阅读内容: 《穷查理宝典》 Poor Charlie's Almanack---Talk Eight

The Great Financial Scandal of 2003

Summary

This talk was handwritten by Charlie when he was vacationing in the summer of 2000.

This parable and morality play gives Charlie a chance to vent his anger at the accounting profession's role in corporate malfeasance. 

The speech is an eerie prediction of the scandals that surfaced well before his predicted date of 2003 and that continue today to be an important issue.

查理芒格写这篇文章的初衷并非为了预言2003年的情况。它是一篇虚构作品。这篇文章的用意是提醒人们留意现代社会中的某些行为和信念系统，同时也是想证明，对股票期权的标准记账方法与那些更广为人知的简单欺骗作假手段本质上没有什么区别。

这篇内容涉及到很多我没接触过的陌生领域的词汇，不懂的地方比较多，所以我就粗略翻看了一下，先简单做个笔记，以后积累多点相关知识后再重读。

一、宽特科技Quant Tech的兴衰

（一）宽特科技辉煌前半生的原因：

（1）Quant Tech had a dominant market share in its business 宽特科技占据该行业的龙头地位

（2）All compensation was paid in cash. There were no stock options. Moreover, the old man believed in tailoring his huge incentive bonuses to precise performance standards established for individuals or small groups 所有薪酬以现金支付，同时摒弃了问题多多的股权激励机制，而选用了简单的现金奖励机制

（3）He would sometimes advise an employee to buy Quant Tech stock, but more paternalistic than that he would not become. 建议员工购买公司股票

（4）Quant Tech was debt free and, except as a reputation-enhancer, really didn't need any shareholders' equity to run its business, no matter how fast revenues grew. 公司无债务

（5）he loved his business and his coworkers and always wanted to have on hand large amounts of cash equivalents so as to be able to maximize work-out or work-up chances if an unexpected adversity or opportunity came along. 持有大量的现金等价物以备不时之需

（6）Possessing a strong balance sheet and a productive culture and also holding a critical mass of expertise in a rapidly changing and rapidly growing business 拥有健康的财务报表和行之有效的企业文化，还拥有行业中的关键技术

（二）宽特科技悲催下半生的原因：（不道德的经营管理方式）

（1）本来宽特公司处于低市值的时候，如果这个董事会够明智，他们会利用手头所有现金和外面借来的资金大量买进宽特科技的股票。然而创始人离世后，董事会做出了愚蠢的决策：Incident to the recruitment of the new executives, it was made plain that Quant Tech's directors wanted a higher market capitalization as soon as feasible.

（2）然而新上任的管理层很快意识到，他们很难更快地提高公司的年收入和利润率。他们的做法是：the new officers were attracted to employing what they called "modern financial engineering," which required prompt use of any and all arguably lawful methods for driving up reported earnings, with big, simple changes to be made first.

二、查理警示人们“恶性效应”对经济的巨大破坏作用：市场普遍存在的财务欺诈极大地毁坏金融市场并引发经济衰退

三、查理的批判

To me, a profession and a nation that allow unsound accounting for management cost are leaning in the same moral direction as the group that leaves most of the steel out of the concrete in erecting high-rise apartment buildings. Moreover, the unsound accounting is more virulent than the murderous construction practice. After all, the defective constructors have a harder time rationalizing their deplorable behavior. And, therefore, the bad accounting will more easily spread than the defective construction. Which is exactly what happened, as defective accounting forstock options became ubiquitous.