原文节选自Seth发给投资人的年报。虽然讲的是二级市场，但是由于金融市场本质是个价值和行为交互左右的市场，很多观点对一级市场也很有借鉴意义。金融危机的教训，有些是新的，有些是过去几十年不断重复的，但是投资者要么没有学习，要么很快就忘记了。
One might have expected that the near-death experience of most investors in 2008 would generate valuable lessons for the future. We all know about the “depression mentality” of our parents and grandparents who lived through the Great Depression. Memories of tough times colored their behavior for more than a generation, leading to limited risk taking and a sustainable base for healthy growth. Yet one year after the 2008 collapse, investors have returned to shockingly speculative behavior. One state investment board recently adopted a plan to leverage its portfolio – specifically its government and high-grade bond holdings – in an amount that could grow to 20% of its assets over the next three years. No one who was paying attention in 2008 would possibly think this is a good idea.
人们或许以为2008年多数投资者频临死亡的体验会为未来提供一些宝贵的经验教训。我们都知道我们的父母和祖父母经历过大萧条以后的“抑郁心态”。艰难时代的记忆笼罩了他们一辈子，导致他们不会过度冒险，从而为健康成长打下了可持续发展的基础。然而，2008年大崩溃才一年后，投资者就恢复了令人震惊的投机行为。一个州的投资委员会最近计划使用杠杆购买投资组合 - 特别是政府和高等级债券 - 未来三年计划把杠杆加到其资产的20%。对研究过2008年的人来讲，没人会觉得这是一个好主意。
Below, we highlight the lessons that we believe could and should have been learned from the turmoil of 2008. Some of them are unique to the 2008 melt- down; others, which could have been drawn from general market observation over the past several decades, were certainly reinforced last year. Shockingly, virtually all of these lessons were either never learned or else were immediately forgotten by most market participants.
下面，我们总结一下2008年的金融危机中我们认为我们已经或者应该学的的教训。这些教训，有的是这次危机所独有的，另外一些，虽然从过去几十年的市场观察中已经得出过，在这次的危机里，又被强化了。令人震惊的是，对于大部分的市场参与者而言，几乎所有的这些经验教训，要么从来没都没学过，要么就很快忘记了。
Twenty Investment Lessons of 2008 2008年的二十条投资教训
1. Things that have never happened before are bound to occur with some regularity. You must always be prepared for the unexpected, including sudden, sharp downward swings in markets and the economy. Whatever adverse scenario you can contemplate, reality can be far worse.
以前从未发生过的事情，未来会不时的发生。你必须永远准备迎接意外，包括市场和经济突然急剧下滑。无论你考虑到了什么坏情况，现实可能坏很多倍。
2. When excesses such as lax lending standards become widespread and persist for some time, people are lulled into a false sense of security, creating an even more dangerous situation. In some cases, excesses migrate beyond regional or national borders, raising the ante for investors and governments. These excesses will eventually end, triggering a crisis at least in proportion to the degree of the excesses. Correlations between asset classes may be surprisingly high when leverage rapidly unwinds.
当过度的情况，比如宽松的贷款标准，广泛而持续存在，人们会形成错误的安全感，从而造成更加危险的局面。在某些情况下，过度的情况可能会超越区域或国界，增加投资者和政府的挑战。过度的情况终将结束，就会引发至少同等严重程度的危机。当杠杆快速去除的时候，资产类别之间的相关性会达到非常高。（译者注：这就是为什么金融危机的时候，所有的资产价格都下跌，可以读读why genius failed）
3. No where does it say that investors should strive to make every last dollar of potential profit; consideration of risk must never take a backseat to return. Conservative positioning entering a crisis is crucial: it enables one to maintain long-term oriented, clear thinking, and to focus on new opportunities while others are distracted or even forced to sell. Portfolio hedges must be in place before a crisis hits. One cannot reliably or affordably increase or replace hedges that are rolling off during a financial crisis.
投资人没有必要把桌上的最后一分钱都挣到。风险的考量应该和回报放到同等的位置上。进入危机的时候，保守的定位至关重要：它使投资人可以面向长期，清醒思考，并且当他人精力分散或被迫抛售的时候专注新的投资机会。危机到来之前，投资组合必须要有对冲。在危机中，你很难找到或付得起对冲的价格。
4. Risk is not inherent in an investment; it is always relative to the price paid. Uncertainty is not the same as risk. Indeed, when great uncertainty – such as in the fall of 2008 – drives securities prices to especially low levels, they often become less risky investments.
风险并不是投资中固有的，它总是和付出的价格相关。不确定性和风险是不一样的。事实上，当巨大的不确定性 - 如在2008年秋季 - 把股票的价格压到很低的时候，它们成为更低风险的投资。
5. Do not trust financial market risk models. Reality is always too complex to be accurately modeled. Attention to risk must be a 24/7/365 obsession, with people – not computers – assessing and reassessing the risk environment in real time. Despite the predilection of some analysts to model the financial markets using sophisticated mathematics, the markets are governed by behavioral science, not physical science.
不要相信金融市场的风险模型。现实总是太复杂，无法精确建模。风险监控必须全天候的关注，用人 - 而不是计算机 - 评估和重新评估实时的风险环境。尽管一些分析师偏好使用复杂的数学对金融市场建模，但是市场受行为科学支配，而不是物理科学。
6. Do not accept principal risk while investing short-term cash: the greedy effort to earn a few extra basis points of yield inevitably leads to the incurrence of greater risk, which increases the likelihood of losses and severe illiquidity at precisely the moment when cash is needed to cover expenses, to meet commitments, or to make compelling long-term investments.
当短期的现金用于投资的时候，不要接受大的风险：多挣几个基点的贪婪总是不可避免的导致更大风险的发生，从而让你在需要现金去支付费用或满足承诺或准备投资可靠的长期机会的时候，增大了你亏损的可能或遭遇严重的流动性问题。
7. The latest trade of a security creates a dangerous illusion that its market price approximates its true value. This mirage is especially dangerous during periods of market exuberance. The concept of “private market value” as an anchor to the proper valuation of a business can also be greatly skewed during ebullient times and should always be considered with a healthy degree of skepticism.
股票的最后一笔交易总是给人一个危险的的错觉：它的市场价格接近其真实价值。这个幻想在市场繁荣的时候尤其危险。 繁荣时期，“私有市场价值”这个概念，作为业务正常估值的锚，也可能被极大的扭曲，所以也需要对它保持足够的怀疑。
8. A broad and flexible investment approach is essential during a crisis. Opportunities can be vast, ephemeral, and dispersed through various sectors and markets. Rigid silos can be an enormous disadvantage at such times.
危机当中，广泛而灵活的投资方式是必不可少的。机会可能巨大而短暂，并且分布在不同的行业和市场。僵硬的呆在一个地方会成为巨大的劣势。
9. You must buy on the way down. There is far more volume on the way down than on the way back up, and far less competition among buyers. It is almost always better to be too early than too late, but you must be prepared for price markdowns on what you buy.
你必须在一路下跌的时候购买。下跌的时候，市场上的量要比上涨的时候多得多，而且买家竞争也少。买的早几乎总是好过买的晚，但是你必须对价格继续下跌做好心理准备。
10. Financial innovation can be highly dangerous, though almost no one will tell you this. New financial products are typically created for sunny days and are almost never stress-tested for stormy weather. Securitization is an area that almost perfectly fits this description; markets for securitized assets such as subprime mortgages completely collapsed in 2008 and have not fully recovered. Ironically, the government is eager to restore the securitization markets back to their pre-collapse stature.
金融创新常常是非常危险的，但几乎没有人会告诉你这一点。新的金融产品通常是为了晴天生产的，几乎从未经受过暴风雨天气的压力测试。证券化领域，是这个描述的完美演绎。证券化市场比如次级抵押贷在在2008年彻底崩溃了，到现在也没有恢复过来。讽刺的是，政府急于把证券化市场恢复到崩溃前的体量。
11. Ratings agencies are highly conflicted, unimaginative dupes. They are blissfully unaware of adverse selection and moral hazard. Investors should never trust them.
评级机构是利益矛盾体，是没有想象力的被愚弄对象。他们对逆向选择和道德风险一无所知还自以为是。投资者最好永远不要相信他们。
12. Be sure that you are well compensated for illiquidity – especially illiquidity without control – because it can create particularly high opportunity costs.
确保你为非流动性获得足够的补偿 - 尤其是不收控制的非流动性 - 因为它会造成极高的机会成本。
13. At equal returns, public investments are generally superior to private investments not only because they are more liquid but also because amidst distress, public markets are more likely than private ones to offer attractive opportunities to average down.
在同等的回报情况下，公开市场投资通常优于私有市场投资，因为公开市场的流动性更好，并且在危机中的时候， 公开市场可以提供有吸引力的投资机会从而提升回报。
14. Beware leverage in all its forms. Borrowers – individual, corporate, or government – should always match fund their liabilities against the duration of their assets. Borrowers must always remember that capital markets can be extremely fickle, and that it is never safe to assume a maturing loan can be rolled over. Even if you are unleveraged, the leverage employed by others can drive dramatic price and valuation swings; sudden unavailability of leverage in the economy may trigger an economic downturn.
警惕一切形式的杠杆。借款人 - 不管个人、企业或政府 - 应该始终让负债和他们的资产的久期匹配。借款人永远要记住，资本市场是极度的变幻无常的，千万不要以为到期的贷款可以继续被结转。即使你没有使用杠杆，别人所使用的杠杆也可以让价格和估值发生剧烈的波动。经济中，杠杆突然消失会引发引发经济衰退。
15. Many LBOs are man-made disasters. When the price paid is excessive, the equity portion of an LBO is really an out-of-the-money call option. Many fiduciaries placed large amounts of the capital under their stewardship into such options in 2006 and 2007.
许多杠杆收购是人为的灾难。当付出的价格过高，杠杆收购中的股权部分就变成了已经亏损的看涨期权。2006和2007年的时候，很多基金管理人把他们管理的大量资本买进了这种期权。
16. Financial stocks are particularly risky. Banking, in particular, is a highly lever- aged, extremely competitive, and challenging business. A major European bank recently announced the goal of achieving a 20% return on equity (ROE) within several years. Unfortunately, ROE is highly dependent on absolute yields, yield spreads, maintaining adequate loan loss reserves, and the amount of leverage used. What is the bank's management to do if it cannot readily get to 20%? Leverage up? Hold riskier assets? Ignore the risk of loss? In some ways, for a major financial institution even to have a ROE goal is to court disaster.
金融股票是特别危险的。银行是一个高度使用杠杆、竞争非常激烈和具有挑战的业务。一个欧洲的大银行最近宣布要在几年内实现20％的ROE。不幸的是，净资产收益率（ROE)高度依赖于绝对收益率、收益率差、充足的贷款损失准备金和杠杆的使用。如果银行的管理层不能实现20%的ROE怎么办？提高杠杆？持有高风险资产？对亏损风险视而不见？在某些方面，对于大型金融机构，设立一个ROE目标是惹火烧身。
17. Having clients with a long-term orientation is crucial. Nothing else is as important to the success of an investment firm.
拥有长期导向的客户至关重要的。对投资机构而言，没有什么比这一条更重要。
18. When a government official says a problem has been “contained,” pay no attention.
当一名政府官员说，问题已经得到了控制，不要真相信。
19. The government – the ultimate short- term-oriented player – cannot with- stand much pain in the economy or the financial markets. Bailouts and rescues are likely to occur, though not with sufficient predictability for investors to comfortably take advantage. The government will take enormous risks in such interventions, especially if the expenses can be conveniently deferred to the future. Some of the price-tag is in the form of back- stops and guarantees, whose cost is almost impossible to determine.
政府是极度短期导向的玩家，承受不了经济或金融市场多大的痛苦。紧急救助和救援都可能发生，但对于投资者而言，不可预测，也没法有效利用。进行这样的干预，政府会承担巨大的风险，尤其是如果该费用可以方便地被推迟到未来。一些干预是以后台支持或担保的形式发生的，其成本几乎不可能确定。
20. Almost no one will accept responsibility for his or her role in precipitating a crisis: not leveraged speculators, not willfully blind leaders of financial institutions, and certainly not regulators, government officials, ratings agencies or politicians.
几乎没有人会承认他或她在制造危机中的起的作用：杠杆投机者不会，金融机构任意妄为的管理层不会，监管者、政府官员、评级机构或政治家当然也不会。
愉悦资本，从摩拜单车到蔚来汽车，等待你的NEXT BIG！
