retention of outstanding managers to captain our operating subsidiaries. Obviously, the job also requires the replacement of a subsidiary’s CEO when that is called for. These duties require Berkshire’s CEO to be a rational, calm and decisive individual who has a broad understanding of business and good insights into human behavior. It’s important as well that he knows his limits. (As Tom Watson, Sr. of IBM said, “I’m no genius, but I’m smart in spots and I stay around those spots.”)

6，选择正确的CEO 至关重要，这也是伯克希尔董事会中需要花费很多时间的问题。管理伯克希尔主要是一项资本配置的工作，同时还要选择和留住出色的管理人员，来领导我们的运营子公司。显然，这项工作还需要再需要的时候更换子公司的CEO。这些职责要求伯克希尔的CEO 是个理性，冷静和果断的人，对商业有着广泛的理解，对人类行为有着深刻的洞察力。同样重要的是，他知道自己的局限性。正如IBM 的创始人Tom Watson 所说，我不是天才，但我在某些领域很聪明，我会一直留在那些领域。)

Character is crucial: A Berkshire CEO must be “all in” for the company, not for himself. (I’m using male pronouns to avoid awkward wording, but gender should never decide who becomes CEO.) He can’t help but earn money far in excess of any possible need for it. But it’s important that neither ego nor avarice motivate him to reach for pay matching his most lavishly-compensated peers, even if his achievements far exceed theirs. A CEO’s behavior has a huge impact on managers down the line: If it’s clear to them that shareholders’ interests are paramount to him, they will, with few exceptions, also embrace that way of thinking.

品格是至关重要的：伯克希尔的CEO 必须为了公司"全力以赴"，而不是他自己。(我使用男性代词是为了避免笨拙的措辞，但性别不应当决定谁成为CEO。)他情不自禁地为公司赚取远超任何可能需要的金钱。但重要的是，无论是自负还是贪婪，都不能激励他去追求与那些薪酬最丰厚的同龄人相当的薪酬，纵使他的成就远远超过他们。CEO 的行为对经理人有着巨大的影响：如果他们清楚知道，对CEO 而言股东的利益是至高无上的，他们也会毫无例外地接受这种思维方式。

My successor will need one other particular strength: the ability to fight off the ABCs of business decay, which are arrogance, bureaucracy and complacency. When these corporate cancers metastasize, even the strongest of companies can falter. The examples available to prove the point are legion, but to maintain friendships I will exhume only cases from the distant past.

我的继任者还需要具备一个特别的优势：有能力摆脱企业衰退的基本因素，即傲慢，官僚主义和自满。当这些企业癌症扩散，即使是最强大的公司也会摇摇欲坠。能够证明这个观点的例子非常多，但为了保持友谊，我将仅仅从那些遥远的过去寻找案例。

In their glory days, General Motors, IBM, Sears Roebuck and U.S. Steel sat atop huge industries. Their strengths seemed unassailable. But the destructive behavior I deplored above eventually led each of them to fall to depths that their CEOs and directors had not long before thought impossible. Their one-time financial strength and their historical earning power proved no defense.

在巅峰时期，IBM，通用汽车(GM)，西尔斯(Sears Roebuck)和美国钢铁(U.S.Steel)位居各自行业榜首。它们的实力看上去无懈可击。但是我上文所谴责的破坏性行为，最终导致它们每一个都陷入了其CEO 和董事在不久前还认为不可能的境地。事实证明，它们曾经的财务实力和历史上的盈利能力都毫无保护作用。

Only a vigilant and determined CEO can ward off such debilitating forces as Berkshire grows ever larger. He must never forget Charlie’s plea: “Tell me where I’m going to die, so I’ll never go there.” If our non- economic values were to be lost, much of Berkshire’s economic value would collapse as well. “Tone at the top” will be key to maintaining Berkshire’s special culture.

随着伯克希尔规模越来越大，只有一位警惕而坚定的CEO 才能够抵御这种削弱的力量。他必须永远不忘查理的请求："告诉我我会死在哪里，这样我将永远不会去那儿"。如果我们丧失了非经济价值(企业文化)，伯克希尔大部分的经济价值也将崩塌。"高层基调"将是保持伯克希尔特殊文化的关键。

Fortunately, the structure our future CEOs will need to be successful is firmly in place. The extraordinary delegation of authority now existing at Berkshire is the ideal antidote to bureaucracy. In an operating sense, Berkshire is not a giant company but rather a collection of large companies. At headquarters, we have never had a committee nor have we ever required our subsidiaries to submit budgets (though many use them as an important internal tool). We don’t have a legal office nor departments that other companies take for granted: human relations, public relations, investor relations, strategy, acquisitions, you name it.

幸运的是，我们未来的CEO 们成功所需要的结构已经稳固到位。目前伯克希尔存在的非同寻常的权力下放，是官僚主义的理想解药。从运营的角度看，伯克希尔不是一家大公司，而是一个大公司群。在总部我们从未设立委员会，也从未要求我们子公司提交预算(虽然许多公司将其作为重要的内部工具)。我们没有其他公司认为理所当然的法律办公室或各种：人力关系，公共关系，投资者关系，战略，并购，但凡你想得起来的部门。

We do, of course, have an active audit function; no sense being a damned fool. To an unusual degree, however, we trust our managers to run their operations with a keen sense of stewardship. After all, they were doing exactly that before we acquired their businesses. With only occasional exceptions, furthermore, our trust produces better results than would be achieved by streams of directives, endless reviews and layers of bureaucracy. Charlie and I try to interact with our managers in a manner consistent with what we would wish for, if the positions were reversed.

当然，我们确实有一个积极的审计职能；没道理成为一个积累问题的傻瓜。然而，在不同寻常的程度上，我们相信我们的经理们会以敏锐的管理意识来管理他们的运营。毕竟，在我们收购他们企业之前，他们就是这么做的。此外，除了偶尔的例外，我们的信任产生的结果，相比于一连串的指令，无尽的检查，层层的官僚机构所取得的成绩更好。如果位置颠倒的话，查理和我尝试以我们所希望的被对待的方式，和我们的经理们互动。

● Our directors believe that our future CEOs should come from internal candidates whom the Berkshire board has grown to know well. Our directors also believe that an incoming CEO should be relatively young, so that he or she can have a long run in the job. Berkshire will operate best if its CEOs average well over ten years at the helm. (It’s hard to teach a new dog old tricks.) And they are not likely to retire at 65 either (or have you noticed?).

7，我们的董事认为，我们未来的CEO 们应该来自伯克希尔董事会已经逐步熟悉的内部候选人。我们的董事还认为，新任的CEO 应当相对年轻，所以他或她才能够长期工作。如果伯克希尔的CEO 们平均领导的时间超过十年，那么伯克希尔将运营的最好。(很难教会一只新狗老把戏。)并且他们也不可能在65 岁退休(或者你已经注意到了什么吗？)

In both Berkshire’s business acquisitions and large, tailored investment moves, it is important that our counterparties be both familiar with and feel comfortable with Berkshire’s CEO. Developing confidence of that sort and cementing relationships takes time. The payoff, though, can be huge.

在伯克希尔企业并购和为伯克希尔量身定制的大型投资行动中，重要的一点是，我们的交易对手都必须熟悉伯克希尔的CEO，并对其感到满意。建立这种信任并且巩固关系需要时间。然而，回报可能是巨大的。

Both the board and I believe we now have the right person to succeed me as CEO – a successor ready to assume the job the day after I die or step down. In certain important respects, this person will do a better job than I am doing.

董事会和我都相信，我们现在有合适的人选来接替我担任CEO，一位准备在我死后或者辞职第二天就接手这份工作的继任者。在某些重要的方面，这个人将做得比我现在做的还要好。

● Investments will always be of great importance to Berkshire and will be handled by several specialists. They will report to the CEO because their investment decisions, in a broad way, will need to be coordinated with Berkshire’s operating and acquisition programs. Overall, though, our investment managers will enjoy great autonomy. In this area, too, we are in fine shape for decades to come. Todd Combs and Ted Weschler, each of whom has spent several years on Berkshire’s investment team, are first- rate in all respects and can be of particular help to the CEO in evaluating acquisitions.

8，对伯克希尔而言，投资总是非常重要的，将由多位专家处理。他们将对CEO 报告，因为他们的投资决策，在很大程度上需要和伯克希尔的运营和收购计划相协调。不过，总体而言，我们的投资经理将享有很大的自主权。在这方面，我们未来几十年将处于良好的状态。ToddCombs 和TedWeschler，他们都在伯克希尔的投资团队工作了多年，在所有方面都是一流的，在评估收购方面能够给予CEO 特别的帮助。

All told, Berkshire is ideally positioned for life after Charlie and I leave the scene. We have the right people in place – the right directors, managers and prospective successors to those managers. Our culture, furthermore, is embedded throughout their ranks. Our system is also regenerative. To a large degree, both good and bad cultures self-select to perpetuate themselves. For very good reasons, business owners and operating managers with values similar to ours will continue to be attracted to Berkshire as a one-of-a-kind and permanent home.

总之，在查理和我离开舞台之后，伯克希尔将被完美地安置。我们有正确的人选，正确的董事们，经理人们以及这些经理人们潜在的继任者。另外，我们的文化深深地根植于他们队伍之中。我们的系统也是可再生的。在很大程度上，好和坏的文化都是自我选择使自己永存。出于很好的理由，那些拥有与我们类似价值观的企业所有者和运营经理人，将继续被伯克希尔作为独一无二的和永远的家所吸引。

● I would be remiss if I didn’t salute another key constituency that makes Berkshire special: our shareholders. Berkshire truly has an owner base unlike that of any other giant corporation. That fact was demonstrated in spades at last year’s annual meeting, where the shareholders were offered a proxy resolution:

9，如果我没有向另一个让伯克希尔与众不同的关键支持者们致敬，那我就是失职的，他们就是我们的股东。伯克希尔的确拥有一个不同于任何其他大型企业的所有者基础。这个事实在去年年会上得到了充分的证实，当时股东们收到一项代理决议：

RESOLVED: Whereas the corporation has more money than it needs and since the owners unlike Warren are not multi billionaires, the board shall consider paying a meaningful annual dividend on the shares.

决议：鉴于公司拥有的资金超过其所需，并且因为股东们不像巴菲特那样是亿万富翁，董事会应当考虑支付有意义的年度股息。

The sponsoring shareholder of that resolution never showed up at the meeting, so his motion was not officially proposed. Nevertheless, the proxy votes had been tallied, and they were enlightening. Not surprisingly, the A shares – owned by relatively few shareholders, each with a large economic interest – voted “no” on the dividend question by a margin of 89 to 1.

该决议的发起股东从未出席会议，所以他的动议没有被正式地提出。尽管如此，代理决议投票已经被统计完毕，并且富有启发性。由相对少数股东持有，每个股东都有很大的经济利益的A 股股东，在分红问题上不出意外地投了"反对票"，比例约89 比1。

The remarkable vote was that of our B shareholders. They number in the hundreds of thousands – perhaps even totaling one million – and they voted 660,759,855 “no” and 13,927,026 “yes,” a ratio of about 47 to 1.

引人注目的投票是我们B 股股东的投票。他们的数量多达数十万，甚至可能超过100 万，他们投的反对票数是660,759,855 票，赞成票是13,927,026，比例约47 比1。

Our directors recommended a “no” vote but the company did not otherwise attempt to influence shareholders. Nevertheless, 98% of the shares voting said, in effect, “Don’t send us a dividend but instead reinvest all of the earnings.” To have our fellow owners – large and small – be so in sync with our managerial philosophy is both remarkable and rewarding.

我们的董事们建议投反对票，但公司没有通过其他方式试图影响股东。尽管如此，98％的有投票权的股份实际上投票说，"不要给我们红利，而是将所有收益再投资"。让我们大大小小的股东跟我们的管理哲学保持一致，这既是了不起的，也是非常有益的。

I am a lucky fellow to have you as partners.

有你们做合伙人，我真是个幸运的家伙。

Warren E. Buffett

沃伦·巴菲特