Warren Buffett: 'American magic' will spur US economic recovery
[AFP]
Christophe VOGT
May 2, 2020 6park.com
【简介】尽管无法可靠地预测米国企业什么时候能够恢复正常，消费者何时会恢复以前的购买习惯，老巴说：第一季度的挫折是“暂时的”。
    巴菲特在一篇关于美国经济历史的长篇演讲中说：我们过去面临过巨大的问题，虽然没有遇到过眼下这种问题，—— 事实上，我们并没有真正面对过任何与“疫情”非常相似的问题。但是，“当我们面临着更棘手的问题的时候，美国奇迹，美国魔法（American miracles, American magic）一直占上风，它将再次取胜。”
    “比起我们在1789年，我们的国家现在更好，是一个令人难以置信的更富裕的国家，...我们还有很长的路要走，但我们是一直朝着正确的方向前进着，”他提到了废除奴隶制和妇女选举权。
    “永远不要做空美国（Never bet against America）”。


(FILES) In this file photo taken May 4, 2019, Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, speaks in Omaha, Nebraska; the celebrated investor ranked as the world's fourth richest man, said he had made a mistake by investing in  the four biggest US airlines, including Southwest (AFP Photo/Johannes EISELE)
Washington (AFP) - Billionaire investor Warren Buffet said Saturday he's confident the US economy will bounce back from its pummeling by the coronavirus pandemic because "American magic has always prevailed." 6park.com
The 89-year-old made the sanguine prediction about the world's largest economy as his holding company Berkshire Hathaway reported first-quarter net losses of nearly $50 billion. 6park.com
Buffett also announced Saturday that his company had sold all its stakes in four major US airlines last month, as the pandemic clobbered the travel industry. 6park.com
"It turns out I was wrong," he said of his acquisitions of 10 percent stakes in American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines and United Airlines. 6park.com
Berkshire Hathaway had paid $7 billion to $8 billion, and "we did not take out anything like that," he said. 6park.com
Between the purchases that took place over months, and the sale, "the airlines business I think changed in a very major way" and could no longer meet Berkshire criteria for profitability, he said. 6park.com
Buffett's announcement may further hurt airlines already pushed to the brink by coronavirus lockdown measures, now looking to the US government for $25 billion in relief funds. 6park.com
- 'American miracles, American magic' - 6park.com
Berkshire Hathaway, based in Omaha, Nebraska, called its first-quarter setback "temporary" but said it could not reliably predict when its many businesses would return to normal or when consumers would resume their former buying habits. 6park.com
"We've faced great problems in the past, haven't faced this exact problem -- in fact we haven't really faced anything that quite resembles this problem," Buffett said in a lengthy speech on the country's economic history. 6park.com
"But we faced tougher problems, and the American miracles, American magic has always prevailed and it will do so again." 6park.com
"We are now a better country, as well as an incredibly more wealthy country, than we were in 1789... We got a long ways to go but we moved in the right direction," he said, referencing the abolition of slavery and women's suffrage. 6park.com
"Never bet against America." 6park.com
Buffett is considered one of the savviest investors anywhere. His fortune of $72 billion is the fourth-largest in the world, according to Forbes, and in normal years, the company's annual gathering in Omaha is a high-point of the calendar for investors, a "Woodstock for capitalists." 6park.com
But the devastating economic impact of the pandemic has hit hard at Berkshire Hathaway's wide range of investments, and the need for social distancing forced it to hold the annual meeting online. 6park.com
Buffett addressed his shareholders in a livestream flanked only by Gregory Abel, who is in charge of Berkshire's non-insurance operations. 6park.com
His business partner for six decades, 96-year-old Charlie Munger, did not appear. 6park.com
- Growth by one measure - 6park.com
Buffett, in a statement, played down his company's bleak-looking net figure. He said a better measure of the company's performance was its operating earnings, which exclude investments and are less subject to sharp fluctuations. 6park.com
By that measure, Berkshire Hathaway saw growth to $5.9 billion from $5.55 billion a year earlier. 6park.com
The brutal drop in the net -- to a loss of $49.75 billion from a profit last year of $21.7 billion -- resulted primarily from the virus-related decline in value of its broad investment portfolio, which ranges from energy to transport to insurance and technology. 6park.com
The annual meeting often has an almost carnival atmosphere, as thousands of fans and investors flock to Nebraska to hear from the celebrated "Oracle of Omaha." Buffett, famous for his relatively modest lifestyle, turns 90 on August 30. 6park.com
In documents filed Saturday, Berkshire noted that until mid-March many of its companies were posting "comparative revenue and earnings increases" over the same 2019 period. 6park.com
Many of its companies -- including in rail transport, energy production and some manufacturing and service businesses -- are deemed essential and are able to continue working amid the far-reaching confinement orders. 6park.com
But their turnover slowed considerably in April, the company statement said. 6park.com
Moves taken by those companies such as employee furloughs, salary cuts and reductions, and capital spending reductions are "necessary actions" and "temporary," it said. 6park.com