资本主义灵魂今安在？

    你在前面的问题里已经提到了一些重要的主题。这本书探讨的就是短期投机行为喧宾夺主，挤占了人们对长期投资和内在价值的关注。

    只有当资本运用到极致，资本主义才能发挥作用。按照过去五年的平均值，我们每年通过首次公开募股和二次发行筹集2,500亿美元的资金，而股市年均交易额高达33万亿美元。这就意味着超过99.2%的资金都用在了投机上面，而只有.8%用于投资。我建议通过征收交易税和其它措施来扭转这一比例。

    在资本市场，我们的代理体系实际上是一个双重代理体系。有拥有者的代理（比如共同基金），还有股东的代理（就是董事）。而两者乐得沆瀣一气，专注于股票价格而不是公司价值。

    公司给出盈利指引，用会计手法推高股价。而我们有公司治理的问题，如政治费用和高额薪酬。

    1951年，我开始进入这个行业时，共同基金的文化是管理至上，而不是推销至上。那时共同基金的运营者是按照拥有者的根本利益行事的专业人士。现如今，他们只是服务于一己私利的公司。基金行业的规模从20亿美元暴涨到今天的12万亿美元。而换手率从15-16%跳升到了现在的100%。

    目前只有7家私有共同基金公司，先锋集团是其中之一。私有投资公司比上市投资公司表现更佳。而43家上市公司中有36家是金融集团。

    目前我们需要采取的最重要行动是什么？

    我们需要一部信托责任的联邦法，要求信托机构将客户利益置于自身利益之上。像金融集团那样的利益冲突必须禁止。你不能同时服务两个主人。法律将规范公司治理的权利和义务，包括提供廉价服务，将股东（即投资公司的客户）的利益置于公共股东的利益之上。

    Eleanor Bloxham是董事会咨询公司“价值同盟和公司治理同盟”（The Value Alliance and Corporate Governance Alliance）的首席执行官。

    You've touched on some of the major themes of the book in your previous questions. The book talks about how short-term speculation has crowded out a focus on long-term investment and intrinsic value.

    Capitalism works when it put capital to work at its highest and best use. As an average over the last five years, we raise $250 billion a year in the markets in IPOs and secondary offerings while $33 trillion a year is traded. That means that over 99.2% is speculative, and .8% is invested. I recommend we institute transaction taxes along with other measures to turn that around.

    In our capital markets, we have an agency system that is really a double agency system. We have the agents for owners [an example is mutual funds] and we have the agents for shareholders [those are directors]. And they operate in a happy conspiracy that is too focused on price rather than value.

    So companies give earnings guidance and use accounting tricks to boost price. And we have problems with governance, with political spending, and high compensation.

    In 1951, when I began in the business, the culture at mutual funds was stewardship versus salesmanship. Those who ran mutual funds used to be professionals who acted in the best interest of owners. Today, they are businesses that act in the interest of themselves. In that time, the funds have grown from $2 billion to the $12 trillion we see today. And rather than 15-16% turnover, these funds now are running at 100%.

    Today, only seven are privately held. Vanguard is one of them [it's a mutual company] and the privately held ones are doing better than the publicly traded ones. Forty three are publicly held and 36 are conglomerates.

    What is the single most important action we need to be taking now?

    We need to have a federal statute of fiduciary duty, which would require that fiduciaries place the interest of clients ahead of their own. Conflicts of interest like conglomerates would be disallowed. You can't serve two masters. The statute would outline the rights and responsibilities of corporate governance. It would include providing services at low costs, putting the interest of shareholders (i.e. their customers) ahead of their public shareholders.

    Eleanor Bloxham is CEO of The Value Alliance and Corporate Governance Alliance (http://thevaluealliance.com), a board advisory firm.