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1998年股东大会 · 巴菲特:我心中最好的生意和最坏的生意

41 段 · 3 位说话人 · 原片 5:38
M1
M10:00

各位先生,下午好。

Good afternoon, gentlemen.

我叫 George Dorrance,来自 Indiana 州的 Fort Wayne。

My name is George Dorrance from Fort Wayne, Indiana.

我的问题跟怎么估算一家公司的内在价值有关,尤其是像您刚才提到的那种资本密集型公司。

My question has to do with estimating the intrinsic value of a company, in particular capital-intensive companies like you were mentioning.

我想到的是像 McDonald's 和 Walgreens 这样的公司,不过类似的还有很多:它们的经营现金流非常健康,而且还在增长,但这些现金流大部分甚至全部,都被开新门店、新餐厅,或者建新工厂这种大笔支出给抵掉了。

I'm thinking of things like McDonald's and Walgreens, but there are lots of others where you have a very healthy and growing operating cash flow, but it's largely or completely offset by heavy expenditures on putting up new stores or restaurants or building a new plant.

所以我的问题是,您在估算未来自由现金流的时候,会怎么处理这种情况?

And so my question is, what do you do for your estimate of future free cash flow?

还有,在 Treasury,长期 Treasury 收益率大概在百分之七左右的情况下,您会用什么贴现率来贴现这些现金流?

And with Treasuries around— long Treasuries around 7%, at what rate do you discount those cash flows?
M2
M20:57

嗯,我们会用长期利率来贴现,这样在所有企业之间就有一个统一的衡量标准。

Well, we discount at the long rate just to have a standard of measurement across all businesses.

不过,对于那种赚到钱就马上把钱花出去的公司,我们不会因为它有总现金流就给它加分。

But we would take the company that is spending the money as it comes in, and they don't get credit for gross cash flow.

我们只看它每年最后实际剩下来的净现金有多少。

They get credit for whatever net cash is left every year.

当然,如果他们花钱花得明智,虽然这些现金要多贴现几年,但现金增长带来的发展应该能把这个影响抵消掉;不然的话,就说明他们投资得不明智。

But of course, if they're spending the money wisely, even though you have to discount it for more years, the growth in cash development should offset that, or they weren't investing it wisely.

最好的生意,是那种你什么都不用再投入,或者只要投入很少,它每年却能给你越来越多钱的生意。

The best business is one that gives you more and more money every year without putting up anything to get it, or very little.

我们手上就有一些这样的生意。

And we've got some businesses like that.

第二好的生意,是那种同样也能每年给你越来越多钱的生意。

The second best business is a business that also gives you more and more money.

它需要你继续投入更多钱,但你把钱再投进去换来增长的那个回报率,是非常令人满意的。

It takes more money, but the rate at which you reinvest the money to get that growth is a very satisfactory rate.

最糟糕的生意,就是那种增长很快,而且你实际上是被迫增长——不增长连牌桌都留不住——同时你再投入资本得到的回报率却非常低。

The worst business of all is the one that grows a lot and where you're forced— in effect forced to grow to stay in the game at all— and where you're reinvesting the capital at a very low rate of return.

有时候,人们就在这样的生意里,却自己还没意识到。

And sometimes people are in those businesses without knowing about it.

不过从贴现、从计算内在价值的角度来说,你要看的就是预期能产生多少现金流,然后把它贴现回来。

But in terms of discounting, in terms of calculating intrinsic value, you look at the cash that is expected to be generated and you discount back.

在我们这里,我们用的是长期 Treasury 利率。

In our case, we use the long-term Treasury rate.

这并不是说,算出这个现值以后你就一定按那个价格去买,但这意味着你把 Treasury 利率当成一个统一的标尺。

That doesn't mean that you pay the amount that such a present value calculation leads to, but it means that you use that as a common yardstick, that Treasury rate.

这也就是说,如果一家公司未来五年把全部现金流都拿去再投资,那它在更后面就最好能带来非常可观的数字,因为说到底,一个金融资产最终必须能回给你现金,才能证明你今天掏这笔钱是合理的。

And that means if somebody is reinvesting all their cash flow the next 5 years, they better have some very big figures coming in down the road, because at the end of the day, a financial asset has to give you back cash to justify you laying out cash for it now.

投资,本质上就是一种艺术:今天先拿出现金,未来再收回来多得多的现金。

Investing is, essentially, the art of laying out cash now to get a whole lot more cash later on.

而且一个东西到了某个时候,最好真的能给你吐出现金来。

And something at some point better deliver cash.

Ben Graham 以前上课的时候,常常会讲他所谓的 frozen corporation。

Ben Graham, in his class, used to talk about what he called the frozen corporation.

这个 frozen corporation,指的是一家公司的章程明文禁止它

And the frozen corporation was a company whose charter prohibited it

永远不能向所有者支付任何东西,也永远不能清算,也永远不能出售。

from ever paying anything to its owners or ever being liquidated or ever being sold.
M3
M33:18

有点像 Hollywood 制片人。

Sort of like a Hollywood producer.
M2
M23:20

对。

Yeah.

那么问题就是,这样一种企业到底值多少钱?

And the question was, what was such an enterprise worth?

嗯,这有点像个理论问题,但它会逼着你去思考,做生意这件事本质上到底是什么。

Well, that's sort of a theoretical question, but it forced you to think about the realities of what business is all about.

而做生意的本质,就是今天先把钱投出去,未来再收回来更多的钱。

And business is all about putting out money today to get back more money later on.
M1
M13:37

Charlie?

Charlie?
M3
M33:42

我确实觉得你提了个很有意思的问题,因为我认为有一类生意,那个最终现金回流的部分,往往其实是一种幻觉。

I do think there is an interesting problem that you raise because I think there is a class of businesses where the eventual cash-back part of the equation tends to be an illusion.

我觉得有些生意就是你不断往里投钱、不断往里投钱,然后突然一下,它就不行了,一分钱现金也回不来。

I think there are businesses where you just keep pouring it in and pouring it in, and then all of a sudden it doesn't work and no cash comes back.

而让我们的工作有意思的地方,就在于努力避开那一类,转而找到另一类——那种会被现金淹没的生意。

And what makes our life interesting is trying to avoid those and get on the alternative kind that drowns you in cash.
M2
M24:17

我们认为有一个指标完全是胡扯,那就是所谓的 EBITDA。

The one figure we regard as utter nonsense is the so-called EBITDA.

我的意思是,在只看一个数字、却把仅仅为了维持原地不动所需要的现金支出排除在外——而这种支出通常都是存在的——这种想法本身就有问题。

I mean, the idea of looking at a figure before the cash requirements of merely staying in the same place—and there usually are.

任何拥有大量固定资产的生意,几乎总是都伴随着这样一种要求:为了在竞争中不掉队、为了维持销量不下滑,必须持续投入大量现金再投资。

Any business with significant fixed assets almost always has with it a concomitant requirement that major cash be reinvested in order simply to stay in the same place competitively and in terms of unit sales.

在这些现金需求之前去看某个数字,简直愚蠢透顶,而且很多人都滥用了它。投资银行这个圈子居然学会了用 EBITDA 这种说法来讲话,这实在不是什么光彩的事。

To look at some figure that is stated before those cash requirements is absolute folly, and it's been misused by lots of people. It's not to the credit of the investment banking fraternity that it has learned to speak in terms of EBITDA.
M3
M35:08

我的意思是,拿一个你明知道是胡扯的指标来用,然后还在这个错误前提上层层加码地往下推理,这在智识上实在说不过去。

I mean, the idea of using a measure that you know is nonsense and then piling additional reasoning on that false assumption, it's not creditable intellectual performance.

然后一旦大家都开始用这种胡扯的说法,那它慢慢就成了标准。

And then once everybody is talking in terms of nonsense, why, it gets to be standard.
M2
M25:37

请第七区提问。

Zone 7, please.