2012年福布斯巴菲特文章：我那价值500亿的决定（中+英

威廉?欧奈尔

巴菲特自述：我那价值500亿的决定
　　作者：Randall Lane
　　2012-03-28
　　www.forbeschina.com/billionaires/review/201203/0015969.shtml
　　本文是由兰德尔.莱恩（Randall Lane）对沃伦.巴菲特（Randall Lane）口述内容整理而成。
　　幻灯片：巴菲特年轻时代
　　自从我拜读了本杰明.格雷厄姆（Benjamin Graham）的著作《聪明的投资者》（The Intelligent Investor）之后，他便一直是我心目中的偶像。此后我一直想去哥伦比亚大学商学院念书，因为他在那里担任教授。当我从哥伦比亚大学商学院毕业，回到奥马哈，并开始推销证券之后，我仍没有忘记他。在1951年至1954年期间，我老是打扰他：经常写信给他讨论有关证券投资的想法。后来我收到了他的一封回信，他在信里说： “你下一次来纽约的时候，请来见我。”
　　于是我就去见了他，他聘请我在他和杰里.纽曼（Jerry Newman）共同负责运营的格雷厄姆-纽曼公司工作。大家都声称是阿尔弗雷德.温斯洛.琼斯（Alfred Winslow Jones）开创了对冲基金产业，但格雷厄姆-纽曼公司的姐妹合伙制投资公司——纽曼及格雷厄姆公司（Newman and Graham）实际上是比琼斯公司更早的一家对冲基金公司。我和当时已怀孕四个月的妻子苏茜（Susie）及女儿一起搬到纽约州怀特普莱恩斯（White Plains）。每天早上，我上班都是坐火车到纽约市中央车站（Grand Central）。
　　我在那里工作的时间很短：第二年，当我25岁时，格雷厄姆先生（那时我就是这么称呼他的）告诉我说，他打算退休了。事实上，他告诉我的不止是这个消息，他还向我提供了接替他的机会，杰里的儿子米奇（Mickey）担任新的高级合伙人，而我担任新的初级合伙人。格雷厄姆-纽曼公司是一家规模非常小的基金公司 ——管理资金只有六七百万美元，但名气非常响。
　　这是一个非常痛苦的决定。这是我接替自己偶像的机会——我甚至把我大儿子取名为霍华德.格雷厄姆.巴菲特（Howard Graham Buffett）（霍华德是我父亲的名字），但我也很想返回奥马哈。那时大概有一个月的时间，我每天早上在上班途中都一直在考虑告诉格雷厄姆先生我打算离职。但是，我很难做到。
　　问题是，当我从大学毕业时，我手里头有9,800美元，但到了1955年年底，我拥有的个人资金已增加到12.7万美元。我当时想，我要返回奥马哈，选修些大学课程，并且阅读大量书籍——我打算退休！我想我们每年有1.2万美元就够生活开销了，而凭借我已拥有的12.7万美元个人资产，我可以很轻松地赚到这笔生活费。那时我对我的妻子说：“复利能保证我会发财致富。”
　　我的妻子和孩子先我一步返回奥马哈。而我则坐上汽车，在往西返回奥马哈的路上，顺道拜访考察那些我有兴趣投资的公司。这是尽职调查。我在宾夕法尼亚州黑泽尔顿（Hazleton）停留了一下，拜访了杰都-高地煤炭公司（Jeddo-Highland Coal Company）。在密歇根州，我走访了当时正在进行破产清算的卡拉马祖炉灶公司（Kalamazoo Stove & Furnace Company）。我去查看该公司待售的公司厂房看上去情况如何。我去了俄亥俄州特拉华市，查看格雷夫兄弟制桶公司（Greif Bros. Cooperage）。（现在谁还知道制桶这门行业呢？）该公司董事长与我会了面。我事先没有预约，只是顺道拜访而已。我发现，人们总是愿意与我交谈。所有这些人都对我给予了帮助。
　　在奥马哈，我租了一幢房子，地址是安德伍德大道（Underwood Ave）5202号，那时每月租金为175美元。我当时对妻子说：“我很乐意购买一幢住房，但那样做的话，就像是一个木匠卖掉了自己的工具箱了。”我不想用光我的所有资金。
　　当时我还没有计划创办合伙制投资公司，甚至也没想找份工作。只要我可以自行操作投资，我就没有什么可以顾虑的。我当然不想再向别人推销证券了。但纯属机缘巧合，当时有七个人，其中包括我的一些亲戚，他们对我说：“你以前卖过股票，我们希望你能告诉我们该如何打理自己的资金。”我回答说：“我不打算再卖股票了，但我会像格雷厄姆和纽曼那样，建立一个合伙制投资公司，如果你们想加入的话，就可以加入。”我的岳父、我的大学室友及其母亲，我的姑妈爱丽丝（Alice），我的姐姐及姐夫，我的律师都签约加入。我也投资了100美元。这就是我创办投资公司的起步——纯属偶然。
　　当我成立这家合伙制投资公司时，我们共进了晚餐，这七人再加上我——我99％确信那顿晚餐是在奥马哈俱乐部（Omaha Club）。我花49美分购买了一本账簿，他们带来了各自投资的支票。我在收下他们的支票前，先向他们分发了用复写纸滕印的半页纸，上面列出了我所谓的基本原则。我说，“有关合伙制投资公司的法律文件有两到四页之多。对此不必担心。我会完完全全地告诉你们这些文件里有些什么内容，以后你们就不会有任何意想不到的相关问题。
　　“但是，这些基本原则就是投资理念。如果你赞同我的投资理念，那么我们就开始吧。如果不赞同的话，我也对此表示理解。今后我不会告诉你们我们拥有哪些股票之类的事情。如果我因投资业绩出色而应该得到鲜花，那么我希望得到它，而如果我因投资业绩不佳而应该受到警告，那么我希望你们向我扔来的是无核水果。但如果我的投资下跌了5％，而市场却下跌了15％的话，那么我可不希望有人会向我扔水果，在这种情况下，我会认为自己应该得到鲜花。”我们把一切都谈清楚了，接着他们就把支票递给了我。
　　我没有向外募集资金，但一些我不认识的人也开始向我寄来要求入股的支票。而当时在纽约，格雷厄姆-纽曼公司正在进行清算。在佛蒙特州有一位大学校长，他叫霍默.道奇（Homer Dodge），之前一直投资于格雷厄姆的基金，他当时问格雷厄姆：“本，我该如何处置我的资金呢？”格雷厄姆回答说：“嗯，这个孩子曾经在我这里工作过……”于是，道奇便开车来到奥马哈，来到我当时居住的那幢租来的房子，我那时25岁，看上去像是17岁，而举止像是12岁。他当时问我：“你现在在做什么呢？”我回答说：“我在帮我家人做这些投资理财的事情，我也会帮你做这些事情。”
　　虽然当时我并没不知道，但25岁确实是我人生中的一个转折点。那年我在改变自己的生活，创建了我的第一家合伙制投资公司，而这家公司最终变成规模相当大的一家合伙制投资公司，它叫做伯克希尔哈撒韦（Berkshire Hathaway）。当时我并不害怕，只是在做自己喜欢做的事情，而现在我仍然在做这件事情。
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　　3/26/2012 @ 2:29PM |72,985 views
　　Warren Buffett's $50 Billion Decision
　　www.forbes.com/sites/randalllane/2012/03/26/warren-buffetts-50-billion-decision/
　　This article, by Warren Buffett, as told to Randall Lane, appears in the upcoming April issue of ForbesLife magazine, as part of its “When I Was 25″ series.
　　By Warren Buffett
　　Benjamin Graham had been my idol ever since I read his book The Intelligent Investor. I had wanted to go to Columbia Business School because he was a professor there, and after I got out of Columbia, returned to Omaha, and started selling securities, I didn’t forget about him. Between 1951 and 1954, I made a pest of myself, sending him frequent securities ideas. Then I got a letter back: “Next time you’re in New York, come and see me.”
　　So there I went, and he offered me a job at Graham-Newman Corp., which he ran with Jerry Newman. Everyone says that A.W. Jones started the hedge fund industry, but Graham-Newman’s sister partnership, Newman and Graham, was actually an earlier fund. I moved to White Plains, New York, with my wife, Susie, who was four months pregnant, and my daughter. Every morning, I got on a train to Grand Central and went to work.
　　It was a short-lived position: The next year, when I was 25, Mr. Graham—that’s what I called him then—gave me a heads-up that he was going to retire. Actually, he did more than that: He offered me the chance to replace him, with Jerry’s son Mickey as the new senior partner and me as the new junior partner. It was a very tiny fund—$6 million or $7 million—but it was a famous fund.
　　This was a traumatic decision. Here was my chance to step into the shoes of my hero—I even named my first son Howard Graham Buffett. (Howard was for my father.) But I also wanted to come back to Omaha. I probably went to work for a month thinking every morning that I would tell Mr. Graham I was going to leave. But it was hard to do.
　　The thing is, when I got out of college, I had $9,800, but by the end of 1955, I was up to $127,000. I thought, I’ll go back to Omaha, take some college classes, and read a lot—I was going to retire! I figured we could live on $12,000 a year, and off my $127,000 asset base, I could easily make that. I told my wife, “Compound interest guarantees I’m going to get rich.”
　　My wife and kids went back to Omaha just ahead of me. I got in the car, and on my way west checked out companies I was interested in investing in. It was due diligence. I stopped in Hazleton, Pennsylvania, to visit the Jeddo-Highland Coal Company. I visited the Kalamazoo Stove & Furnace Company in Michigan, which was being liquidated. I went to see what the building looked like, what they had for sale. I went to Delaware, Ohio, to check out Greif Bros. Cooperage. (Who knows anything about cooperage anymore?) Its chairman met with me. I didn’t have appointments; I would just drop in. I found that people always talked to me. All these people helped me.
　　In Omaha, I rented a house at 5202 Underwood for $175 a month. I told my wife, “I’d be glad to buy a house, but that’s like a carpenter selling his toolkit.” I didn’t want to use up my capital.
　　I had no plans to start a partnership, or even have a job. I had no worries as long as I could operate on my own. I certainly did not want to sell securities to other people again. But by pure accident, seven people, including a few of my relatives, said to me, “You used to sell stocks, and we want you to tell us what to do with our money.” I replied, “I’m not going to do that again, but I’ll form a partnership like Ben and Jerry had, and if you want to join me, you can.” My father-in-law, my college roommate, his mother, my aunt Alice, my sister, my brother-in-law, and my lawyer all signed on. I also had my hundred dollars. That was the beginning—totally accidental.
　　When I formed that partnership, we had dinner, the seven of them plus me—I’m 99 percent sure it was at the Omaha Club. I bought a ledger for 49 cents, and they brought their checks. Before I took their money, I gave them a half sheet of paper that I had made carbons of—something I called the ground rules. I said, “There are two or four pages of partnership legal documents. Don’t worry about that. I’ll tell you what’s in it, and you won’t get any surprises.
　　“But these ground rules are the philosophy. If you are in tune with me, then let’s go. If you aren’t, I understand. I’m not going to tell you what we own or anything like that. I want to get bouquets when I deserve bouquets, and I want to get soft fruit thrown at me when I deserve it. But I don’t want fruit thrown at me if I’m down 5 percent, and the market’s down 15 percent—I’m going to think I deserve a bouquet for that.” We made everything clear, and they gave me their checks.
　　I did no solicitation, but more checks began coming from people I didn’t know. Back in New York, Graham-Newman was being liquidated. There was a college president up in Vermont, Homer Dodge, who had been invested with Graham, and he asked, “Ben, what should I do with my money?” Ben said, “Well, there’s this kid who used to work for me.…” So Dodge drove out to Omaha, to this rented house I lived in. I was 25, looked about 17, and acted like 12. He said, “What are you doing?” I said, “Here’s what I’m doing with my family, and I’ll do it with you.”
　　Although I had no idea, age 25 was a turning point. I was changing my life, setting up something that would turn into a fairly good-size partnership called Berkshire Hathaway. I wasn’t scared. I was doing something I liked, and I’m still doing it.
　　LJW