巴菲特：股市长期回报优于黄金和债券（下）

    第二类投资指的是永远也不会有产出的资产，投资者买入时只是希望其他投资者——这些人同样也明白这类资产永远都不会有产出——将来会以更高的价格接手。最典型的就是郁金香，17世纪时，它一度成为此类买家的最爱。

    这类投资需要买家群体不断壮大，而人们之所以决定买入，是因为他们相信未来买家群体还会继续壮大。这类资产的持有者并不指望资产本身能有什么产出——它永远都不会有产出——而是相信未来，别人会更迫切地希望接手。

    这类资产中的一个大类就是黄金，它当前极受避险投资者的追捧。这些投资者对其他几乎所有资产都不放心，特别是纸币（正如前述，鉴于纸币的购买力，他们的担心不无道理）。不过，黄金有两个显著的缺点。它用途有限，也不能自我繁殖。的确，黄金有一些工业和装饰用途，但这些用途的需求有限，不足以消化新的产量。而且，如果某个投资者一直持有一盎司黄金，最终依然还是只持有一盎司黄金。

    大多数投资者买入黄金是因为他们相信上述担心会升级。过去十年证明这一信念是正确的。此后，金价的继续走高是源于这波走势激发的、更旺盛的购买热情，很多人都将金价上涨视为这种投资观点得到了验证。随着“跟风”投资者的涌入，他们短期内会建立起自己的真理。

    起初合理的投资逻辑加上反复炒作的价格上涨便能造就巨大的资产泡沫，过去15年里我们看到的互联网泡沫和楼市泡沫便是典型。在这些泡沫中，很多最初持怀疑态度的投资者最终都向市场给出的“证据”低了头，一时之间买家群体飞速扩张，足以维持泡沫的继续膨胀。但泡沫大到一定程度，总是免不了会破灭。真是应了那句老话：“聪明人起头，傻瓜结尾”（What the wise man does in the beginning, the fool does in the end）。

    今天，全球的黄金库存有约17万公吨。所有这些黄金熔合在一起会形成一个边长68英尺的立方体。（想象一下，差不多正好能够放入一个棒球场内场。）以每盎司1,750美元（此文撰写时的金价）计算，它的市值约为9.6万亿美元。我们将这个立方体称为A组。

    现在，我们用同样金额创建一个B组。我们可以买下美国所有的耕地（4亿英亩，年产值约2,000亿美元）和16家埃克森美孚（Exxon Mobils）（全球最赚钱的公司，每年利润额超过400亿美元）。然后，还剩下约1万亿美元可用作活动资金（因此，就算这样大手笔的投资后，也丝毫不会感到手头紧张）。你认为一个拥有9.6万亿美元的投资者会选择A组，还是B组？

    除了库存黄金的惊人市值，当前居高不下的金价也让如今的黄金年产值达到了约1,600亿美元。买家——不管是珠宝制造商、工业用户，心存恐惧的个人，还是投机者——必须不断地消化增加的供应，才能让金价继续在当前水平保持均衡。

    The second major category of investments involves assets that will never produce anything, but that are purchased in the buyer's hope that someone else -- who also knows that the assets will be forever unproductive -- will pay more for them in the future. Tulips, of all things, briefly became a favorite of such buyers in the 17th century.

    This type of investment requires an expanding pool of buyers, who, in turn, are enticed because they believe the buying pool will expand still further. Owners are not inspired by what the asset itself can produce -- it will remain lifeless forever -- but rather by the belief that others will desire it even more avidly in the future.

    The major asset in this category is gold, currently a huge favorite of investors who fear almost all other assets, especially paper money (of whose value, as noted, they are right to be fearful). Gold, however, has two significant shortcomings, being neither of much use nor procreative. True, gold has some industrial and decorative utility, but the demand for these purposes is both limited and incapable of soaking up new production. Meanwhile, if you own one ounce of gold for an eternity, you will still own one ounce at its end.

    What motivates most gold purchasers is their belief that the ranks of the fearful will grow. During the past decade that belief has proved correct. Beyond that, the rising price has on its own generated additional buying enthusiasm, attracting purchasers who see the rise as validating an investment thesis. As "bandwagon" investors join any party, they create their own truth -- for a while.

    Over the past 15 years, both Internet stocks and houses have demonstrated the extraordinary excesses that can be created by combining an initially sensible thesis with well-publicized rising prices. In these bubbles, an army of originally skeptical investors succumbed to the "proof " delivered by the market, and the pool of buyers -- for a time -- expanded sufficiently to keep the bandwagon rolling. But bubbles blown large enough inevitably pop. And then the old proverb is confirmed once again: "What the wise man does in the beginning, the fool does in the end."

    Today the world's gold stock is about 170,000 metric tons. If all of this gold were melded together, it would form a cube of about 68 feet per side. (Picture it fitting comfortably within a baseball infield.) At $1,750 per ounce -- gold's price as I write this -- its value would be about $9.6 trillion. Call this cube pile A.

    Let's now create a pile B costing an equal amount. For that, we could buy all U.S. cropland (400 million acres with output of about $200 billion annually), plus 16 Exxon Mobils (the world's most profitable company, one earning more than $40 billion annually). After these purchases, we would have about $1 trillion left over for walking-around money (no sense feeling strapped after this buying binge). Can you imagine an investor with $9.6 trillion selecting pile A over pile B?

    Beyond the staggering valuation given the existing stock of gold, current prices make today's annual production of gold command about $160 billion. Buyers -- whether jewelry and industrial users, frightened individuals, or speculators -- must continually absorb this additional supply to merely maintain an equilibrium at present prices.