我們以自我為中心
畫出一個圓來生活

在我還什麼都不曉得的時候
生命仍兀自地運行

所以
還有什麼蹉跎光陰的理由

Except for special cases (for example, companies with unusual debt-
equity ratios or those with important assets carried at unrealistic balance
sheet values), we believe a more appropriate measure of managerial
economic performance to be return on equity capital. In 1977 our operating
earnings on beginning equity capital amounted to 19%, slightly better than
last year and above both our own long-term average and that of American
industry in aggregate. But, while our operating earnings per share were up
37% from the year before, our beginning capital was up 24%, making the gain
in earnings per share considerably less impressive than it might appear at
first glance.

除非是特殊的情況(比如說負債比例特別高或是帳上持有重大資產未予重估)，否則我
們認為「股東權益報酬率」應該是衡量管理當局表現比較合理的指標，1997年我們期
初股東權益的報酬率約為19%，這比去年同期稍微好一點，但遠高於本身過去長期以
及當年美國企業整體的平均數，所以雖然我們每股的盈餘成長了37%，但由於期初的
資本也增加了34%，這使得我們實際的表現並沒有想像中那麼好。

We expect difficulty in matching our 1977 rate of return during the
forthcoming year. Beginning equity capital is up 23% from a year ago, and
we expect the trend of insurance underwriting profit margins to turn down
well before the end of the year. Nevertheless, we expect a reasonably good
year and our present estimate, subject to the usual caveats regarding the
frailties of forecasts, is that operating earnings will improve somewhat on a
per share basis during 1978.

我們預期未來年度將很難再達到1977年這樣的報酬率水準，一方面是因為期初資本
又增加了23%，一方面我們預期保險核保利潤率會在年底以前開始反轉，盡管如此，
大家還是可以期待豐收的一年，而我們現在的估計是，雖然預測有其先天上的限制，
我認為每股營業利益在1978年應該還有些許成長的空間。