巴菲特谈蒂姆·库克推出的服务:苹果应该做一些行不通的事

苹果公司新品发布会披露流媒体电视和新闻订阅服务几天后，沃伦·巴菲特对这家硬件厂商借此创收的计划给予了不那么令人激动的肯定。

巴菲特说，苹果即将在流媒体订阅市场和迪士尼、Netflix这样的娱乐巨头硬碰硬，“这场游戏不那么容易预测，因为他们有非常聪明的人以及大量资源，其目的是想办法再抓住你半个小时。我可不会参加这样的游戏。”

当采访者，CNBC记者贝基·奎克指出伯克希尔-哈撒韦目前对苹果的投资价值约470亿美元，也就是说伯克希尔实际上已经参与了这个市场的时候，巴菲特对苹果进入一个最终或许不会成功的市场表露出了耐心。

巴菲特说：“苹果——我愿意看到他们取得成功。这家公司承受得起一、两次失误。不能买那些必须把所有事情都做对的公司的股票。你会犯错误，但不要让它在你的资本中占太大比例……苹果应该做一些行不通的事。”

截至2018年年底，巴菲特的伯克希尔-哈撒韦手握2.5亿股苹果公司股票，持股比例约为5.7%。上个季度，随着苹果和其他重磅科技股下跌，伯克希尔卖掉了约300万股苹果股票。据《福布斯》估算，巴菲特的净身家约为830亿美元。

巴菲特还表示他不愿在Lyft、Uber和Pinterest等大型科技公司准备上市时进入IPO市场。虽然承认自己在亚马逊等科技巨头上市时错过了买入机会，但巴菲特认为风险太大，不光是伯克希尔，对普通投资者来说也是如此。伯克希尔上次买进首发新股还是在1955年。

巴菲特说：“在市场火爆时买新股根本不是普通人应该考虑的事。你可以兜一圈，做些笨投资，而且依然可以赚钱。但你不能把它作为终身模式。你得确保自己在下注时跟庄家站在一边，而不是跟庄家对着干。”

在采访过程中，巴菲特自始至终都带着谦虚而直率的幽默来回答问题。当奎克问他是否打算在iPad上看苹果的节目时，巴菲特掏出了一部功能手机，跟十几年前流行的那种手机一样。

88岁的巴菲特开玩笑说：“亚历山大·格拉汉姆·贝尔（被誉为“电话之父”）把这个借给我，我忘了还给他了。”（财富中文网）

译者：Charlie

审校：夏林

A few days after Apple staged an elaborate event to unveil its plans for streaming-TV and news subscription services, Warren Buffett offered less than a rousing endorsement for the device manufacturer’s plans to build out its revenue stream through such offerings.

Buffett said the market for streaming-video subscriptions, in which Apple is going up against entertainment giants like Disney and Netflix, is “not an easy game to predict, because you have very smart people with lots of resources trying to figure out how to grab another half hour of your time. I wouldn’t want to play in that game myself.”

When the interviewer, CNBC’s Becky Quick, pointed out that Berkshire Hathaway’s investment in Apple, currently worth about $47 billion, means Berkshire is in fact playing in that market, Buffett indicated a patience toward Apple’s move into a market that ultimately may not pan out.

“Apple—I’d love to see them succeed. That’s a company that can afford a mistake or two. You don’t want to buy stock in a company that has to do everything right,” Buffett said. “You’re going to make mistakes but you don’t want to make them with too big a portion of your capital… Apple should do some things that don’t work.”

Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway owned 250 million shares of Apple at the end of 2018, or about 5.7% stake in the Silicon Valley giant. The company sold off about 3 million shares of Apple last quarter, as it and other big name tech stocks tumbled. Buffett’s net worth is estimated at around $83 billion, according to Forbes.

Buffett also expressed a reluctance to jump into the IPO market at a time when big-name tech companies like Lyft, Uber and Pinterest are preparing to go public. While acknowledging he missed out on buying tech giants like Amazon when they went public, Buffett thinks the risks are too great, not just for Berkshire but for the average investor as well. The last time his firm bought shares in an IPO was in 1955.

“Buying new offerings during hot periods in the market isn’t anything the average person should think about at all,” Buffett said. “You can go around and make dumb bets and still win. It’s not something you want to take as a lifetime model. You just want to make sure you’re on the side of the house when you bet, rather than bet against the house.”

Throughout the interview, Buffett answered questions with a humble, plainspoken sense of humor. When Quick asked if he planned to watch Apple programs on his iPad, Buffett pulled out a flip phone, the likes of which were popular more than a decade ago.

“Alexander Graham Bell lent it to me and I forgot to return it,” joked the 88-year-old Buffett.