正文
We favor businesses where we really think we know the answer. If we think the business’s competitive position is shaky, we won’t try to compensate with price. We want to buy a great business, defined as having a high return on capital for a long period of time, where we think management will treat us right. We like to buy at 40 cents on the dollar, but will pay a lot closer to $1 on the dollar for a great business.
我们倾向于投资我们知道答案的公司。如果我们认为公司的竞争地位很不稳定，那么我们肯定就不会尝试去补价了。我们想投资好公司，就是在长期内有高现金回报，管理层也会善待我们的公司。原则上我们是40美分买1美元，但是对于真正的好公司我们愿意以无限接近1美元的价格去买入。
If we see someone who weighs 300 pounds or 320 pounds, it doesn’t matter–we know they’re fat. We look for fat businesses.
不管是300磅还是320磅重的人，都没关系，反正我们知道是胖子就对了。没错，我们要找的就是一眼看上去回报就很肥厚的公司。
We don’t get paid for the past, only the future [profitability of a business]. The past is only useful to give you insights into the future, but sometimes there’s no insight. At times, we’ve been able to buy businesses at one quarter of what they’re worth, but we haven’t seen that recently except South Korea.
我们不会从过去取得回报，只有未来才能给我们回报（指公司盈利能力）。过去只为我们预测未来时提供一点见解，不过有的时候可能都给不了哪怕一点见解。时不时地，我们会以四分之一的价格买入一个公司，但是最近这种公司不好找了，除了韩国。
Source: BRK Annual Meeting 2007 Tilson Notes
Time: 2007
来源：BRK2007年会Tilson笔记
时间：2007
Q: What is the ideal business?
完美的公司长什么样？
The ideal business is one that generates very high returns on capital and can invest that capital back into the business at equally high rates. Imagine a $100 million business that earns 20% in one year, reinvests the $20 million profit and in the next year earns 20% of $120 million and so forth. But there are very very few businesses like this. Coke has high returns on capital, but incremental capital doesn't earn anything like its current returns. We love businesses that can earn high rates on even more capital than it earns. Most of our businesses generate lots of money, but can't generate high returns on incremental capital -- for example, See's and Buffalo News. We look for them [areas to wisely reinvest capital], but they don't exist.
完美的公司呢就是能产生高现金回报，而且同时还能把产生的现金回报再投资到同样能产生高回报公司的公司。我们设想一下，一个值一个亿的公司每年能挣20%，然后把这挣的2千万再投资，那么下一年就挣一亿两千万的20%，长此以往下去...不过这样的公司少之又少。可口可乐现金回报很高，但是增量资本可跟当前的回报不一样。我们比较喜欢那种回报率比盈利还高的公司。我们手下绝大多数公司都挺能挣钱的，但是不能在增量资本上产生高回报——举个例子，See’s和布法罗新闻。我们在找这样的（领域去理智的再投资），但是找不到。
So, what we do is take money and move it around into other businesses. The newspaper business earned great returns but not on incremental capital. But the people in the industry only knew how to reinvest it [so they squandered a lot of capital]. But our structure allows us to take excess capital and invest it elsewhere, wherever it makes the most sense. It's an enormous advantage.
于是，我们就只好拿着钱转向别的公司了。报纸产业回报是很高但都不是增量资本。然而那个产业中的人只知道再投资一个公司（所以很多钱都打了水漂）。但是我们的体系允许我们拿着多余的资金去投资别的公司，别的挣得更多的公司。这是一个巨大的优势。
See's has produced $1 billion pre-tax for us over time. If we'd deployed that in the candy business, the returns would have been terrible, but instead we took the money out of the business and redeployed it elsewhere. Look at the results!
See's一共为我们带来了税前10亿美金的收益。如果我们把这个钱仍旧拿来投资糖果公司（See's是美国一家巧克力公司），那回报肯定糟透了，但是我们把钱拿出来去投别的产业了。看看我这回报！
[CM: There are two kinds of businesses: The first earns 12%, and you can take it out at the end of the year. The second earns 12%, but all the excess cash must be reinvested -- there's never any cash. It reminds me of the guy who looks at all of his equipment and says, "There's all of my profit." We hate that kind of business.]
（查理芒格：有两种企业：第一种每年挣12%，然后年末你可以把这笔钱拿走。第二种也挣12%，但是所有超额现金必须拿来再投资——这样就不会再产生现金了。这让我不禁脑补一个人看着他所有的设备说，“看看，这是我所有的利润”。我们恨死这种企业了。）
