Renowned American investor Jim Rogers has attracted global attention with his prediction that gold prices will fall to $900 an ounce. His words carry weight not just because of his years in the industry, but because two years ago the retired hedge fund manager, who co-founded the Quantum Fund with George Soros, correctly said that gold – then hitting peak prices – would drop to $1,200 an ounce.
著名的美国投资者吉姆•罗杰斯(Jim Rogers)因其有关黄金价格将跌至每盎司900美元的预测吸引了全世界的注意力。他的讲话具有市场影响力不仅仅是由于他深厚的行业历练，还因为两年前这名退休的对冲基金经理（他曾与乔治•索罗斯(George Soros)共同创立量子基金(Quantum Fund)）成功地预测到了当时涨至峰值的黄金价格将跌至每盎司1200美元。
Gold, he repeatedly warns, is not a mystical commodity and its real bottom will not be reached until those investors who think it cannot fall have all left the market.
他不断地警告称，黄金并不是一种神秘的商品，只有当那些认为黄金价格不会下跌的投资者全部退出市场以后，金价才有可能真正触底。
Mr Rogers is on a mission to convince the investment world to look seriously at agriculture. He explains to Elaine Moore why he thinks it will be a source of profit for years to come.
罗杰斯力图说服投资界认真考察农业领域。他向伊莱恩•摩尔(Elaine Moore)解释了自己为何认为农业在未来几年将成为一大投资收益来源。
Why do you think gold prices are going to keep falling?
问：你为何认为黄金价格将持续下跌？
Gold has gone up 12 years in a row, which is terribly unusual for any asset, so it would be an anomaly if there was not a correction.
答：黄金价格已经持续上涨了12年，这对任何一种资产来说都是极其罕见的，因此市场若不出现一次回调的话将会非常反常。
I am terrible at market timing but I expect gold to go down 50 per cent from its peak, which would take it to about $900. I’m not selling gold at the moment but if it falls or if it gets down there, then I hope I will be smart enough to buy more.
我并不善于找准市场时点，但我预计黄金价格相对于其峰值将下跌50%，也就是说跌至约每盎司900美元的水平。现阶段我并没有卖出黄金，但如果黄金价格下跌或者跌至上述水平，那我希望自己到时能够足够明智地购买更多黄金。
Why does gold attract so much attention?
问：为什么黄金会引发如此强烈的关注？
I can’t tell you why, but I always have the same experience. When I speak at investment events there is always someone asking about gold. I’d rather talk about agriculture.
答：我无法告诉你原因何在，但我对此有着切身感受。当我在投资界的活动上发言时，总会有人问起黄金。而我更愿意谈谈农业。
What do you want to say about agriculture?
问：关于农业你想谈些什么？
I think there is more money to be made in agriculture. I don’t think we’ve had the final bottom in gold but we must be nearing it in sugar. Sugar is down 75 per cent from its all-time high – there’s not much in the world that’s down 75 per cent.
答：我认为农业领域更具获利前景。我认为黄金价格还没有跌至终极低点，但蔗糖价格已经接近底部。蔗糖价格相对于其历史最高水平已经下跌了75%——世界上很少有什么资产的价格跌幅达到了75%。
I think that farming is going to become one of the most exciting professions in the next 20 years. The average age of a farmer in the US is 58, in Korea it’s 65. It is an old profession and the people in it are dying out or retiring. In the US, more people study public relations than agriculture.
我认为，农业将成为未来20年中最激动人心的职业发展领域之一。目前美国农民的平均年龄为58岁，韩国则为65岁。农业是一个老龄化的行业，从业者要么临近退休，要么衰老死去。在美国，学习公共关系的人比学习农业的人更多。
The world is facing a serious demographic and production problem. If something doesn’t change then we won’t have food at any price. Prices will have to go up a lot to attract labour and the Food and Agriculture Organisation has tried to get people to see this crisis. They see what I see. What more do you need to know?
目前全球面临着严峻的人口结构及粮食生产问题。如果不做出改变，那么无论支付怎样的高价，我们也买不到粮食。粮食价格必须大幅上涨才能吸引到进行生产所需的劳动力，联合国粮农组织(UN Food and Agriculture Organisation)为使人们认识到这场危机做出了努力。他们已经看到了我所看到的问题。你还需要再知道些什么呢？
People blame it on speculators but it isn’t about them – it’s about the fact that inventories are now at the lowest they’ve been in recorded history and even though we have had good crops in the past decade, production cannot keep up with demand. In the past if we had problems with the weather, then we had huge inventories. But now we don’t have inventories and we don’t have farmers.
人们把粮食涨价的责任归咎于农产品投机者，但问题并不是由他们造成的——问题的根源在于，农产品储备量现已跌至历史低点，虽然近十年来我们的粮食收成不错，但产出跟不上需求的增长。过去如果我们遇到了天气问题，我们尚且有大规模的粮食储备应急。而现在我们既缺乏粮食储备，又缺少种粮的农民。
Why isn’t there more interest in this sector?
问：为什么对农业感兴趣的人不多？
We’ve had long cycles where the financial sector was in charge, followed by times when the people who make things were in charge. We’re at a midpoint now.
答：我们经历了金融行业占主导地位的长周期，随后又经历了制造业人士引领潮流的时期。现在我们正处于一个中间点。
When I was at college [Mr Rogers was born in 1942] people used to talk about the City and Wall Street as backwaters. Now the kids at Oxford all want to start hedge funds. But the fundamentals have changed so much. There is so much competition in finance and banking in the rest of the world, we have gigantic leverage in the industry and now every government is coming down hard against financial types. I think finance is going to be a terrible place to be for the next 10, 20, 30 years.
当我还在大学读书的时候（罗杰斯生于1942年），人们习惯于将伦敦金融城以及华尔街称为死水一样的落后地方。现如今，牛津大学(Oxford University)的学生们都想要成立对冲基金。但这个行业的基本状况已经发生了很大变化。世界其他地区的金融与银行业竞争非常激烈，行业内的杠杆水平很高，并且现在每个国家的政府都在严加管束金融业人士。我认为在未来的10年、20年甚至30年中，金融都将是一个糟糕的职业方向。
You set up the RICI [Rogers International Commodity Index] in the late 1990s, how are you investing in agriculture?
问：你在二十世纪九十年代晚期创立了罗杰斯国际商品指数(Rogers International Commodity Index)，你在农业领域是如何进行投资的呢？
I mainly buy agricultural products – farms. I buy publicly traded farms in Australia and Indonesia and Africa. But you can invest in tractors and fertilisers and seeds – there are lots of ways into this.
答：我主要购买的是农产品——还有农场。我在澳大利亚、印度尼西亚以及非洲收购公开交易的农场。你也可以投资于拖拉机、肥料以及种子——有很多投资农业领域的途径。
What else are you currently investing in?
问：目前你还投资于其他哪些领域？
Well, apart from agriculture I’m looking at the US dollar because there will be more currency turmoil in the future and I think a lot of people are going to flee to the US dollar as a haven. The Chinese currency will also continue to be strong, and sugar, which I’ve mentioned. I’m also buying shares in airlines and I’m looking at Russia, which I’ve been pessimistic about since 1966, but which I’m now changing my views on.
答：除了农业以外，我还关注美元走势，因为未来汇率市场还将出现更多的动荡，而我认为将有很多人大规模买入美元作为避险资产。人民币汇率也将继续走强，还有我之前提过的蔗糖。此外我还购买航空公司的股票，并关注俄罗斯局势，自从1966年以来我对该国一直持悲观态度，但我正在调整自己的这一观点。
What are your views on passive investment?
问：你对被动投资模式怎么看？
There are plenty of studies that show that index investing outperforms 80 per cent of active managers, so passive investing is the best way for most investors. If you are a good stock picker then, sure, do that, but the evidence is so strong that basically most people should use passive investments.
答：大量研究显示，指数化投资的收益高于80%的主动型投资经理。因此被动投资对于绝大多数投资者而言是最佳选择。如果你善于挑选股票，那么你当然可以这么做，但相关研究证据极具说服力地表明，基本上，大多数人都应采用被动投资。