저자: WarrenBuffett&CharlieMunger · 외국인
요약 보기
에너지 산업 관련 질문에 대해 극단적 입장은 비현실적이며 탄화수소는 당분간 필수적이라고 봄. 다만 세계가 점차 탄화수소에서 멀어지고 있다고 언급. 쉐브론 보유에 도덕적 거부감은 없다고 밝힘. 애플 매각은 실수였다고 회고하고 팀 쿡 경영 능력을 높이 평가. 미국 빅테크는 미국의 자랑이며 반독점으로 무너뜨리면 안 된다는 입장. 경제학자들의 예측이 빗나간 점과 현대통화이론(MMT)에 대한 과신을 경계하며, 무제한 재정 확대는 결국 재앙으로 끝날 수 있다고 경고.
다듬은 글
Charlie and I consider it the most interesting movie by far we've ever seen in terms of economics. Don't we? Yes. And the professional economists of course have been very surprised by what's happened. It reminds me of what Churchill said about Clement Adley. He said he was a very modest man and had a great deal to be modest about.
And that's exactly what's happened with the professional economists. They were so confident about everything. And it turns out the world is more complicated than than they thought. I think the modern monetary theorists are more confident than they ought to be, too. I don't think we any of us know what's going to happen to this stuff.
I do think there's a good chance that that this extreme conduct is more feasible than everybody thought, but I do know if you keep just doing it without any limit, it will end in disaster. Charlie has also referenced passing up on a private tobacco deal that you both knew was a cinch, yet you both have no regrets in saying no to the transaction.
I'm not suggesting that the oil and gas business has the same known negative externalities as cigarettes. They do not. With tobacco, the cause and effect relationship between the products and cancer is direct, obvious, and measurable. With hydrocarbons, the societal costs and benefits are far more complex to evaluate.
However, an increasing portion of society is drawing their lines in such a way that their painting does not include hydrocarbons period. My question is, has the alarmism from the climate community now become pervasive across society to the extent it has become irrational? Have we built our own unrealistic consensus on the pace of change achievable with regards to the transition to greener energy sources to the extent that this is becoming an overly expensive tax worn by the current younger generation?
Can we gather from your purchase of Chevron stock that you do not believe the howling from society, regulators and politician will impair the prospects of hydrocarbons and Chevron for that matter in the next 10 years? Can investors still assume an oil and gas business that finds and produces oil at low cost per barrel can generate a sufficient return on capital for a long time to come?
Well, I I'll give you a 10-word answer to that. they uh uh uh I can't remember all the questions there were there, but I would say that people that are on the extremes of both sides are are a little nuts. I I I would hate to have all the hydrocarbons banned in three years or and you you know, you wouldn't want a world it wouldn't work.
And on the other hand, you know, what's happening will be adapted to over time just as we've adapted to all kinds of things. I do not think I I'm I'm interested a quote from 1997 because uh you know we've talked about this before we have no problem owning Costco or Walmart you know and and a substantial number of their stores and uh you know they they sell cigarettes.
It's a big item you know it's it's it's something that brings people in. They know the price of cigarettes and and uh you know they put them up front and uh so we don't uh it's a very tough situation. And we made that decision a long time ago when we went to Memphis and and we looked at a business that was a very very good business and it was much less harmful uh at least from everything I could find out.
Uh it was much less harmful than smoking tobacco, chewing tobacco was. And these were decent people and they were running a legal business and they all chewed tobacco themselves. So they they were and they told me that their mother was 100 and chewing tobacco and all these things. But Charlie and I did go down in the lobby of that hotel and we just said to ourselves, "This is probably the best business we've ever seen." Uh, and I called my then son-in-law, Alen Ringburg, and he'd studied chewing tobacco and its effects when he was working for uh a NATO related organization and and we decided not to do it.
But you know would we you know I see I used to see ads in our paper from financial companies where I knew they were terrible you know and I it's it's a very tough thing to decide whether you get in or out of a business. It's very tough time to decide what so what companies benefit society more than others.
I mean, it's I don't know whether I think Chevron's benefited society in all kinds of ways, and I think it continues to do so, and I think we're going to need a lot of hydrocarbons for a long time, and we'll be very glad we've got them. But I do think that the world's moving away from them, too. And and I that could change.
I I I I don't like making the moral judgments on stocks in terms of actually running the businesses, but there's something about every business that if you knew what you wouldn't like uh and uh uh you know, meat packers or anything, you ever gone through a meat packing, you know, it there's it if you expect perfection, you know, in your spouse or in your friends or in companies, you're not going to find and and uh what you elect to do yourself.
If you own an index fund, you're going to own Chevron. And believe me, Chevron is not an evil company in the least. And and uh I have no compunction about owning in the least about owning Chevron. And if if we own the entire business, I wouldn't I would not feel uncomfortable about being in that business.
Charlie, well, I agree. You know, you can imagine two things. A young man marries into your family. He's a English professor at say Sworthmore. Or he's a he works for Chevron. Which would you pick? Cuz I don't see I want to admit I'd take the guy from Chevron. Well, I hope your daughters agree with you.
Yeah. He's got a product that people absolutely love and and uh uh there's an installed base of people and they get satisfaction rates of 99% and I get the figures from the furniture mart to what's being sold and if people come in and they want an Android phone, they want an Android phone. If they if they want Apple, they want an Apple phone, you can't sell them the other one.
I mean it it the the brand and the product is is it's an incredible product. It's a huge huge bargain uh to people. I mean what the part it plays in their lives is huge. I use it as a phone but I'm probably the only guy in the country. You know maybe some descendant of Alexander Graham Bell is doing the same thing.
uh it is indispensable to people and you know it costs you know car costs $35,000 and I'm I'm sure with some people if you asked them whether they want to give up had to give up their their uh Apple or give up the give up their car you know and really make the choice for the next 5 years you know who knows what they do but it it is it and we we you know we got a chance to buy it and I uh I sold some stock last year, although our shareholders still had their percentage interest go up because we repurchase shares, but that was that was probably a mistake.
In fact, and Charlie and in his usual low-key way, uh let me know that that you thought it was a mistake too, didn't Charlie? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. it. I could only do so many things that I can get away with with Charlie. I kind of used them up between Costco and Apple. Uh so uh uh and um incidentally, he probably he's very likely was right in both circumstances.
It's it's an extraordinary business. But I do want to emphasize that uh in his own way, it's a different way, but Tim Cook is we we see a lot of managers of a lot of businesses and you're looking at two great ones on the both ends here. Uh he's handled that business so well. He couldn't do what Steve Jobs obviously could do in terms of of creation.
Uh but I don't but Steve Jobs couldn't really I don't think do what Tim Cook has done in in many respects. Well, I also think it's clear that that list you showed of the leading American companies, it's been a very important for America that we've done so well in this new tech field. And I personally would not like to see our present giants brought down to some low level by some anti-competitive reasonings.
I don't think they're doing a lot of harm any competitively. I think they're a credit to the Americans, credit to our civilization. They're and they're and they're huge and they're huge and that's good for us. I should go back to the previous question. You know, people talk about the aging management at Bergkshire and I always assume they're talking about Charlie when they say that.
But but I I would like to point out that in three more years, Charlie will be aging at 1% a year. and he is this no one is aging less than Charlie. If you could take some of these new companies with 25 year olds, they're aging at 4% a year. So, so we will have the slowest aging managed percentage wise by far that any corporate any American company has.
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