James Anderson，蘇格蘭抵押貸款投資信托公司的經理，給我們分析了關於阿裡巴巴這個令人興奮的公司崛起的經驗。
去年，我寫了一篇讨論亞馬遜公司對於投資者以及世界經濟發展的重要性文章。我認為，從公司的早期變革階段到成熟階段全面的認識一個公司對於投資 成功十分關鍵。
這些非凡贏家的回報遠高於普通公司的振蕩回報以及那些預測日内市場走勢的大標題盈利要高得多，即使成功的公司也有很多艱難時刻。
但是，最誘人的是如何找到最具有發展潛力的公司。他們的出現不是隨機的，他們是得利於所屬領域、地理條件以及最重要的一點，管理哲學。一年前，我就預測下一個全國性的公司會是阿裡巴巴。去年我們秋季中期報告中顯示，蘇格蘭抵押公司擁有價值0.44億歐元的阿裡巴巴股份。一年之後，同樣的持股，價值達到了1.48億歐元。今天，阿裡巴巴市值達到2500億美元，高於英國石油公司以及葛蘭素史克公司的總和。
但這是找到潛在的未來的巨人,是最誘人的。他們的出現不是隨機的。他們由部門集中,地理,尤其是管理哲學。一年前,我建議下一個巨大的全球性公司阿裡巴巴。蘇格蘭擁有抵押貸款作為非上市股權投資。這是價值£4400萬在我們去年秋季中期報告。一年後同樣的持有價值£1.48億。今天阿裡巴巴本身享有的市值約為2500億美元——或者更比英國石油公司和葛蘭素史克的總和。
阿裡巴巴顯示出了許多大公司共有的特性，正如托爾斯泰的歷史名言“所有幸福的家庭都是相似的”，企業也同樣如此。它們與那些將我們指數視為垃圾的公司截然相反。它們有具有遠見的投資者：如果沒有馬雲，阿裡巴巴是無法想像的。他是中國首富，但更重要的是，作為一個追夢者，他在杭州總部成功推翻了美國的電子上午壟斷地位，成功地說服了17位質疑他的朋友。而這17位朋友仍然掌控著阿裡，這或許會令許多人震驚，但是我們卻為此感到高興。因為他們的投入要遠比那些沒有耐心的基金資本主義經理多得多。因為，阿裡巴巴像許多大企業一樣，它不註重短期盈利以及關於股東價值的謠言。
馬雲說道：“客戶第一，員工第二，股東第三。”他的雄心基本上是無限的。許多投資者會選擇回避這類野心。相反，我們認為一旦任何一家公司的最終規模被公佈、定義之後，人們對於它的前景就會失去興趣。阿裡巴巴已經進入到一個人們無法想像的領域。中國的金融都已受到它的影響。
阿裡巴巴是中國企業轉型的原因和標志。中國的工業化，噴薄濃煙的鋼鐵廠以及政黨的意識形態正在被創新性的，轉型的，潛在的不受控制的私人巨頭所取代。阿裡巴巴的年度市場訂單6月份之前就達到145億，它每年仍然以50%的速度增長。它的銷售量大於亞馬遜以及ebay的總和。中國現在不是模仿，而是跳躍式前進。作為互聯網公司，阿裡巴巴，騰訊，百度市值已位於世界前10。中國的東部沿海是走在世界資本主義前沿的美國西海岸的唯一競争對手。這樣看來，Mark Zuckerberg自學漢語就不奇怪了。
最終，美國的西北海岸以及中國的東南沿海的大公司驚人的相似。除了他們相似的思維模式之外，他們也給世界帶來了巨大的挑戰。作為投資者，我們需要適應那些對資本或上市需求少的公司。阿裡巴巴和facebook一樣，都是作為了一家私人公司實現了其主導地位。在首次官方交易時，其價值就高達2億美金。國企以及私企之間的界限正在迅速變得模糊。遺憾的是，個人投資者很難利用這一點進行交易。
全球的競争格局將會被這個野心勃勃的競争對手所主導。它們的發展壯大會讓金融與知識界震驚，傳統的、保守的企業管理前景將會變得暗淡。如果我們認為它們的影響僅局限於一些次要的、不幸的金融公司的話，那麼我們這是在自欺欺人。目前為止，它已經影響了零售商以及報紙行業，並正在開始破壞大公司的運作模式。貪婪的銀行業在這次變革中幸免，但是他們註定會被阿裡巴巴以及騰訊的優勢吞噬。對於英國石油公司和葛蘭素史克來說，它們的業務現在或許只是阿裡巴巴的一半，但是未來有可能會更糟。
隨著大的科技公司超越電子以及電子商務的狹窄界限，商業世界開始分離。如果Elon Musk能夠證明電動汽車以及太陽能是經濟發展的未來，如果Illumina公司的基因排序取得長足進展並顯示藥物對於我們健康僅有微小的作用，那麼關於什麼是安全的市價指數在未來將會給我們帶來很多痛苦。這將發生在google挽救死亡命運的計劃之前。
Alibaba and Chinese lessons
James Anderson, manager of the Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust, gives us an insight into the rise of Alibaba and the lessons that can be learnt from this exciting company
Last year I wrote an article discussing the significance of Amazon for investors and the global economy. I argued that identifying transformative companies at a very early stage and owning them through to maturity is central to investment success.
the returns from such extraordinary winners can far outweigh the oscillations of normal companies or the headlines blaring of daily market movements. this requires endurance. even great companies have trying times.
But it is finding the potential giants of the future that is most alluring. their occurrence is not random. they are concentrated by sector, geography and especially management philosophy. I suggested a year ago that the next great global company was Alibaba. scottish Mortgage owned a stake as an unquoted investment. It was valued at £44 million in our Interim report last autumn. A year later the same holding was worth £148 million. today Alibaba itself enjoys a market capitalisation of around $250 billion – or a bit more than Bp and Glaxo combined.
Alibaba displays characteristics that are sufficiently common amongst great companies as to suggest that tolstoy’s aphorism that ‘All happy families are alike’ has a corporate equivalent. they look not at all like the unhappy companies that litter our indices. they have founders with vision. Alibaba is unimaginable without Jack Ma. he is now China’s richest man but more significantly the dreamer who convinced 17 questioning friends that he could overthrow Us e-commerce dominance from his hangzhou apartment. that these partners still control the firm horrifies many but delights us. far better their commitment than the impatience of fund manager capitalism. for, as at almost all great companies, Alibaba pays little attention to immediate earnings prospects or the mantras of shareholder value.
As Ma remarks: “Customers first, employees second, and shareholders third.” his aspirations are almost boundless. Many investors fight shy of such ambition. Instead we believe that once the ultimate scale of any business is known and defined then it is of little interest to the forward-looking. Already Alibaba has moved into territory it once could not imagine. Chinese finance is already reeling from its attacks.
Alibaba is both cause and symbol of the transformation of China. the imagined China of forced industrialisation, of belching steel plants and party ideology is being superseded by innovative, transformative and potentially uncontrollable private juggernauts. Alibaba’s marketplace generated 14.5 billion orders in the year to June. the company is still growing 50% year on year. Its sales volumes are bigger than those of Amazon and eBay combined. China is not imitating but leaping ahead. Alibaba, tencent and Baidu are well ensconced amongst the world’s top 10 internet companies by capitalisation. the east coast of China is the only global rival to the West coast of America as the cutting edge of global capitalism. It is no wonder that Mark Zuckerberg has taught himself to speak Mandarin.
Ultimately the great companies of north West America and south-east China are shockingly similar. Beyond their parallel mental models they bring huge challenges to the world. As investors we have to become accustomed to companies that have little need of capital or of public quotation. Alibaba, like facebook, built its dominance as a private company. By the time of its first official trade it was valued at over $200 billion. the boundary between public and private is blurring rapidly. sadly this is hard
for individual investors to negotiate.
the global competitive landscape will be dominated by this breed of super-ambitious competitors. As they expand and flex muscles that are now intimidating in financial and intellectual scale, the prospects of traditional, conservative managerial behemoths will dim. We fool ourselves if we believe that their threats will be confined to some unfortunate but peripheral internet casualties. What up until now has affected retailers and newspapers is just starting to undermine the business models of our largest companies. the greed of bankers has survived the crash but their businesses may not survive the advances demonstrated by Alibaba and tencent. for Bp and Glaxo it may be demeaning that they are now half the size of Alibaba but their future may be much worse.
As the ambitions and ethos of the great technology companies move beyond narrow electronics and e-commerce, then the business world will be ripped apart. If elon Musk proves that electric cars and solar energy are the economic future, if Illumina’s exponential improvements in genomic sequencing show up how little of the current drugs industry is beneficial to our health, then there is much pain ahead for what is said to be safe and secure in our market indices. And that is before Google’s planned solution to death.
本文翻譯由兄弟財經提供
文章來源：http://www.dianomi.com/img/uploads/VOs2ScCoyKkAAETAy58AAAAT.pdf