原文信息：
- 标题：1958 Annual Letter to Partners
- 发表时间：1959-02-11
- 整合：Ponge
- 英文校对：孙萧萧
- 校译：孙萧萧
1958 Letter
1958 年信
Warren E Buffett
沃伦 E 巴菲特
5202 Underwood Ave. Omaha, Nebraska
内布拉斯加州，奥马哈市，安德伍德大道5202号
THE GENERAL STOCK MARKET IN 1958
1958 年股市的整体情况
A friend who runs a medium-sized investment trust recently wrote: “The mercurial temperament, characteristic of the American people, produced a major transformation in 1958 and ‘exuberant’ would be the proper word for the stock market, at least”.
一位管理着中等规模投资信托的朋友最近写道：“美国人那极具特色的躁动脾气，在1958年发生了重大转变。至少，用“亢奋”一词来形容股市情绪非常贴切。”
I think this summarizes the change in psychology dominating the stock market in 1958 at both the amateur and professional levels. During the past year almost any reason has been seized upon to justify “Investing” in the market. There are undoubtedly more mercurially-tempered people in the stock market now than for a good many years and the duration of their stay will be limited to how long they think profits can be made quickly and effortlessly. While it is impossible to determine how long they will continue to add numbers to their ranks and thereby stimulate rising prices, I believe it is valid to say that the longer their visit, the greater the reaction from it.
我认为，他的话很好地总结了主导 1958 年股市中业余投资者与专业投资者的情绪变化。过去一年里，几乎所有的理由都被找来证明“投资”股市是明智之举。毋庸置疑，相比以往多年，如今股市中情绪多变的躁动股民更多了。只要他们觉得股市还能快速而轻松地赚大钱，就会一直留在股市，不愿离开。而这类人的队伍还在继续壮大，并进一步推高了股价。尽管我无法判断这种状态还将持续多久，但我可以确凿地说：这些人待得越久，带来的负作用就越大。
I make no attempt to forecast the general market - my efforts are devoted to finding undervalued securities. However, I do believe that widespread public belief in the inevitability of profits from investment in stocks will lead to eventual trouble. Should this occur, prices, but not intrinsic values in my opinion, of even undervalued securities can be expected to be substantially affected.
我无意预测市场走势，而是努力搜寻低估值股票。然而，若广大公众一致认为买股票必定能赚钱的话，我确信这最终只会带来麻烦。到那时，包括低估值股票在内的所有股票价格（但不是我所说的内在价值）都将受到严重影响。
RESULTS IN 1958
1958 年的业绩
In my letter of last year, I wrote:
我在去年的信中曾写道：
“Our performance, relatively, is likely to be better in a bear market than in a bull market so that deductions made from the above results should be tempered by the fact that it was the type of year when we should have done relatively well. In a year when the general market had a substantial advance, I would be well satisfied to match the advance of the averages.”
“相对而言，我们在熊市的业绩可能会好于牛市。因此，我们应当正视今年的业绩，毕竟行情不好的年份我们本就应该比指数表现得更好。而在股市整体大幅上涨的年份里，只要能跟上指数涨幅，我就非常满意了。”
The latter sentence describes the type of year we had in 1958 and my forecast worked out. The Dow-Jones Industrial average advanced from 435 to 583 which, after adding back dividends of about 20 points, gave an overall gain of 38.5% from the Dow-Jones unit. The five partnerships that operated throughout the entire year obtained results averaging slightly better than this 38.5%. Based on market values at the end of both years, their gains ranged from 36.7% to 46.2%. Considering the fact that a substantial portion of assets has been and still is invested in securities, which benefit very little from a fast-rising market, I believe these results are reasonably good. I will continue to forecast that our results will be above average in a declining or level market, but it will be all we can do to keep pace with a rising market.
最后一句描述的正是我们 1958 年的情况，所以我的预言应验了。道琼斯工业平均指数从 435 点上涨到 583 点，加上约 20 个点的股息，道琼斯成分股的总体涨幅高达 38.5%。我们运营了完整年度的五家合伙企业，去年取得的平均收益率略高于 38.5%。按最近这两年年末的市值计算，它们的收益率区间为 36.7% 到 46.2%。考虑到大部分的资产已经且仍然配置在那些几乎无法从快速上涨的市场中获益的股票上，我认为这个投资结果相当不错。我仍然预计我们的业绩在下跌或盘整行情中会跑赢指数，而在上涨行情中我们所能做的就是跟上指数。
TYPICAL SITUATION
典型案例
So that you may better understand our method of operation, I think it would be well to review a specific activity of 1958. Last year I referred to our largest holding which comprised 10% to 20% of the assets of the various partnerships. I pointed out that it was to our interest to have this stock decline or remain relatively steady, so that we could acquire an even larger position and that for this reason such a security would probably hold back our comparative performance in a bull market.
为了让大家更好地理解我们的投资方法，我觉得不妨在此复盘一下在 1958 年做的一笔具体投资。去年，我提到过我们有只股票最大持仓占到各家合伙企业资产的 10% 到 20%。我还指出我们希望这只股票最好是下跌或者保持横盘，这样我们就可以买入更多的仓位，但因此原因，这只股票也很可能拖累我们在牛市中的相对业绩。
This stock was the Commonwealth Trust Co. of Union City, New Jersey. At the time we started to purchase the stock, it had an intrinsic value 10 per share which was largely responsible for a depressed price of about $50 per share. So here we had a very well managed bank with substantial earnings power selling at a large discount from intrinsic value. Management was friendly to us as new stockholders and risk of any ultimate loss seemed minimal.
这只股票就是新泽西州尤宁城的联邦信托公司 (Commonwealth Trust Co.)[^1]。在我们开始买入这只股票时，保守估算它的内在价值是每股 125 美元。尽管每股收益达 10 美元，但公司找到了合理的理由，就是不派发现金股息，因此原因其股价跌到了每股 50 美元左右。于是，我们以较内在价值大幅折价的价格买入了这家管理出色、盈利能力强的银行股票，管理层对新晋股东的我们态度友善，所以这笔投资最终亏损的风险很小。
[^1]
译注： 网上有些译文将该公司名称翻译为“新泽西州的联合城联邦信托公司”，但“新泽西州的联合城联邦信托公司”在DeepL中被翻译为：Union City Federal Trust Company of New Jersey，与原文不符。根据DeepL的英译中和中译英反复验证，翻译为“新泽西州尤宁城的联邦信托公司”是正确的。另，对 Union City 的翻译，网上大部分译者、DeepL、百度百科翻译为“联合市”或“联合城”，考虑到地名翻译一般采用音译而非意译，同时经搜索维基百科、查询《世界地名翻译大辞典》、《外国地名译名手册（中型本）》，其翻译均为“尤宁城”，故本译文采用“尤宁城”的译法，感谢 @Ponge 对此提出的修改讨论及建议。
Commonwealth was 25.5% owned by a larger bank (Commonwealth had assets of about $50 Million – about half the size of the First National in Omaha), which had desired a merger for many years. Such a merger was prevented for persona1 reasons, but there was evidence that this situation would not continue indefinitely. Thus we had a combination of:
联邦信托的 25.5% 股权由一家更大的银行持有（联邦信托有大约 5000 万美元的资产，其规模大概是奥马哈第一国民银行 (First National) 的一半）。多年来，这家大银行一直期望合并联邦信托。合并因为个人原因受阻，不过有迹象表明这种状况不会无限期地持续下去。因此，我们对该笔投资的综合评判如下：
- Very strong defensive characteristics;
- Good solid value building up at a satisfactory pace and;
- Evidence to the effect that eventually this value would be unlocked although it might be one year or ten years. If the latter were true, the value would presumably have been built up to a considerably larger figure, say, $250 per share.
---
- 有极强的防御性；
- 具有良好而稳固的价值，正以令人满意的速度增长；
- 虽然不确定是一年还是十年，但有迹象表明，公司价值终将得以显现。假如是十年的话，则该价值将会增长到一个可观的数字，比如说每股 250 美元。
Over a period of a year or so, we were successful in obtaining about 12% of the bank at a price averaging about $51 per share. Obviously it was definitely to our advantage to have the stock remain dormant in price. Our block of stock increased in value as its size grew, particularly after we became the second largest stockholder with sufficient voting power to warrant consultation on any merger proposal.
用了一年左右时间，我们成功地获得了该银行约 12% 的股权，平均买入成本约为每股 51 美元。很显然，该股票一直不涨的股价的确有利于我们买入。我们所持股票的价值随着持股数量的增长而增加，尤其是成为第二大股东后，我们拥有了足够的投票权，从而确保我们可对任何并购提案发表意见。
Commonwealth only had about 300 stockholders and probably averaged two trades or so per month, so you can understand why I say that the activity of the stock market generally had very little effect on the price movement of some of our holdings.
联邦信托只有约 300 名股东，平均每月大概只有两笔左右的交易。这下你明白为什么我说股票市场的波动几乎不会影响我们某些持股的股价变动了吧。
Unfortunately we did run into some competition on buying, which railed the price to about $65 where we were neither buyer nor seller. Very small buying orders can create price changes of this magnitude in an inactive stock, which explains the importance of not having any “Leakage” regarding our portfolio holdings.
不幸的是，我们在买入过程中确实遇到了一些竞争，致使股价上涨到约 65 美元，这个价格我们既不想买也不会卖。对于成交不活跃的股票来说，很小的买单就能造成如此大幅的价格变化，这也解释了不要“泄露”我们的投资组合股票有多么的重要。
Late in the year we were successful in finding a special situation where we could become the largest holder at an attractive price, so we sold our block of Commonwealth obtaining $80 per share although the quoted market was about 20% lower at the time.
去年下半年，我们成功地找到了一个特殊情况投资机会，能以一个吸引人的价格成为最大股东。于是，我以每股 80 美元的价格卖掉了我们所持有的联邦信托股票，而这个价格比当时的市场报价高出约 20%。
It is obvious that we could still be sitting with $50 stock patiently buying in dribs and drabs, and I would be quite happy with such a program although our performance relative to the market last year would have looked poor. The year when a situation such at Commonwealth results in a realized profit is, to a great extent, fortuitous. Thus, our performance for any single year has serious limitations as a basis for estimating long term results. However, I believe that a program of investing in such undervalued well protected securities offers the surest means of long term profits in securities.
显然，我们也可以选择坐拥 50 美元成本的股票，同时继续耐心地零星买入。即便这样操作会让我们去年的业绩相比市场不太好看，我也会十分满意。不过，像联邦信托这样的能够及时将盈利兑现的股票，很大程度上只是偶然。因此，基于我们任何单个年度的业绩去估计长期结果具有严重的局限性。然而，我相信投资这种受到良好保护的低估值股票是取得长期收益的最可靠途径。
I might mention that the buyer of the stock at 80 with an intrinsic value 50 with an intrinsic value of $125, and it seemed to me that our capital could better be employed in the situation which replaced it. This new situation is somewhat larger than Commonwealth and represents about 25% of the assets of the various partnerships. While the degree of undervaluation is no greater than in many other securities we own (or even than some) we are the largest stockholder and this has substantial advantages many times in determining the length of time required to correct the undervaluation. In this particular holding we are virtually assured of a performance better than that of the Dow-Jones for the period we hold it.
我还要提到的是，即使以 80 美元价格买进的买家，预计多年后也会获得不错的回报。不过呢，内在价值 135 美元时 80 美元的买入价格，与内在价值 125 美元时 50 美元的买入价格相比，两者的相对低估程度迥然而异。对我来说，我们的资金更应该配置到另一只股票上去。这只新股票的体量比联邦信托大一些，占各家合伙企业资产的 25% 左右。虽说其低估程度不如我们现在持有的许多其他股票（比某些股票低估一些），但我们作为这只新股票的最大股东，在决定何时修正低估状态上具有显著的优势。就这个特定的投资，我们几乎可以确定在持有期间业绩表现会优于道指。
THE CURRENT SITUATION
当前的情况
The higher the level of the market, the fewer the undervalued securities and I am finding some difficulty in securing an adequate number of attractive investments. I would prefer to increase the percentage of our assets in work-outs, but these are very difficult to find on the right terms.
To the extent possible, therefore, I am attempting to create my own work-outs by acquiring large positions in several undervalued securities. Such a policy should lead to the fulfillment of my earlier forecast – an above average performance in a bear market. It is on this basis that I hope to be judged. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them.
因此，如果可能的话，我想通过大量买入几只被低估的股票来构建自己的套利类组合。这样的策略将证实我之前的预测——在熊市中跑赢指数。我也希望大家以这样的基准来评判我的业绩。如果你们有任何问题，欢迎随时来询。
WARREN E. BUFFETT
沃伦 E. 巴菲特
2-11-59
1959年2月11日