巴菲特：我犯了一个1000亿美元的大错误

    沃伦•巴菲特的身家已经超过700亿美元。然而，在今年写给伯克希尔哈撒韦公司股东的信中，巴菲特说他犯过一个商业错误，他本人和投资者因此蒙受的损失可能远远超过自己拥有的财富。

    今年是巴菲特及其投资合伙人决定获取伯克希尔哈撒韦控制权50周年。在今年的股东信中，巴菲特讲述了往事，并且回忆了自己收购这家公司的历程。当时，这是一家陷入困境的纺织企业，总部设在马萨诸塞州贝德福德。除了讲述这段经历，巴菲特还透露了自己的两大商业和投资错误，还说其中一个错误让自己和投资者损失了1000亿美元。

    让人意外的是，巴菲特提到的第一个错误是买下伯克希尔哈撒韦。他说这次收购是个“极为愚蠢的决定”。巴菲特表示，当时自己知道这家公司陷入了困境，而他进行收购只是因为觉得后者很便宜。在那个时候，巴菲特的计划是迅速锁定收益并退出，而且他差点这样做。

    1964年5月份，时任伯克希尔哈撒韦首席执行官的西伯里•斯坦顿提出，以稍低于承诺价格的水平回购自己在这家公司的股份。这让当时34岁的巴菲特很生气，尽管斯坦顿的报价仍能让这笔为期两年的投资给他带来52%的回报率。巴菲特反其道而行之，开始着手收购这家公司，并于第二年5月和自己的合伙人控制了伯克希尔哈撒韦。

    这是一招错棋。

    伯克希尔哈撒韦继续苦苦挣扎。为了让这家纺织公司扭亏，巴菲特投入了大量资金，但最终在20年后结束了伯克希尔哈撒韦的纺织业务。

    然而，巴菲特说自己最大的错误出现在两年后。1967年初，巴菲特收购了一项业务，后者就是伯克希尔哈撒韦保险和投资业务的雏形，并最终让这家公司发展成为一个综合商业帝国。巴菲特把这项业务并入了伯克希尔哈撒韦，也就是目前依然由他掌管的上市公司。

    巴菲特说，当时自己仍然经营着投资合伙对冲基金，如果通过这支基金收购此项业务，50年来自己创造的投资收益就会统统进入他和投资者的囊中。现在，他却要和伯克希尔哈撒韦的流通股股东分享这些收益。

    但人们很难将其看做是一个错误，也很难相信巴菲特真的对此感到后悔。如果这位投资界传奇当时去做了对冲基金经理，那么他现在会是什么样？这个世界又会是什么样？这很难想象。而现在，他是伯克希尔哈撒韦的掌门人，后者已经成为历史上最成功的上市合伙投资公司。只要有钱，任何人都能购买这家公司的股份并因此致富。而且，如果巴菲特只是经营对冲基金，就可能不会有这50封年度致股东信，巴菲特的智慧可能也不会呈现在众人面前。与往常一样，今年这封信的内容依然十分精彩。

    今年的股东信题为《伯克希尔——过去、现在和将来》，其特别章节中还有颇多的惊喜，特别是对巴菲特的粉丝而言。如果不是巴菲特犯了这个1000亿美元的错误，可能人们就难以读到如此多的精彩信件了。（财富中文网）

    译者：Charlie

    审稿：李翔

    Warren Buffett is worth more than $70 billion. But in this year’s annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders, Buffett writes that he made a business mistake that may have cost him and his investors much more than that.

    This year marks the 5oth anniversary of Buffett and his investment partners’ decision to take control of Berkshire Hathaway. In this year’s letter to shareholders, Buffett takes a stroll down memory lane and recalls how he took over Berkshire Hathaway, which at the time was a struggling textile manufacturer based in Bedford, Mass. Along with that story, Buffett shares what he says were two of his biggest business and investment mistakes, one of which he claims cost him and his investors $100 billion.

    The first mistake Buffett mentions is, surprisingly, buying Berkshire. Buffett calls the actions that led up to his purchase of Berkshire a “monumentally stupid decision.” He says he knew Berkshire was a troubled company and that he had only bought into it because he thought it was cheap. Buffett expected to make a quick profit and get out. And he almost did.

    But when, in May 1964, Berkshire CEO Seabury Stanton offered Buffett slightly less than what he had promised to repurchase his stake in the company, the 34-year old investor bristled, even though the price Stanton offered would have given Buffett a 52% return for his two-year investment. Instead, Buffett launched a takeover campaign. By the following May, Buffett and his partners had taken control of the company.

    It was a bad move.

    Berkshire continued to struggle. And Buffett threw good money after bad trying to turnaround the company’s textile mills. He eventually closed Berkshire’s operations two decades later.

    But Buffett claims his biggest mistake came two years later. In early 1967, he bought the business that would eventually be the seed of Berkshire’s insurance, investment, and, eventually, conglomerate empire. Buffett bought and merged it into Berkshire, the publicly traded company that he still runs today.

    Buffett says if he had bought the insurance business through his investment partnership hedge fund, which he still ran at the time, he and his investors would have captured all of the investment gains he has created over the past 50 years. Instead, he has shared those gains with the public shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway.

    But it’s hard to consider this a mistake that Buffett truly regrets. It’s odd to imagine what Buffett would be like now or, indeed, what the world would be like if the legendary investor had remained a hedge fund manager and not the head of what became the most successful publicly traded investment partnership in history, into which anyone, who had the money, could buy into and become rich. And there likely wouldn’t have been 50 years of investment letters and Buffett wisdom for all to read. This year’s letter, like the others, is great.

    There are plenty of other gems in the special section of this year’s letter titled, “Berkshire – Past, Present and Future,” particularly if you are a Buffett fan. And if not for Buffett’s $100 billion mistake, there would probably be a lot fewer of those.