芒格：2003年的金融大丑闻（中+英）

巴菲特

　　查理·芒格记录于2000年夏天
　　2003年爆发的金融大丑闻使得宽特科技公司——人们向来称之为宽特技术——突然间声名扫地。
　　宽特科技这时已经是全国最大的纯工程企业，这是其传奇式创始人阿尔伯特·贝索格·宽特工程师多年苦心经营的成果。2003年之后，人们开始把宽特科技的故事当做一出两幕的道德剧。第一幕是伟大的创始人宽特的时代，被看做是道德高尚的黄金时代。第二幕是这位创始人的后继者的时代，被视为道德沦丧的时代，在这个时代的末期，宽特科技变得跟索多玛或蛾摩拉差不多。
　　这篇记录将会清楚地展示，宽特科技从好到坏的转变并不是在其创始人于1982年去世后突然发生的。1982年之后，该公司仍保留了许多好的作风，而早在1982年之前许多年，宽特科技所处的金融文化环境就已经出现严重的问题了。
　　要理解宽特科技的故事，我们最好把它当做一出经典悲剧，在剧中，只是一个漏洞就遭到了命运女神的惩罚。这个漏洞就是该国对职工股票期权的特殊会计处理。宽特科技和它的国家成了受害者。这次金融大丑闻的情节就好像是索福克勒斯笔下的悲剧。
　　在我们的故事中，宽特科技（Quant Tech）是一家虚构的工程公司，它经历了许多真实公司常见的弊端——特别是没有在会计报表中正确地反映出职工股票期权成本的致命伤。
　　1982年去世的时候，阿尔伯特·贝索格·宽特为他的继任者和造物主留下了一家非常繁荣和有为的公司。宽特科技惟一的业务是设计新型的发电厂，这种小型发电厂能够改善电力供应，而且超级清洁、超级节能，备受世界各国欢迎，给该公司带来了不菲的设计收入。
　　在1982年，宽特科技占据该行业的龙头地位，营业收入为10亿美元，而盈利高达1亿美元。它的成本主要是支付给参与设计的技术员工的薪酬。
　　直接的员工薪酬成本占到营业收入的70%。在这里面，30%是基本工资，40%是依据创始人设计的一套复杂方法计算出来的奖金。所有薪酬都以现金支付。该公司没有股票期权，因为宽特先生认为对股票期权的法定会计处理方式“软弱、腐败和令人鄙视”，他不想企业做糟糕的账目，正如他不想做糟糕的工程设计。除此之外，这位老先生还坚持严格依据业绩标准来给个人或小组发放巨额的激励性奖金，而不愿意像其他公司那样采用股票期权作为激励机制，因为他认为那种做法是不可取的。
　　然而，即使在这位老先生的制度之下，大多数把毕生心血奉献给宽特科技的员工也已经变得富裕起来，或者肯定会变得富裕起来。之所以如此，是因为那些员工和其他不在公司任职的股东一样，也从市场上购买宽特科技的股票。这位老先生向来认为，他的员工既然拥有足以设计发电厂的聪明才智和自律意识，当然会通过这种方式来好好为自己谋利。他有时候会建议员工去购买宽特科技的股票，但也就是到此为止，不会表现出更多的家长作风。
　　1940年11月7日，华盛顿州皮尤吉特河塔科马湾上第一座吊桥垮塌，原因是施工不合格，该地区常年刮大风，设计方却没有正确地考虑到这个因素的影响。当时该桥才通车几个月。
　　等到1982年他去世的时候，宽特科技完全没有债务，如果不是为了提高公司知名度，不管业务增长多快，它的运营根本就不需要股东的资金。然而，老先生相信本杰明·富兰克林的名言“空袋子很难竖起来”，他想要宽特科技巍然屹立。此外呢，他热爱他的企业和同事，总是希望手里持有大量的现金等价物，以便发生不测时有充分准备，或者遇到机会时能够抓得住。
　　所以到1982年，宽特科技持有五亿美元的现金等价物，大概是年收入的50%。
　　年的宽特科技不但拥有健康的财务报表和行之有效的企业文化，还拥有一个快速变化、快速增长的行业中的关键技术，只要继续采用老先生的方法，在未来20年，它的年均利润必定可以达到收入的10%，而年收入增长必定可以达到20%。在这20年之后，从年开始，在很长一段时间内，宽特科技的利润将会继续保持在年收入的10%，而年收入的增长速度将会下降到每年4%。但没有人能够准确地预言这段不可避免的收入增长缓慢期将会从什么时候开始。
　　老先生为宽特科技设定的利润分配制度非常简单：他从来不派红利，而是把所有利润转换成现金等价物累积起来。
　　任何有经验的股票投资者都能看到，1982年是购入拥有大量现金的宽特科技的良机，当时它的市盈率只有15，而且尽管它的前景非常好，整个公司的市值只有15亿美元。既然公司前景很好，市值为什么很低呢？这是因为在1982年，其他很棒的股票的市盈率也只有15，甚至更少，这也是因为当时的利率很高，而且持股人此前多年的投资回报率相当令人失望。
　　索福克勒斯
　　（Sophocles，公元前496年—公元前406年）
　　索福克勒斯是古希腊的编剧、剧作家、神职人员和雅典政治家，被认为是希腊的三大悲剧作家之一（其他两位是埃斯库罗斯和欧里庇得斯，他经常与这两个人展开戏剧竞赛）。索福克勒斯创作的剧本超过部，包括亚里士多德在内的许多学者认为他是古希腊戏剧史上最伟大的编剧。他的存世作品中最着名的是悲剧《俄狄浦斯王》和《安提戈涅》。
　　宽特公司在1982年的低市值造成的后果之一，就是令那些董事感到不满意，老先生刚刚去世，他们就开始蠢蠢欲动。如果这个董事会很明智，他们会利用手头所有的现金和外面借来的资金大量买进宽特科技的股票。然而，这样的决定并不符合1982年常见的企业经营智慧，所以董事会作出了常见的决策。他们从宽特科技之外聘请了新的首席执行官（CEO）和财务总监（CFO），这些人来自一家实行员工股票期权激励计划的公司，该公司市值是年报披露利润的20倍，尽管其资产负债表比宽特科技差很多，利润的增长速度也没有宽特科技那么高。宽特科技的董事们聘请这两位新的高层管理人员的意图很明确，就是希望尽快提高公司的市值。
　　宽特科技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，也很难增加宽特科技的利润率。创始人在这两方面已经做到了尽善尽美。新上任的管理层也不敢改变运作得如此之好的企业文化。因此，新管理层决定启动他们所谓的“现代金融工程术”，迅速采用各种尽管存在争议但又合法的手段以提高财务报表上的盈利，先从简单但是重大的改起。
　　命运弄人，这种让宽特科技的创始人原本极其憎恶的股票期权记账方法，现在却让新管理层的工作变得十分轻松，而且最终将会毁掉宽特科技的声望。当时美国通常的会计做法是这样的，假如先给了员工认股权，公司便可以将股票低于市场价卖给员工，折让给员工的部分就相当于现金（如果员工同时将股票以市场价格立刻卖掉的话），但在做账的时候并不用记为薪酬支出，从而不会影响年报披露的盈利。虽然这种特别奇怪的记账方法遭到某些最聪明正直的会计师的反对，但会计行业还是采纳了，因为大多数企业的管理人员不愿（会计师）将他们从行使股票期权中得到的收益算入公司成本，那样的话他们任职的公司的利润就会下降。会计行业在做出这个特别怪异的决定时竟然奉行的是那些跟优裕的资深会计师截然不同的人所奉行的准则。这项准则通常是那些食不果腹、无权无势的人遵守的：“谁给我面包吃，我就给谁唱歌。”幸运的是，税务部门并没有像会计行业那样采用这种特别怪异的记账方法。税务部门拥有基本的常识，理所当然地将行使股票期权获得的收益视为薪酬成本，在计算企业所得税的时候会把这部分减去。
　　宽特科技的新管理层精通金融业务，他们一眼就看出，只要使用这种特别怪异的记账方法，再加上完善的所得税征收制度，宽特科技会有极大的机会，只要采取非常简单的做法，就能增加其年报上披露的利润。宽特科技每年大量的成本本来就是发放给员工的激励性奖金，这为“现代金融工程术”提供了千载难逢的良机。
　　厄普顿·辛克莱
　　“让人们去理解那些跟他们的利益冲突的事情是很难的。”
　　例如，管理层可以很容易看出，如果1982年的宽特科技用行使员工股票期权得到的利润代替它那四亿美元的激励性奖金成本，同时用省下来的奖金加上员工为股票期权支付的金钱来回购所有因行使期权而增发的股份，其他一切保留不变，那么1982年宽特科技的年报披露的利润将会上涨400%，从一亿美元上涨到五亿美元，而流通股的份额仍跟原来一样！所以在管理人员看来，最正确的做法就是用员工行使股票期权的获利来取代激励性奖金。那些精于计算的工程师怎么会在意他们的奖金到底是现金还是现金等价物呢？只要管理层愿意，作出这样的替换安排似乎没有什么困难的。
　　然而，新管理层也很容易可以看出，他们在推行新把戏的时候必须小心谨慎，有所约束。很明显，如果他们在某一年推行新把戏的力度太大，那么可能会引起会计人员的抗议，或者遭到其他方面的敌视。这无异于杀死一只会下很多金蛋的鹅，至少对管理层来说是这样。毕竟，他们非常清楚地知道，他们的把戏能够增加年报披露的利润，只是因为他们把真实的盈利和伪造的盈利相加而已——因为通过这种把戏在年报上增加的盈利并不会给宽特科技带来真正的经济效应，只会带来那种临时的虚假效应（这跟虚报期末存货造成的虚假效应是一样的）。新的CEO私下把这种迷人的、谨慎的做法称为“明智的克制型造假”。
　　“正确的做法是永远别让错误的会计开始”
　　1991年，金融会计标准委员会提议将职员股票期权的部分真实成本视为支出。由于遭到企业界和国会的强烈反对，这项提案最终被大大缩水，仅仅要求公司在备注中有所披露。然而，目前美国通行的会计准则要求职员股票期权的部分真实成本在损益表中必须被记为支出。查理对此持怀疑态度：“等到股票期权被行使时，账目上记录的总成本往往比实际发生的总成本低很多。此外，那部分记到盈利下面的成本通常被故意用不正当的办法降低了。这种事情是很难杜绝的。正确的做法是永远别让错误的会计开始。”
　　显然，新管理层也认识到，用行使员工股票期权的利润来取代奖金的做法不能一蹴而就，应该在未来多年里逐渐实施。他们私下管这种谨慎的方法叫做“细水长流”计划。他们认为这个计划有四个优点：
　　第一，每年虚报一点利润，被发现的概率比虚报大量利润要低。
　　第二，虽然每年虚报的利润不多，但经过多年累积，这个“细水长流”计划将会产生巨大的长期效应，而且也不容易被人发现。那位财务总监私下恬不知耻地说：“如果我们每年只在葡萄干里掺入一点点大便，这样的话，就算最后出现了一大堆大便，可能也不会有人发现。”
　　第三，对于公司外部的会计师来说，一旦包庇过几份显示利润有增长但包含了少数造假成分的财务报表，而不包庇同样虚报利润增长的财务报表，他们可能会觉得非常难为情。
　　第四，通过实施“细水长流”计划，宽特科技的管理层可以防止丑闻或者更为严重的事情发生。
　　其他公司实施的股票期权计划比宽特科技更加大方，所以如果有人提出异议，管理层可以解释说，适当地实行员工股票期权计划有助于吸引和留住人才。实际上，考虑到这种怪异的股票期权记账方法对企业文化和股市热情的影响，这种说辞往往是正确的。
　　你们必须遵守他为这家事务所设定的原则，必须维护他的声誉。你们不能打着他的旗号去做坏事。我敢保证，如果你们不遵守他的原则，他宁愿这家事务所倒闭。他给你们留下了巨大的信誉。你们的机会很好，你们的责任也很重大。
　　——邓肯 · 利托菲尔牧师在阿瑟·安达信（上图）葬礼上的讲话1947年1月13日
　　具备上述四个优点的“细水长流”计划明显是个好方法，宽特科技的管理层现在只要决定每年增加多少虚假利润就行了。这个决定也是很容易做出的。管理层首先考虑三个他们想要满足的合理条件：
　　首先，他们希望这个“细水长流”计划能够持续不断地实施20年。
　　其次，他们希望在这20年里面，宽特科技每年披露的利润增长幅度都差不多，因为他们认为，如果宽特科技每年的年报披露的利润增长都很稳定，那些代表机构投资者的理财分析专家将会给予宽特科技的股票较高的估值。
　　第三，为了维护年报披露的利润的可信度，他们不想引起投资者的怀疑，所以即使在第20年，宽特科技从设计发电厂得到的利润率也不会高过40%。
　　确定这些要求之后，管理人员计算起来就简单了，因为他们已经估算出宽特科技的收入和盈利将会在未来20年里每年增长20%。管理人员很快决定利用他们的“细水长流”计划，让宽特科技的披露利润每年增长28%，而不是像该公司的创始人老老实实地报出20%。
　　就这样，这个“现代金融工程”大骗局逐渐将宽特科技推向悲剧的下场。人类历史上没有几个臭名昭着的大骗局能比这场骗局干得更漂亮了。根据会计师核准的年报，宽特科技的利润每年增长28%。除了少数几个公认的不切实际、过于迂腐、愤世嫉俗的怪物之外，没有人批评宽特科技的财务报表。该公司的管理层继续执行创始人从不分派红利的做法，这很大程度上维护了宽特科技年报的可信度，人们相信它每年的盈利增幅确实达到了。在那种通常破坏现实认知的巴甫洛夫联想反射效应的影响之下，认为宽特科技拥有大量现金等价物的人们万万不会想到其年报披露的部分利润竟然是伪造的。
　　庞氏骗局
　　现代金融工程术最着名的例子之一是1919年在波士顿发源的庞氏骗局。卡尔洛·“查理”·庞兹（Carlo“Charles”Ponzi）声称他有能力利用国际邮政票据套利，许诺天可获利50%，吸引了数以千计的投资者。为了建立信用，他把新投资者的钱作为利润返回给旧投资者——这是典型的金字塔骗局所用的花招。庞兹很快就募集了数百万美元的资金。1920年，《波士顿邮报》刊发文章质疑庞兹的做法，于是有关方面对庞兹展开了独立的审计。审计表明这是骗局，投资者要求退钱。到最后，平均每个投资者只收回了37%的资金，庞兹被判了几年有期徒刑。20世纪20年代末期，出狱后的庞兹死不悔改，又开始兜售佛罗里达州一些毫无价值的土地。
　　因此，在“细水长流”计划实施了几年之后，宽特科技的管理层自然想要让该公司年报披露的每股盈利继续以28%的速度增长，同时大幅度地虚报公司持有的现金等价物的增长。这种办法取得了很大的成效。等到这个时候，宽特科技公司股票的市盈率已经非常高，通过不匹配地逐步增加购股权持有量，公司管理层开始相应减少用现金支付奖金，或者相应减少回购宽特科技的股票。管理层很容易意识到，这种改变极大地完善了他们最初的计划。这不但使得他们虚报盈利的做法因现金加速增长而变得更难以察觉，而且还为宽特科技引入了庞氏骗局效应或者连锁信效应，给包括管理层在内的现有股东带来了切实的好处。
　　在这个时候，管理层还解决了最初的计划中的另一个漏洞。他们发现，由于宽特科技虚报的盈利以每年28%的利润增长，而作为税前利润的一部分，宽特科技缴纳的所得税相对税前利润税率却逐年下降。这显然会招致他们不想看到的质疑和批评。这个问题很快被消除了。外国的许多发电厂都是由政府出资兴建并归政府所有的，宽特科技很容易说服某些外国政府支付更高的设计费，只要宽特科技额外交给这些外国政府的所得税比增加的设计费多一点点就可以。
　　信任，但去证实
　　有一个好办法可以查证企业年报中披露的利润是否属实，那就是将年报中披露的好消息和该企业实际缴纳的所得税进行比较。由于管理层不愿给美国税务局看他们用来糊弄股东的注水报表，所以企业的表格中“支付所得税的现金”一栏往往更为准确、更为忠实地反映了该企业的真实盈利。
　　最后，宽特科技在2002年的年报中披露，该公司的利润为160亿美元，收入为470亿美元，包括大量由现金等价物产生的利息收入，而这些现金有相当一部分来源于这些年净增加的股份。现在宽特科技持有的现金等价物达到了惊人的850亿美元，大多数投资者认为一家拥有如此之多现金的企业每年能够赚到其年报披露的亿美元的利润也不是不可能的。在2003年，宽特科技的市值高达1400亿美元，是其2002年披露利润的90倍。
　　如果让人选择增长速度的话，所有人会选几何级数，可惜地球上的资源是有限的。
　　但是，所有人类对几何级数增长的过度追求，在一个有限的地球上，最终都以惨痛收场。
　　2003年，宽特科技在这两个方面都失败了。
　　到2003年，宽特科技的真实盈利能力只以每年的速度增长，因为公司的销售收入增长速度已经下降到4%。这时宽特科技没有办法避免让其股东——主要是机构投资者——大失所望。股东的失望使宽特科技的股票价格直线下跌，一下子跌去了50%。股票价格的暴跌反过来又促使人们重新审视宽特科技的财务报告。最后，终于人人都看清楚了，原来该公司绝大部分的利润都是伪造的，而且这种大规模的故意篡改已经持续了很多年。这导致宽特科技的股票继续狂跌，等到年年中，宽特科技的市值只剩下1400亿美元，和六个月前的高峰期相比，90%的市值蒸发了。
　　几何级数增长：与直觉背道而驰
　　为了让年轻的学生领略复利的魔力，有位教师提出了一个有趣的方案：
　　“我打算给你两个选择，但选中之后不能改变主意，所以选之前仔细考虑。第一个选择是，我每天给你1000美元，连给天，你拿到钱之后随时可以花。第二个选择是，我第一天给你一美分，第二天给你两美分，第三天给你四美分，每天给你的钱是前一天的两倍，这样持续30天，但你必须等到30天结束之后才能用这笔钱。”
　　年轻人想到连续一个月每天有1000美元可以花就很心动，他可不想一个月后口袋里只有一堆分币可以用，所以他选择了第一个。他的选择明智吗？
　　按照第一个选择，年轻人总共可以得到3万美元。按照第二个选择，复利的魔力将会使总数达到5368709.12美元。
　　这是一家非常重要的公司，从前它广受推崇，很多人都买了它的股票，所以它的股票价格暴跌了，总共有13000亿美元的市值消失了，这给人们带来了巨大的痛苦。宽特科技的丑闻败露之后，公众和政界自然把满腔怒火都发向了宽特科技，尽管这个国家最好的发电厂依然是由该公司那些值得尊敬的工程师设计的。
　　怒火并没有只烧到宽特科技就熄灭。它很快蔓延到其他公司，其中有些公司明显也犯了跟宽特科技相同的错误，只是严重程度有所不同。公众和政界的怒火就像引发它的行为那样，很快就变得不可收拾。这次金融丑闻不仅令投资者血本无归，而且还引发了严重的经济衰退，就像20世纪年代日本经济在企业界长年累月做假账之后陷入萧条那样。
　　这次大丑闻之后，公众对各种专业人士非常反感。
　　当然，遭到最多谴责的是会计专业人士。制定会计师准则的机构的缩写是“F. A. S. B”（，金融会计标准委员会），现在每个人都说这四个字母代表“”（金融会计还做假）。
　　经济学教授也遭到非议，人们责怪他们未能敲响警钟，没有提醒公众注意广泛的做假账行为将会给宏观经济带来的糟糕后果。传统经济学家是如此令人大失所望，乃至哈佛的约翰·肯尼思·加尔布雷斯获得了诺贝尔经济学奖。毕竟他曾经预言大规模的、尚未败露的公司舞弊行为将会对经济产生极大的刺激效应。人们发现2003年之前的情况跟加尔布雷斯的预测差不多，而且随后那些年里，那种情况果然导致经济陷入了大衰退。
　　下面是着名经济学家约翰·肯尼思·加尔布雷斯的名言集锦：
　　“我们都认为悲观是智力超群的标志。”
　　“美当然没有绝对的标准。所以追求美才会如此有趣。”
　　“如果你什么都不想做，那么你就去开会吧。”
　　“经济预测的惟一功能是让占星学变得令人尊敬。”
　　“现代的保守主义者从事的是道德哲学中最古老的活动，也就是说，他们要为自私寻找一个超级漂亮的道德借口。”
　　“许多美国人死于食物过多，而非死于食物太少。”
　　“当面临要么改变想法、要么证明无需这么做的选择时，绝大多数人都会忙于寻找证据。”
　　“那些走运的人总是说他们过得幸福是因为他们的道德很高尚。”
　　“难道你不明白吗，‘让一家企业停泊在废话当中，和让它驶入麻烦的思维之海比起来，是一种好得太多、太多的做法。’”
　　“有权势的人总是宁愿拿全副身家去冒险，也不肯舍弃一点利益。”
　　“在任何大型组织里面，和多数人一起错比一个人对安全得多。”
　　由于美国国会和证券交易委员会（SEC）的许多成员都是律师，而这些律师参与起草的财务披露法规现在都被视为是漏洞百出，所以每个星期都有关于“律师”的新笑话。其中有一个是这样的：“肉贩说：‘律师的声誉最近下跌了好多啊。’收银员说：‘他们的声誉本来就只有薄饼那么点，哪有好多可以跌啊。’”
　　但公众对专业人士的敌视并不仅限于会计师、经济学家和律师。许多向来洁身自好的专业人士的声誉也遭到了“池鱼之殃”，比如说工程师，他们根本就不懂得在这个国家已经泛滥成灾的金融诈骗。
　　到最后，许多对这个国家有益的、也是它未来的福祉所需的行业都遭到了广泛的、不明智的仇视。
　　这时，天庭采取了行动。目睹一切的上帝本人改变主意，决定提前审判2003年金融大丑闻这桩令人伤心的案子。他召唤来他的首席大侦探，并说：“史密斯，我要公正严明地处理这件事，你去把那些最应该为此负责的罪人带进来。”
　　但史密斯带来的是一群证券分析专家，多年以来，这些人一直为宽特科技的股票摇旗呐喊。大法官感到很不高兴。“史密斯，”他说，“我不能对低级的认知错误进行最严厉的处罚，这些错误大部分由俗世的标准激励制度引起，是在下意识的情况下发生的。”
　　接下来，史密斯带来了一群美国证券交易委员会的委员和一些位高权重的政治家。“不，不，”大法官说，“这些人受到许多令人遗憾的力量的左右，他们也是身不由己，你指望他们遵守正确的行为规范是不合理的。”
　　“他们的声誉本来就只有薄饼那么点，哪有好多可以跌啊。”
　　首席侦探这下以为他终于明白了。接着他把那些在宽特科技落实他们的“现代金融工程”的高层管理人员给抓来了。“你差不多抓对了，”大法官说，“但我要你带来的是造孽最深的罪人。这些管理人员当然会遭到严厉的处罚，因为他们作奸犯科，毁掉了那位伟大工程师的遗产。但我要你抓的是那些很快会被打入地狱最底层的混蛋，那些本来可以轻而易举地阻止这次大灾难的人。”
　　首席侦探终于真正明白了。他记得地狱最底层是为背叛者准备的。所以他现在从炼狱带来一群老人，这些人在世时曾是各大会计师事务所杰出的合伙人。“这就是你要的背叛者，”首席侦探说，“他们在处理员工股票期权时采用了错误的记账方法。他们在一个高尚的行业中身居高位，那个行业的职责和你差不多，都是通过设定正确的规则，来帮助社会正确地运转。才华出众、锦衣玉食的他们居然故意造成如此明显可预测的谎言和欺骗，真是罪无可赦。他们完全知道他们的所作所为是极其错误的，然而他们还是执迷不悟。由于司法系统受到商界的影响，你开始误将他们判得很轻。但现在你可以把他们送到地狱的最底层啦。”
　　威廉·布莱克通过各种媒介——包括素描、木刻画、版画、水彩画等——创造了《上帝审判亚当》
　　（God Judging Adam，1795年）的画面。其中一幅伟大的作品是由铅笔、墨水和水彩完成的彩色蚀刻凸版画，现藏于纽约的大都会艺术博物馆。
　　大法官被这通慷慨陈词镇住了，沉默了片刻。
　　然后他安静地说：“干得好，你是我忠诚的好仆人。”
　　我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。除了有关加尔布雷斯教授的内容，任何与真实的人物或企业雷同的情节均属巧合。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。
　　重读第八讲
　　2000年夏天，我在写这篇文章的过程中得到很多乐趣。但我很认真地想证明，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。
　　在我看来，做假账无异于在盖高层公寓楼的时候把钢筋从水泥中抽走，允许这么做的行业和国家必将学到惨痛的教训。而且假账的破坏作用比那些害死人的豆腐渣工程更大。毕竟，那些无良的建筑商很难给他们的肮脏行为找到正当的理由。因此无良的会计行为比无良的建筑行为更容易扩散。事实正是如此，股票期权的无良记账方法已经变得无处不在。
　　自从我写下这第八讲以来，情况已经有所改善。
　　目前美国的会计行业要求职员股票期权的部分真实成本在损益表中必须被记为支出。然而，等到股票期权被行使时，账目上记录的总成本往往比实际发生的总成本低很多。此外，那部分记到盈利下面的成本通常被故意用不正当的办法降低了。
　　这篇关于会计的寓言是一个令人悲伤的例子，它再次证明能给人们带来好处的罪恶很难被消除，因为大量的人认为，一件事只要能给他们带来利润，就不可能是罪恶的。
　　享乐是罪恶的最大动因。
　　——柏拉图
　　查理在加州大学圣塔巴巴拉分校发表这次演讲那天，本书的编辑连续12个小时跟他在一起。我们当天的行程是这样的：从洛杉矶驱车两个小时过去，午饭，演讲前会议，演讲，演讲后招待会，最后到甲骨文集团的财务总监（现任董事会主席）杰夫·亨利家吃饭。查理当时尽管离80岁生日只有几个月，但还是表现得像个不知疲惫的大师。他在那天表现出来的犀利、耐力和幽默令人惊叹和敬佩。
　　查理这次演讲的内容
　　

admin

  The Great Financial Scandal of 2003
　　(An Account by Charles T. Munger)
　　The great financial scandal erupted in 2003 with the sudden, deserved disgrace of Quant Technical Corporation, always called “Quant Tech”.  By this time Quant Tech was the country’s largest pure engineering firm, having become so as a consequence of the contributions of its legendary founder, engineer Albert Berzog Quant.
　　After 2003, people came to see the Quant Tech story as a sort of morality play, divided into two acts.  Act One, the era of the great founding engineer, was seen as a golden age of sound values.  Act Two, the era of the founder’s immediate successors, was seen as the age of false values with Quant Tech becoming, in the end, a sort of latter day Sodom or Gomorrah.
　　In fact, as this account will make clear, the change from good to evil did not occur all at once when Quant Tech’s founder died in 1982.  Much good continued after 1982, and serious evil had existed for many years prior to 1982 in the financial culture in which Quant Tech had to operate.
　　The Quant Tech story is best understood as a classic sort of tragedy in which a single flaw is inexorably punished by remorseless Fate.  The flaw was the country’s amazingly peculiar accounting treatment for employee stock options.  The victims were Quant Tech and its country.  The history of the Great Financial Scandal, as it actually happened, could have been written by Sophocles.
　　As his life ended in 1982, Albert Berzog Quant delivered to his successors and his Maker a wonderfully prosperous and useful company.  The sole business of Quant Tech was designing, for fees, all over the world, a novel type of super-clean and super-efficient small power plant that improved electricity generation.
　　By 1982 Quant Tech had a dominant market share in its business and was earning $100 million on revenues of $1 billion.  It’s costs were virtually all costs to compensate technical employees engaged in design work.  Direct employee compensation cost amounted to 70% of revenues.  Of this 70%, 30% was base salaries and 40% was incentive bonuses being paid out under an elaborate system designed by the founder.  All compensation was paid in cash.  There were no stock options because the old man had considered the accounting treatment required for stock options to be “weak, corrupt and contemptible,” and he no more wanted bad accounting in his business than he wanted bad engineering.  Moreover, the old man believed in tailoring his huge incentive bonuses to precise performance standards established for individuals or small groups, instead of allowing what he considered undesirable compensation outcomes, both high and low, such as he believed occurred under other companies’ stock option plans.
　　Yet, even under the old man’s system, most of Quant Tech’s devoted longtime employees were becoming rich, or sure to get rich.  This was happening because the employees were buying Quant Tech stock in the market, just like non-employee shareholders.  The old man had always figured that people smart enough, and self-disciplined enough, to design power plants could reasonably be expected to take care of their own financial affairs in this way.  He would sometimes advise an employee to buy Quant Tech stock, but more paternalistic than that he would not become.
　　By the time the founder died in 1982, 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.  However, the old man believed with Ben Franklin that “it is hard for an empty sack to stand upright,” and he wanted Quant Tech to stand upright.  Moreover, 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.  And so in 1982 Quant Tech had on hand $500 million in cash equivalents, amounting to 50% of revenues.
　　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, Quant Tech, using the old man’s methods, by 1982 was destined for 20 years ahead to maintain profits at 10% of revenues while revenues increased at 20% per year.  After this 20 years, commencing in 2003, Quant Tech’s profit margin would hold for a very long time at 10% while revenue growth would slow down to 4% per year.  But no one at Quant Tech knew precisely when its inevitable period of slow revenue growth would begin.
　　The old man’s dividend policy for Quant Tech was simplicity itself: He never paid a dividend.  Instead, all earnings simply piled up in cash equivalents.
　　Every truly sophisticated investor in common stocks could see that the stock of cash-rich Quant Tech provided a splendid investment opportunity in 1982 when it sold at a mere 15 times earnings and, despite its brilliant prospects, had a market capitalization of only $1.5 billion.  This low market capitalization, despite brilliant prospects, existed in 1982 because other wonderful common stocks were also then selling at 15 times earnings, or less, as a natural consequence of high interest rates then prevailing plus disappointing investment returns that had occurred over many previous years for holders of typical diversified portfolios of common stocks.
　　One result of Quant Tech’s low market capitalization in 1982 was that it made Quant Tech’s directors uneasy and dissatisfied right after the old man’s death.  A wiser board would then have bought in Quant Tech’s stock very aggressively, using up all cash on hand and also borrowing funds to use in the same way.  However, such a decision was not in accord with conventional corporate wisdom in 1982.  And so the directors made a conventional decision.  They recruited a new CEO and CFO from outside Quant Tech, in particular from a company that then had a conventional stock option plan for employees and also possessed a market capitalization at 20 times reported earnings, even though its balance sheet was weaker than Quant Tech’s and its earnings were growing more slowly than earnings at Quant Tech.  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.
　　The newly installed Quant Tech officers quickly realized that the company could not wisely either drive its revenues up at an annual rate higher than the rate in place or increase Quant Tech profit margin.  The founder had plainly achieved an optimum in each case.  Nor did the new officers dare tinker with an engineering culture that was working so well.  Therefore, 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.
　　By a strange irony of fate, the accounting convention for stock options that had so displeased Quant Tech’s founder now made the new officers’ job very easy and would ultimately ruin Quant Tech’s reputation.  There was now an accounting convention in the United States that, provided employees were first given options, required that when easily marketable stock was issued to employees at a below-market price, the bargain element for the employees, although roughly equivalent to cash, could not count as compensation expense in determining a company’s reported profits.  This amazingly peculiar accounting convention had been selected by the accounting profession, over the objection of some of its wisest and most ethical members, because corporate managers, by and large, preferred that their gains from exercising options covering their employers’ stock not be counted as expense in determining their employers’ earnings.  The accounting profession, in making its amazingly peculiar decision, had simply followed the injunction so often followed by persons quite different from prosperous, entrenched accountants.  The injunction was that normally followed by insecure and powerless people:  “His bread I eat, his song I sing.”  Fortunately, the income tax authorities did not have the same amazingly peculiar accounting idea as the accounting profession.  Elementary common sense prevailed, and the bargain element in stock option exercises was treated as an obvious compensation expense, deductible in determining income for tax purposes.
　　Quant Tech’s new officers, financially shrewd as they were, could see at a glance that , given the amazingly peculiar accounting convention and the sound income-tax rules in place, Quant Tech had a breathtakingly large opportunity to increase its reported profits by taking very simple action.  The fact that so large a share of Quant Tech’s annual expense was incentive bonus expense provided a “modern financial engineering” opportunity second to none.
　　For instance, it was mere child’s play for the executives to realize that if in 1982 Quant Tech had substituted employee stock option exercise profits for all its incentive bonus expense of $400 million, while using bonus money saved, plus option prices paid, to buy back all shares issued in option exercises and keeping all else the same, the result would have been to drive Quant Tech 1982 reported earnings up by 400% to $500 million from $100 million while shares outstanding remained exactly the same!  And so it seemed that the obviously correct ploy for the officers was to start substituting employee stock option exercise profits for incentive bonuses.  Why should a group of numerate engineers care whether their bonuses were in cash of virtually perfect equivalents of cash?  Arranging such substitutions, on any schedule desired, seemed like no difficult chore.
　　However, it was also mere child’s play for the new officers to realize that a certain amount of caution and restraint would be desirable in pushing their new ploy.  Obviously, if they pushed their new ploy too hard in any single year there might be rebellion from Quant Tech’s accountants or undesirable hostility from other sources.  This, in turn, would risk killing a goose with a vast ability to deliver golden eggs, at least to the officers.  After all, it was quite clear that their ploy would be increasing reported earnings only by adding to real earnings an element of phony earnings – phony in the sense that Quant Tech would enjoy no true favorable economic effect (except temporary fraud-type effect similar to that from overcounting closing inventory) from that part of reported earnings increases attributable to use of the ploy.  The new CEO privately called the desirable, cautious approach “wisely restrained falsehood”.
　　Plainly, the new officers saw, it would be prudent to shift bonus payments to employee stock option exercise profits in only a moderate amount per year over many years ahead.  They privately called the prudent plan they adopted their “dollop by dollop system” which they believed had four obvious advantages:
　　           First, a moderate dollop of phony earnings in any single year would be less likely to be noticed than a large dollop.
　　           Second, the large long-term effect from accumulating many moderate dollops of phony earnings over the years would also tend to be obscured in the “dollop by dollop system.”  As the CFO pithily and privately said: “If we mix only a moderate minority share of turds with the raisins each year, probably no one will recognize what will ultimately become a very large collection of turds.”
　　           Third, the outside accountants, once they had blessed a few financial statements containing earnings increases only a minority share of which were phony, would probably find it unendurably embarrassing not to bless new financial statements containing only the same phony proportion of reported earnings increase.
　　           Fourth, the “dollop by dollop system” would tend to prevent disgrace, or something more seriously harmful, for Quant Tech’s officers.  With virtually all corporations except Quant Tech having ever-more-liberal stock option plans, the officers could always explain that a moderate dollop of shift toward compensation in option-exercise form was needed to help attract or retain employees.  Indeed, given corporate culture and stock market enthusiasm likely to exist as a consequence of the strange accounting convention for stock options, this claim would often be true.
　　With these four advantages, the “dollop by dollop system” seemed so clearly desirable that it only remained for Quant Tech’s officers to decide how big to make their annual dollops of phony earnings.  This decision, too, turned out to be easy.  The officers first decided upon three reasonable conditions they wanted satisfied:
　　           First, they wanted to be able to continue their “dollop by dollop system” without major discontinuities for 20 years.
　　           Second, they wanted Quant Tech’s reported earnings to go up by roughly the same percentage each year throughout the whole 20 years because they believed that financial analysts, representing institutional investors, would value Quant Tech’s stock higher if reported annual earnings growth never significantly varied.
　　           Third, to protect credibility for reported earnings, they never wanted to strain credulity of investors by reporting, even in their 20th year, that Quant Tech was earning more than 40% of revenues from designing power plants.
　　With these requirements, the math was easy, given the officers assumption that Quant Tech’s non-phony earnings and revenues were both going to grow at 20% per year for 20 years.  The officers quickly decided to use their “dollop by dollop system” to make Quant Tech’s reported earnings increase by 28% per year instead of the 20% that would have been reported by the founder.
　　And so the great scheme of “modern financial engineering” went forward toward tragedy at Quant Tech.  And few disreputable schemes of man have ever worked better in achieving what was attempted.  Quant Tech’s reported earnings, certified by its accountants, increased regularly at 28% per year.  No one criticized Quant Tech’s financial reporting except a few people widely regarded as impractical, overly theoretical, misanthropic cranks.  It turned out that the founder’s policy of never paying dividends, which was continued, greatly helped in preserving credibility for Quant Tech’s reports that its earnings were rising steadily at 28% per year.  With cash equivalents on hand so remarkably high, the Pavlovian mere-association effects that so often impair reality recognition served well to prevent detection of the phony element in reported earnings.
　　It was therefore natural, after the “dollop by dollop system” had been in place for a few years, for Quant Tech’s officers to yearn to have Quant Tech’s reported earnings per share keep going up at 28% per year while cash equivalents grew much faster than they were then growing.  This turned out to be a snap.  By this time, Quant Tech’s stock was selling at a huge multiple of reported earnings, and the officers simply started causing some incremental stock-option exercises that were not matched either by reductions in cash bonuses paid or by repurchases of Quant Tech’s stock.  This change, the officers easily recognized, was a very helpful revision of their original plan.  Not only was detection of the phony element in reported earnings made much more difficult as cash accumulation greatly accelerated, but also a significant amount of Ponzi-scheme or chain-letter effect was being introduced into Quant Tech, with real benefits for present shareholders, including the officers.
　　At this time the officers also fixed another flaw in their original plan.  They saw that as Quant Tech’s reported earnings, containing an increasing phony element, kept rising at 28%, Quant Tech’s income taxes as a percentage of reported pre-tax earnings kept going lower and lower.  This plainly increased chances for causing undesired questions and criticism.  This problem was soon eliminated.  Many power plants in foreign nations were built and owned by governments, and it proved easy to get some foreign governments to raise Quant Tech’s design fees, provided that in each case slightly more than the fee increase was paid back in additional income taxes to the foreign government concerned.
　　Finally, for 2002, Quant Tech reported $16 billion in earnings on $47 billion of revenues that now included a lot more revenue from interest on cash equivalents than would have been present without net issuances of new stock over the years.  Cash equivalents on hand now amounted to an astounding $85 billion, and somehow it didn’t seem impossible to most investors that a company virtually drowning in so much cash could be earning the $16 billion it was reporting.  The market capitalization of Quant Tech at its peak early in 2003 became $1.4 trillion, about 90 times earnings reported for 2002.
　　However, all man’s desired geometric progressions, if a high rate of growth is chosen, at last come to grief on a finite earth.  And the social system for man on earth is fair enough, eventually, that almost all massive cheating ends in disgrace.  And in 2003 Quant Tech failed in both ways.
　　By 2003, Quant Tech’s real earning power was growing at only 4% per year after sales growth had slowed to 4%.  There was now no way for Quant Tech to escape causing a big disappointment for its shareholders, now largely consisting of institutional investors.  This disappointment triggered a shocking decline in the price of Quant Tech stock which went down suddenly by 50%.  This price decline, in turn, triggered a careful examination of Quant Tech’s financial reporting practices which, at long last, convinced nearly everyone that a very large majority of Quant Tech’s reported earnings had long been phony earnings and that massive and deliberate misreporting had gone on for a great many years.  This triggered even more price decline for Quant Tech stock until in mid-2003 the market capitalization of Quant Tech was only $140 billion, down 90% from its peak only six months earlier.
　　A quick 90% decline in the price of the stock of such an important company, that was previously so widely owned and admired, caused immense human suffering, considering the $1.3 trillion in market value that had disappeared.  And naturally, with Quant Tech’s deserved disgrace, the public and political reaction included intense hatred and revulsion directed at Quant Tech, even though its admirable engineers were still designing the nation’s best power plants.
　　Moreover, the hatred and revulsion did not stop with Quant Tech.  It soon spread to other corporations, some of which plainly had undesirable financial cultures different from Quant Tech’s only in degree.  The public and political hatred, like the behavior that had caused it, soon went to gross excess and fed upon itself.  Financial misery spread far beyond investors into a serious recession like that of Japan in the 1990s following the long period of false Japanese accounting.
　　There was huge public antipathy to professions following the Great Scandal.  The accounting profession, of course, got the most blame.  The rule-making body for accountants had long borne the acronym “F.A.S.B.”  And now nearly everyone said this stood for “Financial Accounts Still Bogus”.
　　Economics professors likewise drew much criticism for failing to blow the whistle on false accounting and for not sufficiently warning about eventual bad macroeconomic effects of widespread false accounting.  So great was the disappointment with conventional economists that Harvard’s John Kenneth Galbraith received the Nobel Prize in economics.  After all, he had once predicted that massive, undetected corporate embezzlement would have a wonderfully stimulating effect on the economy.  And people could now see that something very close to what Galbraith had predicted had actually happened in the years preceding 2003 and had thereafter helped create a big, reactive recession.
　　With Congress and the S.E.C. so heavily peopled by lawyers, and with lawyers having been so heavily involved in drafting financial disclosure documents now seen as bogus, there was a new “lawyer” joke every week.  One such was:  “The butcher says ‘the reputation of lawyers has fallen dramatically’, and the check-out clerk replies: “How do you fall dramatically off a pancake?’”
　　But the hostility to established professions did not stop with accountants, economists and lawyers.  There were many adverse “rub-off” effects on reputations of professionals that had always performed well, like engineers who did not understand the financial fraud that their country had made not a permissible option but a legal requirement.
　　In the end, much that was good about the country, and needed for its future felicity, was widely and unwisely hated.
　　At this point, action came from a Higher Realm.  God himself, who reviews all, changed His decision schedule to bring to the fore the sad case of the Great Financial Scandal of 2003.  He called in his chief detective and said, “Smith, bring in for harsh but fair judgment the most depraved of those responsible for this horrible outcome.”
　　But when Smith brought in a group of security analysts who had long and uncritically touted the stock of Quant Tech, the Great Judge was displeased.  “Smith,” he said, “I can’t come down hardest on low-level cognitive error, much of it subconsciously caused by the standard incentive systems of the world.”
　　Next, Smith brought in a group of S.E.C. Commissioners and powerful politicians.  “No, no,” said the Great Judge, “These people operate in a virtual maelstrom of regrettable forces and can’t reasonably be expected to meet the behavioral standard you seek to impose.”
　　Now the chief detective thought he had gotten the point. He next brought in the corporate officers who had practiced their version of “modern financial engineering” at Quant Tech.  “You are getting close,” said the Great Judge, “but I told you to bring in the most depraved.  These officers will, of course, get strong punishment for their massive fraud and disgusting stewardship of the great engineer’s legacy.  But I want you to bring in the miscreants who will soon be in the lowest circle in Hell, the ones who so easily could have prevented all this calamity.”
　　At last the chief detective truly understood.  He remembered that the lowest circle of Hell was reserved for traitors.  And so he now brought in from Purgatory a group of elderly persons who, in their days on earth, had been prominent partners in major accounting firms.  “Here are your traitors,” said the chief detective.  “They adopted the false accounting convention for employee stock options.  They occupied high positions in one of the noblest professions, which, like Yours, helps make society work right by laying down the right rules.  They were very smart and securely placed, and it is inexcusable that they deliberately caused all this lying and cheating that was so obviously predictable.  They well knew what they were doing was disastrously wrong, yet they did it anyway.  Owing to press of business in Your Judicial System, you made a mistake at first in punishing them so lightly.  But now you can send them into the lowest circle in Hell.”
　　Startled by the vehemence and presumption, the Great Judge paused.  Then He quietly said:  “Well done, my good and faithful servant.”
　　                                   ----------------------------------------------------
　　This account is not an implied prediction about 2003.  It is a work of fiction.  Except in the case of Professor Galbraith, any resemblances to real persons or companies is accidental.  It was written in an attempt to focus possibly useful attention on certain modern behaviors and belief systems.