安然

但毫无疑问，InterNorth 是更大的公司，但很明显，Lay 和 HNG 的人将从那时起主导大局。

But, definitely, InterNorth was the bigger company, but it was clear that Lay and the HNG guys were gonna be running the show from

从那时起。

then on.

是的。

Yeah.

我认为贝萨妮·麦克莱恩是这样描述的：InterNorth 几乎被耍了，他们知道付出了高价，但也知道必须拿下。

I think that Bethany McLean sort of puts it in this way where it's almost like InterNorth got hoodwinked where they knew they were paying a lot, but they knew it was important to get.

但当他们用几个月后的眼光重新审视这笔交易时，他们意识到：等等。

But then once they started looking at the deal with a couple of months of retrospect, they were like, wait a minute.

我们给了 HNG 很多董事会席位，他们的高管对合并后的公司产生了巨大影响。

We gave HNG a lot of board seats, and their executives are having a lot of influence on the combined company.

等等。

And wait a minute.

我们刚刚把公司拱手让人了。

We just gave away the company.

是的。

Yes.

具体来说，这种文化冲突体现在新公司的总部将设在哪里的问题上。

And specifically, this culture clash manifests in the question of where the headquarters for this new company is gonna be.

原来的InterNorth管理团队和董事会成员当然希望公司留在奥马哈，而且所有董事会成员都在奥马哈拥有广泛的政治人脉。

The old InterNorth management team and board members, they, of course, wanna keep the company in Omaha, and all the board members are sort of politically connected in Omaha.

他们认为：我们不希望公司搬到休斯顿这样的大城市，把这么多工作机会从奥马哈带走。

They're like, we don't want this company moving to the big city of Houston, taking all these jobs out of Omaha.

公司留在这里非常重要。

It's important that the company stays here.

而莱伊当然非常善于政治运作。

And Lay, of course, he's very political.

他非常圆滑。

He's very diplomatic.

他愿意说些合适的话来安抚董事会，但他根本不想搬到奥马哈。

He's sort of willing to say the right things to appease the board, but he has no interest in moving to Omaha.

他就在休斯顿这个大城市里。

Like, he's in the big city in Houston.

他是业界的重要人物。

He's a player in the industry.

他现在是个得克萨斯石油大亨。

He's now a Texas oil man.

他想留在休斯顿。

He wants to stay in Houston.

是的。

Yeah.

为了说得更清楚一点，InterNorth拥有一项极其宝贵的有形资产。

And to be super clear here, Inter North had a ridiculously valuable hard asset.

这引述自贝桑妮的书。

This is now quoting from Bethany's book.

在其两万英里的管道网络中，有一项真正的珍宝。

Among its 20,000 miles of pipeline was a genuine prize.

北方天然公司，这条主要的南北向管线将德克萨斯州的天然气输送到爱荷华州、明尼苏达州以及中西部大部分地区。

Northern Natural, the major North South line feeding gas from Texas into Iowa, Minnesota, and much of the rest of the Midwest.

所以，这是恩隆一方在交易中占得上风的首个例子，尽管交易另一方拥有的是一项对终端用户和客户具有可量化价值的真正有形资产。

So this is sort of the first example of someone in Enron land getting the better part of an economic deal, even though on the other side of the deal, there's a real hard asset that has quantifiable value for end users, for customers.

是的。

Yeah.

最终，正如我们将看到的，他们甚至不再关心这一点。

Eventually, as we'll see, they give up on even caring about that.

没错。

Yes.

所以，正如我们所说，这两家公司的文化冲突体现在总部选址上。

So like we're saying, this culture clash between the two companies manifests itself in the headquarters location.

那么他们做了什么？

So what do they do?

他们采取了任何管理团队和公司在向董事会证明自身决策时都会采取的做法。

They do what any management team and company would do when you're trying to justify your decision to the board.

他们聘请了麦肯锡公司。

They hire McKinsey and Company.

我的意思是，这种事你根本编不出来。

I mean, you can't make this stuff up.

你绝对编不出这种事。

You totally can't make this side.

这成为整个故事中至关重要的关键点。

This becomes completely freaking key to the story.

没有总部研究，就没有恩罗特。

Like, no headquarters study, no Enron.

因为这项任务被交到了麦肯锡休斯顿办公室一位年轻、才华横溢的初级合伙人手中，他就是杰弗里·斯金格，他在哈佛商学院毕业后加入麦肯锡，当时是贝克学者，也就是全班前5%的顶尖学生。

Because the desk on which this assignment lands is a young hotshot superstar junior partner at McKinsey in the Houston office, one Jeffrey Skilling, who had joined McKinsey after Harvard Business School where he was a baker scholar, you know, top 5% of the class.

而且据我所知，他在那里名声相当显赫。

And famously, I think he had quite the reputation there.

我觉得他很乐意到处讲这个故事。

I think he was happy to broadcast this story.

他能进入是因为哈佛商学院的院长在一次休斯顿之行中面试了他。

He got in because the, dean of Harvard Business School interviewed him on a trip to Houston.

我认为当时斯金林刚从南卫理公会大学毕业，在休斯顿工作，院长问他是否聪明，斯金林回答说：‘我他妈的很聪明。’

I think Skilling was working in Houston at the time he'd graduated from SMU, And the dean interviewed him and asked him if he was smart, and Skilling replied to the dean, I'm effing smart.

但他并没有用 exactly 这些词来说。

And he didn't say it in exactly those words.

这是一档适合家庭收听的播客。

It's a family friendly podcast.

你知道，我们可不是杰夫·斯金林。

You know, we're not Jeff Skilling.

不过我们确实会直接说出斯金林后来说的一些脏话，因为这对故事至关重要。

Although we will actually say the words of some profanity that Skilling utters later because it is absolutely key to the story.

斯金林前往奥马哈向董事会汇报他的发现，结论是公司显然应该设在休斯顿。

Skilling shows up in Omaha to present to the board his findings, which is that obviously the company should be in Houston.

撇开所有政治博弈不谈，当时世界上最大的管道公司总部设在休斯顿而非奥马哈，这完全合情合理。

Even all the political wrangling aside, it makes sense that the largest pipeline company in the world at that point in time should be based in Houston, not in Omaha.

这里我们需要说清楚。

And we should be clear here.

当时天然气正经历一件有趣的事，它被普遍视为正面角色。

There's this interesting thing going on at the time with natural gas where it's sort of perceived as the good guy.

你已经开始看到美国人对肮脏的大石油和煤炭产业的不满，而天然气——此前一直被视为开采原油时无用的副产品——也受到了牵连。

And you're already starting to see this American ire toward the dirty big oil and coal and natural gas, which is, of course, a previously thought to be useless byproduct of extracting crude oil.

你知道，你可以用它来生产汽油。

You know, you can make gasoline out of it.

可以从原油中制造出这么多出色的产品。

Can make all this great stuff out of crude oil.

而天然气则不同，它直到后来才因大量科学发现而展现出用途，比如我们现在或过去许多人用它来为家庭供暖。

And then there's this natural gas, which didn't have great use cases until lots of scientific discoveries and reasons why we all use it to heat our homes now or or many people used to heat their homes.

但它当时被视为一种近乎清洁的新能源前沿领域，因此许多能源行业的人希望投身其中。

But it was viewed as this sort of, like, next great frontier of pseudo clean energy, and so it was a place where a lot of people in the energy business wanted to be going.

是的。

Yes.

哦，这个观点太棒了。

Oh, such a good point.

很高兴你在这里停了一下，我们应该稍微讨论一下。

I'm glad you paused here, and we should discuss a little bit.

天然气有很多优势。

Natural gas had lots of things going for it.

一个是环保方面的，你知道的，比石油更清洁，诸如此类。

One was sort of the environmental, you know, cleaner than oil, you know, all that.

第二个是，它确实是能源行业中最早得到足够放松管制的领域，因此可以在此基础上做些有趣的事情。

Two was that certainly it was the first part of the energy industry to be deregulated enough that you could do interesting things with it.

但第三点，我认为在美国，对天然气最有利的推动力是，你提到石油开始有了肮脏的负面形象。

But three, I think probably the biggest tailwind in its favor in America was, you know, you said oil had started to develop this sort of dirty connotation.

我认为这很大程度上是因为欧佩克和石油禁运。

I think a lot of that was because of OPEC and the oil embargoes.

就像，美国依赖着这些外国石油。

Like, here's this foreign oil that America's dependent on.

我的意思是，直到今天，政客们还在竞选时大谈特谈要减少对外国石油的依赖，诸如此类的话。

I mean, even to this day, like, you know, how much are politicians campaigning on, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, blah blah blah blah blah.

你知道的吧？

You know?

是的。

Yeah.

这一切都要追溯到上世纪七十年代。

All goes back to the nineteen seventies.

没错。

Yep.

对。

Yeah.

有趣的是，天然气在当时人们对电力的认知中，扮演了类似的角色。

It's interesting how, natural gas was the sort of electric power of its day in terms of perception.

它是八十年代的特斯拉。

It was the Tesla of the nineteen eighties.

不是

Not

更不用说还有许多其他连锁效应了。

to mention there's all these just phenomenal other knock on effects to it.

等等。

Wait.

你知道，你可以通过管道输送它。

You know, you can pipeline it.

你可以把它运到任何地方。

You move it all over the place.

你可以很容易地储存它。

You can store it really easily.

因此，你可以以超高密度的方式储存大量能源，以便在某个地方不需要时，却能在另一个地方使用。

So you can store lots of energy in a super dense way in case you don't need it in one place, but you do need it in another.

它具有这些绝佳的天然特性，不仅对终端消费者非常有用，而且随着放松管制的到来，它也成为自由市场经济中极具价值的资产。

It has these great sort of natural properties that make it not only really useful for the end consumer, but as this deregulation is coming in, it makes it a great asset to use in your free market enterprise.

好了，各位听众。

Alright, listeners.

现在是时候感谢我们非常兴奋的新朋友——Sierra了。

Now is a great time to thank a new friend of the show that we are very excited about, Sierra.

是的。

Yes.

我们非常高兴能与Brett、Clay以及他们那里的整个团队合作。

We are thrilled to be working with Brett, Clay, and the entire team over there.

那我们为什么对Sierra感到兴奋呢？

So why are we excited about Sierra?

嗯，多年来我们制作《Acquired》节目学到的一点是，一家优秀公司往往由其客户体验所定义。

Well, one of the things that we've learned from making Acquired over the years is that a great company is often defined by its customer experience.

没错。

Yep.

但要做到优秀很难。

But being great is hard.

与客户沟通成本很高。

Talking to customers is expensive.

虽然网站和应用程序很不错，但它们有点慢且笨重，客户还得花时间学习如何使用。

And while websites and apps are great, they're also kinda slow and clunky, and your customers have to learn them.

是客户在适应你，而不是你在适应客户。

They don't learn you.

Sierra 改变了这一切。

Sierra changes all that.

他们打造了面向客户的AI代理，能够完成各种惊人的任务，比如帮人找到理想的房子、挑选电视节目、办理房贷、配送沙发、退鞋、为患者进行医疗认证、订购信用卡、阻止订阅用户取消服务，等等。

They build customer facing AI agents that can do an insane range of things, like finding the perfect home or picking TV shows or originating mortgages, shipping a sofa, returning shoes, authenticating patients for health care, ordering credit cards, saving subscribers from canceling, and on and on.

自创立以来的短短两年内，Sierra 已成为领先的对话式AI平台，众多杰出企业如ADT、Clear、Minted、Ramp、Redfin、Rocket Mortgage、Safelite、SiriusXM和Wayfair都信赖Sierra来提升客户体验。

In just two years since founding, they've become the leading conversational AI platform with hundreds of incredible companies like ADT, Clear, Minted, Ramp, Redfin, Rocket Mortgage, Safelite, SiriusXM, and Wayfair, all trusting Sierra for their customer experiences.

Sierra 的设计足以满足财富500强企业的需求，包括医疗和金融服务等高度监管的行业，但它同样非常适合任何企业，包括你的公司。

Sierra was built to be powerful enough for Fortune 500 companies, including heavily regulated industries like health care and financial services, but it really works great for any business including yours.

借助Sierra，你只需构建一次AI代理，几周内就能在电话、聊天、短信、WhatsApp、邮件等多种渠道上部署，并支持30多种语言。

With Sierra, you can build your AI agent once and deploy it everywhere within weeks on the phone, in chat, SMS, WhatsApp, email, all in over 30 languages.

你甚至可以将其发布到 ChatGPT。

You can even publish it to ChatGPT.

凭借他们独特且极具针对性的成果导向定价模式，你只需为 Sierra 带来的价值付费——包括提升客户满意度和问题解决率、降低成本以及增加收入。

And with their unique and insanely aligned outcomes based pricing model, you only pay for the value that Sierra delivers, increased customer satisfaction and resolution rates, lower costs, and higher revenue.

Sierra 让全球优秀企业每天每时每刻都能展现出最佳状态。

Sierra enables the great companies of the world to show up at their best consistently every minute of every day.

事实上，我们对 Sierra 的评价如此之高，以至于大卫和我都投资了这家公司。

And in fact, we think so highly of Sierra that David and I even invested in the company.

要了解如何利用 AI 构建更出色、更人性化的人机交互体验，请访问 sierra.ai/acquired，并告知他们 Ben 和 David 推荐了你。

To find out how you can build better, more human customer experiences with AI, visit sierra.ai/acquired and tell them that Ben and David sent you.

好的。

Okay.

那么回到那个关键的 HNG 内北区董事会会议，地点在奥马哈，我想那应该是 1985 年或 1986 年。

So back to this fateful HNG inner north board meeting in Omaha in, I think this is now 1986, 1985 or 1986.

斯金林，这位才华横溢的麦肯锡顾问，正坐在等候室里，准备向管理层和董事会做汇报，这时前任 CEO——合并后排名第二的李——走出来告诉斯金林，他将继续留任，因为他刚刚被董事会解雇了，而李已经策划了一场政变，现在自己成为了公司的 CEO。

Skilling, the hotshot McKinsey consultant, is sitting there in the waiting room, getting ready to go present to management and the board when the prior CEO, the number one member, Lei is number two after the merger, walks out and informs Skilling that he's gonna keep on going because he has just been fired by the board, and Lei has engineered the coup that Lei is now the CEO of the company.

所以这次董事会会议上，总部讨论的时间其实并不多。

So, there don't really have much time for the headquarters discussion in this board meeting.

而他们有的那点时间，董事会直接说：不行。

And what time they do have, The board is like, no.

显然，我们会把总部留在奥马哈，而且莱伊是个极其老练的政治家。

Obviously, we're keeping it in Omaha and, you know, Lay's the consummate politician.

他深知不能得寸进尺。

He knows better than to press his luck.

他已经得到了自己想要的东西。

Like, he just got what he wanted.

他不会在这次董事会上跟新董事会起冲突。

He's not gonna fight with his new board at this board meeting.

对于肯·莱来说，直到最后，我认为他从未在公开或半公开场合说过任何具有对抗性或惹恼别人的话。

To the very end for Ken Lay, I don't think he ever said anything in a public or pseudo public context that was confrontational or pissed anybody off.

直到最后的时刻。

To the very bitter end.

所以总部搬迁的事并没有在这次会议上发生。

So the headquarters move does not happen at that meeting.

但不久之后确实发生了，而正是在这时，斯金格和雷首次见面。

It does happen shortly thereafter, but this is where Skilling and Lei meet for the first time.

董事会会议结束后，雷以他典型的政客方式出场了。

And, Lei comes out in his very, you know, sort of politician manner after the board meeting is over.

他向斯金格为所有的纷争道歉。

He apologizes to Skilling for all the drama.

他说，你知道的，我读过你关于这项研究的工作。

He says, you know, look, I've read your work on the study.

你做得真的非常出色。

You really did an excellent excellent job.

我非常希望继续与你和麦肯锡保持合作关系。

Like, I would love to keep the relationship going with you and McKinsey.

这家合并后的公司还有很多工作要做。

We're gonna have a lot of work to do at this combined company.

我希望你成为我们在休斯顿的麦肯锡合作伙伴，负责为我们领导一系列战略举措。

I want you to be our McKinsey partner back in Houston who's gonna lead a whole bunch of strategic initiatives for us.

好的。

Yes.

所以，这一切开始了。

So it begins.

是的，这一切开始了。

And so it begins.

现在莱伊已经安顿下来了。

So Lay's now settled in.

他掌权了。

He's in charge.

他是董事长。

He's the chairman.

他是首席执行官。

He's the CEO.

他决定要给这家公司换个新名字，你知道的，HNG Inter North 听起来太老派了，而且充满了他前任的影子。

And he decides that he wants to get a new name for this company, you know, HNG Inter North that, you know, it sounds too old and, you know, it's reeking of his predecessor.

确实，这些能源公司的名字都糟糕透顶。

And it is true that all these energy companies have just the worst names.

我的意思是，全是些毫无意义的前缀和后缀，比如 co、corp、inter，听起来就像个办公室空间，Intertek。

I mean, it's all these, like, completely meaningless prefixes and suffixes, like co and corp and inter, and it's like an office space, Intertek.

它们都叫得像那样。

They're all named something like that.

是的。

Yes.

也许这正是现代命名时代的开端，因为他们会聘请昂贵的命名和品牌顾问。

Well, maybe this is the beginning of the modern era of that because they go and they hire very expensive naming and branding consultants.

标志其实是后来才出现的，甚至几年后，保罗·兰德才设计了安然的标志。

The logo would actually come a little later, but including a few years later, Paul Rand would design Enron logo.

这将是那位传奇人物设计的最后一个标志，天哪。

This would be the last logo that the legendary Oh, man.

兰德在去世前设计了它。

Rand designed before he died.

他当然设计了IBM标志和Next标志。

He, of course, designed the IBM logo, the Next.

Next标志，还有UPS标志之类的。

Next logo, the UPS logo maybe.

他的风格非常鲜明。

And he very much has his style.

比如，当你看到IBM标志或者Next标志，你知道，史蒂夫·乔布斯的Next，还有Enron的标志。

Like, you think the IBM logo or if you know the Next logo, you know, Steve Jobs is next, like, at the Enron logo.

它们都属于同一种风格。

Like, they're all kinda in the same style.

ABC、耶鲁大学出版社、西屋电气。

ABC, Yale Press, Westinghouse.

哦，西屋电气。

Oh, Westinghouse.

是的

Yeah.

我祖父曾在西屋电气工作。

My grandfather worked for Westinghouse.

真的吗？

Really?

是的

Yeah.

传奇人物。

Legendary.

恩龙标志是他去世前设计的最后一个标志。

Enron would be the last logo he designed before he died.

哎哟。

Oof.

多么伟大的遗产啊。

What a legacy.

于是，命名顾问们与保罗分开，为公司想出了一个绝妙的新名字。

So the naming consultants separate from Paul, they come up with a brilliant new idea for the company.

他们想把它命名为Enteron。

They want to name it Enteron.

差不多了。

Almost.

差不多了。

Almost.

雷非常喜欢。

Lei loves it.

雷喜欢它。

Lei loves Lei loves it.

大家都非常兴奋。

Everybody's so excited.

他们公布了这个名字。

They announce the name.

这个名字是一个混成词，n e n代表能量，t e r则是对Inter North的致敬。

And the name comes from it's a portmanteau, n e n for energy, t e r as a nod to inter north.

把那种传承感重新带回来。

Get that, you know, legacy back in there.

最后加上去，因为听起来酷且现代。

And then on at the end because it sounds cool and modern.

Enteron。

Enteron.

于是他们公布了这个名字。

So they announced it.

但他们没有去查字典，因为enteron实际上是一个医学术语。

They didn't check though in the dictionary because enteron is actually a medical term.

它是一个词。

It is a word.

这是一个医学术语。

It is a medical term.

这个词源自希腊语，意思是活体生物的肠道消化道，尤其用于胚胎。

It comes from a Greek word, and it means the intestinal digestive tract of a living creature and is particularly used for embryos.

比如，胚胎的消化道就叫enteron。

So like the digestive tract of embryos is an enteron.

所以，他们因此在媒体上遭到抨击，莱伊太在意形象了，简直要疯了。

So, they kinda get pilloried in the press for this Lei, he's so concerned about appearances, and he goes nuts.

但在这整个故事中，我们会看到莱伊从未失去冷静。

Lei never loses his cool as we'll see throughout this story.

比如，他在这里确实失控了。

Like, he loses his cool here.

他完全暴怒，冲着命名顾问大喊大叫。

He, like, goes completely ballistic, yelling at the naming consultants.

所有人都要求他们重新做研究，改掉这个名字。

Everybody demands that they do another study, change it.

于是他们回来提议：如果我们去掉‘ter’，直接缩短为Enron呢？莱伊大概会很喜欢，因为他会说，对，我就讨厌那些家伙。

And so they come back and they're like, what if we just get rid of the ter and we shorten it to Enron, which Lay probably loves because he's like, yeah, you know, I hate those guys.

那些都是老一辈的人。

Those are the old guys.

把他们淘汰掉。

Get rid of them.

所以他最终得到了他想要的一切。

So he ends up getting exactly what he wants.

总部迁到了休斯顿。

Headquarters moves to Houston.

他担任首席执行官和董事长。

He's the CEO and chairman.

安然，面向未来。

Enron, future looking.

你知道，这是他的孩子。

You know, it's his baby.

这是一种重建，你知道的，能源行业的新故事、新时代。

It's a refounding, you know, new story, new era for the energy industry.

是的

Yep.

所以这算是第一章的结尾了。

So that's sort of the end of chapter one.

你看到了这次合并。

You get this merger.

他们是真正的管道公司。

They're real pipeline companies.

他们拥有实体资产。

They've got hard assets.

他们有了新的领导者和全新的企业文化，并且正在为客户提供真正的价值。

They have sort of a new corporate culture with a new leader, and they're delivering real value to customers.

是的

Yep.

他们正在执行莱伊在早期职业生涯中开创的原始交易模式。

And they're running the proto trading playbook that Lay pioneered back in his early days.

就在那之后不久，他们就遭遇了第一起交易丑闻。

And pretty quickly after this, they actually face their first trading scandal.

你读过这件事吗？

Did you read about this?

我读过。

I did.

这简直是前兆。

It's such a predecessor.

肯·莱总是视而不见，这明显是他性格上的缺陷，令人惊讶的是，这种事竟然在大丑闻发生十年前就出现了。

Like, it's such an obvious personality flaw of Ken Lay's to look the other way, and it's, like, amazing that it happened, what, ten years before the big scandal.

所以，新成立的安然公司有两名交易员，他们实际上常驻纽约，开始侵吞公司资金。

So two traders at the new Enron who are actually based in New York, they start embezzling money from the company.

他们伪造交易记录。

They're filing fake trades.

他们提交虚假的纳税申报表。

They're filing fake tax returns.

他们伪造了银行账户。

They're creating false bank accounts.

他们有一个著名的假银行账户，名字好像是叫‘Yas先生’，这清楚地展示了交易员和交易文化的幼稚本质。

They have a false bank account famously, I think, the name of a mister m Yas, which clearly this will give you a window into the sophomoric nature of traders and trading cultures.

你自己写下来，然后好好想想。

Just write that out and figure it out for yourself.

于是公司注意到了这件事。

So the company picks up on this.

这件事引起了莱的注意，大家普遍建议公司聘请的审计师——安达信——向董事会提出建议。

It comes to Lei's attention and, you know, everybody recommends the company's auditors that Arthur Andersen, you know, recommended the board.

那是当时首屈一指的会计事务所。

The premier accounting firm of the day.

当时五大顶级会计公司之一。

Premier big five accounting firm at the time.

他们建议莱和公司解雇这些人。

They recommend that Lei and the company should fire these guys.

显然，他们正在窃取公司资产，伪造交易，而莱伊却说，这些家伙确实太糟糕了。

Obviously, they're stealing from the company, they're falsifying trades, and Lay's like, well, you know, these guys, it's really bad.

他们做的事确实很糟糕。

It's bad what they did.

我们当然应该惩罚他们。

We should censor them for sure.

我们应该设立一些管控措施，确保这种情况不再发生，但他们确实是出色的交易员。

You know, we should set up some controls, make sure this doesn't happen again, but they're really good traders.

你知道的。

You know?

他们为公司赚了大量钱。

They've really made a lot of money for the firm.

我认为我们不该解雇他们。

I don't think we should fire them.

你知道的。

You know?

这感觉是个很大的举动，大家都说，好吧。

That that feels like a big step, and everybody's like, okay.

他们当时

They were

把钱转入了自己的银行账户。

funneling money to their own bank accounts.

是的。

Yeah.

但李对此置之不理，而他因对他们的信任和这一决定立即得到了回报。

But Lee lets it slide, and, he is immediately rewarded for his faith in them and his, decision here.

几乎立刻，他们就做了任何在这种情况下刚侥幸逃脱的幼稚之人会做的事。

Almost immediately, they do what any sophomoric people in a situation like that would do who just got away with one.

他们变得极度冒险。

They go way risk on.

于是他们失去理智，在接下来的几个月里亏损了近十亿美元。

So they go on tilt and they rack up within the next few months almost a billion dollars.

十亿。

One b.

那是十亿。

That's a b.

十亿美元。

A billion dollars.

这是八十年代末的交易亏损，仅这一笔就足以让整个公司从一开始就垮掉。

This is in the late eighties of trading losses, which that would be enough to bring down the whole firm at the get go.

当你需要考虑合并后公司的企业价值时，我手头没有具体数据，但你有一个大约十亿美元的公司和一个二十亿美元的公司。

When you gotta think the enterprise value of the combined company, I don't have it in front of me, but you had a, I don't know, billion dollar company by a 2 and billion dollar company.

因此，这家公司的整体企业价值不可能超过一百亿美元。

And so, you know, whole enterprise value of the firm can't be more than $10,000,000,000.

这两个笨蛋竟然在交易中亏掉了十亿美元。

And these two bozos just racked up a billion dollars in trading losses.

这一次，李终于把他们开除了。

This time, Lei does fire them.

幸运的是，对于年轻的安然公司和雷来说，但对世界其他地方而言不幸的是，这一事件发生在季度早期，交易大厅因此有足够时间掩盖这些亏损，使得在财报公布时无需报告整整十亿美元的损失，最终只报告了不到一亿美元的亏损。

And fortunately, for young Enron and for Lei, but unfortunately for the rest of the world, this happens early enough in the quarter that the trading floor is able to dig out enough of these losses that they don't have to report the whole billion dollar loss come earnings time and only end up reporting, I think, less than a $100,000,000 of losses.

因此，公司奇迹般地挺了过来。

So the company miraculously survives.

所以你可能会认为莱伊应该从中吸取教训了，但并没有。

So you would think that Lay would learn his lesson here, but no.

我们这里说的是肯尼斯·雷。

This is Kenneth Lai we're dealing with.

让我们暂时想一想，为什么会有交易员存在？

And let's for a moment say, why are there traders?

这其实是一个很有趣的现象。

That's sort of an interesting thing that's happening here.

我以为这是一家管道公司。

I thought this was a pipeline company.

我以为这是一家物流企业，负责将天然气从一个地方运到另一个地方，并向客户收取相关服务费用。

I thought this was a logistics company that moved natural gas from one place to another and charged customers for the services associated with that.

好吧，交易员最初的存在，正如你所说，是为了帮助匹配供需。

Well, the traders originally are there to your point to sort of help match supply to demand.

你知道的。

You know?

并不是每个人面前都有一台电脑，可以自动在当下以合适的价格购买到符合需求的产品。

It's not like everybody just got a computer in front of them where they can automatically be buying the right products to fit their needs at the right price at this moment in time.

你某种程度上需要与人互动，而这些人可以随意报出价差。

You sort of need to interface with people, and those people can quote spreads wherever they want.

他们可以说：我有个卖家愿意以这个价格出售，而你是买家，我感觉你愿意以这个价格买入。

They can say, I got a seller for this price, and you're the buyer, and I'm sort of sensing that you'll buy for that price.

好的。

Okay.

我会撮合供需。

I'll match make supply to demand.

我会报出一个我认为能在这笔交易中赚取最多利润的价差，然后就这么定了。

I'll quote a spread where I think I can make the most possible money on this trade, and we'll go with that.

因此，这标志着他们开始同时成为一家物流能源运输公司和某种意义上的金融组织——一个交易台。

And so this is the beginning of them being both a logistics energy transportation company and also a financial organization of sorts, a trading desk.

是的。

Yes.

一个为能源行业服务的准金融机构，即交易台。

A trading desk, a proto financial institution for the energy industry.

没错。

Yep.

说到这个，我们回到休斯顿，谈谈之前承诺的麦肯锡战略合作。

So speaking of, back to Houston and the promised McKinsey strategic engagement.

这件事正在发生。

It's happening.

杰夫·斯金林是主导这一战略规划的关键合伙人，负责为安然公司全新的金融与交易业务制定战略计划。

Jeff Skilling is lead hotshot partner to develop a strategic plan for this very thing, the new finance and trading operations of Enron.

有一天，斯金林有了一个极其卓越的点子——按他自己的说法，这简直太棒了，于是他向所有人夸耀这个点子有多出色。

And one day, Skilling has a absolutely brilliant idea, brilliant by his own estimation, and he proclaims it to everybody how brilliant it is.

如果安然公司进一步超越莱伊最初创建能源现货市场的创新，不再仅仅作为市场的中介或管道，而是更像一家投资银行在这个行业中运作，会怎么样？

What if Enron goes one step further from Lay's kind of original innovation of creating a spot market for energy and rather than just being sort of the facilitator of the market being the pipeline in the middle, what if Enron started acting even more like an investment bank in this industry?

他用这个想法的表述是：安然成为天然气的‘银行’，意思是他们可以去找石油和天然气生产商或钻探公司，大量收购这些井未来将产出的产量。

And the phrase that he uses for this idea is Enron becoming a quote bank for gas And the idea is that they can go to oil and gas producers to drillers and they can buy up a lot of the future production that's gonna come out of their wells.

这有点像过去那些公司常做的事情。

Kinda almost like the old companies used to do.

但安然公司并不只是作为这些井未来产出的买家，而是在这里对所有产品进行重新包装。

But rather than Enron then being the customer for what's gonna come out of those wells, they repackage everything here.

这正是你刚才提到的证券化，本。

This is the securitization that you were talking about a minute ago, Ben.

他们将所有这些未来的能源商品重新打包。

They repackage all of these future energy commodities.

他们将其切分、重组，然后以任意的时间周期和期限出售给能源买家和消费者。

They slice it and dice it, and then they resell it to buyers, to consumers of energy on kinda whatever timeline and term length they wanted.

所以，我们现在已从最初的管道模式——从生产商那里购买资产、购买能源商品，再卖给客户——彻底转变了。

So So we've gone now the industry from the pipelines, buy the assets from the producers, buy the energy commodities from the producers, and then sell them to customers.

莱的创新在于，创建一个让生产者和客户今天直接交易的市场。

Lay's innovation is, like, create a market where you let the producers and the customers trade directly today.

在实时现货市场中，每个人都无法预知明天的价格会是多少。

In real time spot markets where everyone is subject to, I don't know what tomorrow's price is gonna be.

我明天再给你报价。

I'll quote it to you tomorrow.

所以你 inherently 面临着明天价格可能更高的风险。

So you you have inherent risk that tomorrow's price could be higher.

抱歉，但事实就是这样。

So sorry, but that is what it is.

是的。

Yep.

因此，斯基林的创新是，让我们把这个变成一个完整的金融衍生品市场，让买卖双方可以为未来任何数量的这种商品以固定价格签订合约。

So Skillings innovation here is let's turn this into a full fledged kind of financial derivatives market and let buyers and sellers write contracts and buy contracts for any amount of this commodity in the future at a set price.

这才是真正的期货合约。

So true futures contracts.

而这种技术最早的一个真正应用场景是，想象你是一家地方公用事业公司，正试图为你的城镇提供天然气。你一直使用恩龙建立的这个现货市场来预测明天的价格，但你非常担心，万一发生某种未知的黑天鹅事件，价格会飙升。

And the most sort of early legitimate use case for this is imagine you are a local utility who's trying to provide natural gas to your town, and, you know, you've been using this great spot market that Enron stood up to figure out, you know, what's the price gonna be tomorrow, you're pretty worried about it skyrocketing in the event of some unknown black swan event or something like that.

所以，如果你能通过签订一份期货合约来对冲这种风险，岂不很好？比如锁定某个固定价格。

So wouldn't it be nice if you could hedge your exposure to that risk by also negotiating a futures contract where you say, well, let me lock in a certain rate.

我知道这比现在的价格更贵，但至少不会出现糟糕的情况。

And, yeah, I know it's gonna be more expensive than it is now, but at least nothing bad can happen.

这样我就能更可预测地规划未来三个月的支出。

And then I can sort of be predictable in the way that I'm thinking about what my spend's gonna be over the next three months.

因此，这是期货合约的一个非常正当的应用场景，它们可以通过恩龙进行交易。

So that's like a super legitimate use case of one of these futures contracts that they could trade using Enron.

你可以想象出各种类似的实用场景。

You can imagine all sorts of utility here.

是的。

Yep.

于是恩龙就这么做了。

So Enron does it.

他们开创了这个市场，这个市场后来被称为能源衍生品，并且至今仍占据能源市场非常重要的一部分。

They pioneer this market that would come to be known and is, I think, and assumes still a very, very large part of the energy market today called energy derivatives.

斯金林在安然公司发明并开创了这一市场。

Skilling in Enron, invent it, and pioneer it.

此时，能源是基础资产。

And at this point, the energy is the underlying asset.

衍生品本身除了对实际买卖基础资产的人有实用价值外，并不特别引人注目。

The derivative itself is not particularly interesting other than its own utility for if you are actually buying or selling the underlying asset.

这一点很重要。

That's, an important thing to note.

后来，每个人都将失去理智，对衍生品本身感到兴奋。

Everyone will lose their heads later and get excited about the derivative on its own.

他们根本不关心它是什么的衍生品。

They don't care what it's a derivative of.

它只是一个可交易的东西，数字会上涨，也会下跌。

It's a tradable thing that numbers go up, numbers go down.

这让我想起了过去一年加密货币的某些情况。

It reminds me a lot of some of crypto over the last year.

就像在交易狗狗币一样。

It's like trading Dogecoin.

对。

Right.

有谁知道这种币到底是什么，或者它该做什么吗？

Does anybody even know what this coin is or is supposed to do?

有人在乎吗？

Does anybody care?

没有。

No.

但我可以对它进行投机。

But I can speculate on it.

因此，最初提供能源衍生品的动机非常有趣，甚至可以说是纯真的，但随着时间推移，当每个人都失去理智时，这种动机彻底崩溃了。

And so there is a very interesting, almost innocent early beginning of why you would offer energy derivatives that completely falls apart over time as everyone loses their head.

当斯金林提出这个想法时，他还在外面，对吧？

And Skilling's still outside, right, when he pitches this idea?

到这个时候，他还在麦肯锡。

He's still at McKinsey at this point.

是的。

Yes.

暂时如此。

For the moment.

所以在接下来的事情中，他们意识到这是一个需要推向市场的新概念。

And so in this next thing, they realize this is a a new concept they need to bring to the market.

他们该如何启动这个新的衍生品市场？

How are they gonna bootstrap up this new derivatives market?

嗯，他们需要生产方的支持。

Well, they kinda need the producers to get on board.

他们需要获得供应端——那些原始资源，然后才能将其金融化、证券化，转化为这些衍生品。

They need to get the supply, the raw supply that they can then financialize, securitize, turn into these derivatives.

他们真正能让生产商愿意参与的方式，就是为他们提供资金。

And the way that they can really convince producers to wanna do this is if they fund them.

就像一家投资银行一样，他们开始走出去，与钻探公司开展开发合作和联合开发项目，说：嘿。

So just like an investment bank, they now start going out and doing these development deals and co development deals with drillers saying, hey.

我们来给你们提供资金。

We'll fund you.

我们会资助你们的勘探和钻探工作。

We will finance your exploration, your drilling.

作为资助的一部分，安然公司将锁定你们资产未来产量的证券化权利。

And as part of financing that, Enron is gonna lock up the rights to then securitize the future production out of your assets.

这本身并不是一种恶意的策略。

Which again, on its own, not a malicious strategy.

想想我们之前讲的高通案例。

Think about our Qualcomm episode.

嘿，索尼。

Hey, Sony.

你会不会启动一个新风险项目，我们共同投资生产使用CDMA技术的翻盖手机，以此向市场证明CDMA是一项可行的技术？

Will you spin up a new venture that we'll co invest in to make flip phones that use CDMA so we can prove to everyone else in the market that CDMA is a viable technology?

我们会投资这个项目。

We'll invest in it.

你只需要提供这些战略资源。

You just have to provide these strategic assets.

你可以拥有其中一半的股份，诸如此类。

You can own half of it, blah blah blah.

这是一种常见的培育生态系统的方式：用你的资金激励其他参与者，把他们带入你的生态系统。

It is a common way to bootstrap an ecosystem to use your dollars to incentivize other participants to bring a thing into your ecosystem.

而且，说实话，如果故事就此结束，这家公司很可能非常出色。

And, you know, honestly, like, if the story were to stop there, this probably would be a great company.

在这样一个大宗商品市场中带来巨大创新，是的，这个市场本就应该这样运作。

Bringing huge innovation to a commodity market, yeah, probably this market should work this way.

它应该被金融化和证券化。

It should be financialized and securitized.

能源资产是大宗商品。

Energy assets are commodities.

是的。

Yep.

不幸的是，这个故事并没有就此结束。

Unfortunately, that is not where the story ends.

远未结束。

Far, far, far from it.

所以到了1990年，我们已经进入了安然时代的几年后。

So 1990, now we're a couple years into the lay Enron era.

而莱伊和公司的副董事长里奇·金德，他后来在丑闻爆发前离开了安然，创办了金德摩根。

And lay and the vice chairman of the company, guy named Rich Kinder, who later would leave Enron before all the dirt hits the fan and start Kinder Morgan.

你可以把里奇·金德现在理解为搞实体资产的人。

You can think of Rich Kinder for now as the hard assets guy.

他真正懂得通过管道向客户输送碳氢化合物的内在价值，并致力于打造一家在这方面高效执行的公司。

He's the guy that really understands the intrinsic value of delivering hydrocarbons through a pipe to customers and trying to build a company that is just executing really well on doing that.

是的。

Yes.

于是，他们两人一起努力说服斯金林。

So the two of them, they work on convincing skilling.

他们认为这是一个伟大的构想，也是安然公司的未来。

They think this is a big idea, and this is the future of Enron.

他们努力说服斯金林离开麦肯锡，加入安然公司，全职担任他们即将成立的新型天然气银行——安然金融部的首席执行官。

They work on convincing skilling to leave McKinsey and come over and join Enron as the full time CEO of this new gas bank that they're gonna call the Enron Finance Division.

而他做出的一个极具代表性的决定，充分揭示了杰夫·斯金林这个人的一些本质。

And in a very telling move tells you a lot about what you need to know about Jeff Skilling as a person.

他们在讨论这件事，正在进行谈判。

They're talking about this, they're negotiating.

他最终决定接受他们的邀请。

He decides he wants to take them up on the offer.

他将离开麦肯锡。

He's gonna leave McKenzie.

他打电话给他们，进行最终的条款谈判。

He calls them up to do the final negotiations of the terms of his offer.

他打电话给他们时，正陪妻子待在医院，当时妻子正在分娩他们的第二个孩子，我想。

He calls them up from the hospital where he is with his wife while his wife is in labor with their, I think, second child.

这告诉你他的优先事项在哪里。

That tells you where his priorities lie.

显然，这段婚姻也没有持续太久。

Obviously, that marriage does not last too much longer.

我会在这里用‘显然’这个词。

I'll be using obviously there.

是的。

Yeah.

显然。

Obviously.

显然。

Obviously.

所以斯金格来了。

So Skilling comes in.

他接管了安然的财务部门，创立了这个新部门。

He takes over Enron Finance, starts this new division.

有必要指出的是，他加入并开展这项工作的一个必要条件。

It is worth pointing out the thing that he made a necessary condition in order for him to join and do this.

你知道那是什么吗？

Do you know what that thing is?

我不知道。

Oh, I don't.

正是杰夫·斯金格坚持认为，为了加入安然并启动这个新部门，肯·莱和董事会必须同意采用公允价值会计。

It was that Jeff Skilling insisted that in order to join Enron and start this new division, Ken Lay and the board had to agree to use mark to market accounting.

我没想到斯金格考虑得这么长远，还把这作为加入的条件。

I did not realize that Skilling was looking that far ahead and made it a condition of his joining.

这显示了他有多么精明。

This shows how unbelievably savvy he is.

他某种程度上意识到，自己无法建立起这项业务。

He sort of realized he couldn't build the business.

嗯，按他自己的说法，他他妈的特别聪明。

Well, he is effing smart according to him.

是的。

Yeah.

如果没有这么做，他真的无法建立起自己想要的业务吗？

Could He not build the business that he wanted to without doing this.

他 literally 把这称为——这在《最聪明的人》一书中被描述为，加入公司时必须横躺在轨道上的关键问题。

He literally called it, and this is in the smartest guys in the room, a lay my body across the tracks issue about joining the company.

我不知道他是不是从产房就开始谈论这件事了。

I wonder if he talked about it from the delivery room.

太糟糕了。

Awful.

好吧。

Alright.

那么，公允价值会计是什么？

So what is mark to market accounting?

这很有价值，因为我们之后会深入讨论，但先从概念上理解一下。

It's worth, because we'll get into this a bunch, but let's understand it conceptually.

是的。

Yeah.

恩龙花了一段时间才得以实施这一点，我们稍后会讲到，但你先说吧。

It ends up taking a while for Enron to be able to implement this that we'll get into, but go for it.

通常来说，如果你从事的是向客户输送天然气并收取费用的业务，你会在实际交付天然气时确认与运输相关的成本。

So normally, if you're in the business of delivering gas to customers who will pay for it, you account for the cost that it takes to physically move the gas when you deliver it at the time you're delivering it.

而客户支付给你的现金，就是你的收入。

And the cash that your customers pay you, that's your revenue.

当他们付款时，你就确认这笔收入。

And you recognize that when they pay you.

但想象一下，如果你从事的是另一种业务，比如股票交易。

But imagine you're in a different business like trading stocks.

你可能应该对所买卖的一切资产按市场价值进行会计处理，无论是否已经实际售出。

You probably should be accounting for the market value of everything you buy and sell, whether or not you have actually sold it.

比如，如果你以每股20美元的价格买入特斯拉，而现在它的价值涨到了每股200美元，你就应该反映你已实现了一笔收益，尽管这还只是未实现的收益。

Like, if you bought Tesla at $20 a share and it's now worth $200 a share, you should reflect that you have a gain, albeit an unrealized one.

这就是公允价值会计。

This is mark to market accounting.

而且，众所周知，所有风险投资机构都这么做。

And famously, all VCs do this.

对吧？

Right?

谈谈你投资组合的估值吧，你知道的。

Talk about marks, you know, of your portfolio.

没错。

Right.

公司从第三方获得一轮增资，第三方设定了新的价格。

Company raise an up round from a third party who's setting a new price.

这就是市场对该资产价值的判断。

That is what the market is saying this asset is worth.

即使你还没有实际收到现金，你也可以将这一价值计入账目。

And you get to account for that value even though you haven't actually received the cash.

你知道，即使你没有卖出特斯拉股票，也不意味着你没有未实现的收益。

You know, just because you haven't sold your Tesla shares, it doesn't mean that you don't have an unrealized gain.

或者，即使风投公司尚未从该公司实现流动性退出，也不意味着该公司不值更多钱。

Or just because the VC hasn't realized the liquidity event from that company, it doesn't mean that the company is not worth more.

所以斯凯林显然非常希望采用这种市值计价处理方式。

So Skilling obviously really wanted this mark to market treatment.

虽然你可以想象，市值计价会计准则很容易被滥用，但如果你能避免这种诱惑，它可能是可以接受的。

And while you can imagine that it's probably easy to abuse mark to market accounting rules, it is probably okay if you can avoid the temptation.

但值得注意的是，安然公司在采用这种方法时，成为了第一家使用该方法的非金融公司。

But it is worth pointing out that Enron, when they did adopt this, became the very first nonfinancial company to use this method.

是的。

Yeah.

嗯，天哪。

Well, oh, boy.

我们一会儿还会深入讨论公允价值会计，但可以说，滥用的可能性非常高。

We're gonna talk quite a bit more about mark to market accounting in a minute, but let's just say the potential for a litany of abuse is high.

非常高，尤其是对于一家运营公司，而不是真正的金融机构。

Very, very high, especially for what is an operating company, not actually a financial firm.

是的。

Yeah.

在我看来，公允价值会计正是‘能力越大，责任越大’的典范，因为它确实引发了这样一个问题：好吧。

Mark to market accounting to me is the epitome of with great power comes great responsibility because it really does open up this question of like, okay.

那么，市场价格究竟是多少？你如何确定某物的真实市场价格？

Well, what is the market price, and how do you discover the true market price of something?

当没有人为你支付现金时，说这个东西的实际价值是多少，难道不显得有点模糊吗？

When someone's not paying you for it and giving you the cash, doesn't it seem a little squishy to say what the thing is actually worth?

哦，先记下这一点。

Oh, put a pin in that.

我们不会。

We're gonna no.

我们会回头再谈这个。

We're we're gonna come back to that.

所以，斯基林，我想，在医院产房里那个把身体放在铁轨上的时刻之后。

So, skilling, I guess, after this lay his body on the tracks moment in the Delivery Room at the hospital.

他加入恩罗特，负责新的恩罗特金融部门，并成为该部门的首席执行官。

He comes in, he joins Enron running the new Enron finance division where he's CEO of the division.

他获得了公司大量股权，与他部门的业绩挂钩。

He gets a big equity stake in the company tied to the performance of his division.

在我们讲述这个故事的过程中，多想想激励机制以及它们所驱动的行为。

Think a lot as we go through this story about incentives and the behavior that they drive.

他把这部门打造成像投资银行一样。

So he models this division just like an investment bank.

他开始在休斯顿的恩罗特办公室建设大型交易大厅。

He starts building out big trading floors in the Enron office in Houston.

你知道，他希望这个部门就像华尔街一样，在休斯顿这里运作。

You know, he wants to have this be just like Wall Street, you know, here in Houston.

他招来了很多交易员类型的人。

Brings on trader type folks.

最著名的是，他在这里主要是个配角，因为外界根本没人能弄清楚这家伙在安然公司到底干了什么。

Most famously, he's a side character here mostly because nobody could ever actually figure out or from the outside what this guy actually did at Enron.

但这个叫路·皮的人，本来就在安然公司，但这个人

But this guy named Lou Pie who already was at Enron, but this guy

我一听到他的名字就

I can't even hear his name without

天哪。

Oh my god.

如果你看过《最聪明的人在房间里》这部电影，那真是一部很棒的电影，是这本书的电影版。

Like, if you've watched the movie of the smartest guys in the room, it's a really good movie, the movie version of the book.

那是在二月中旬左右，用了大量这种奇怪的备用镜头。

It's so mid February, like, use all this weird b roll footage.

所以，如我所说，外界没人能真正弄清楚他在安然公司到底做什么。

So Lou, like I said, nobody could ever actually figure out from the outside what he does at Enron.

但他真正出名的一点是他对脱衣舞娘的痴迷。

But one thing that he becomes really known for is his love of strippers.

而且不是仅仅停留在概念上，他最终离开了妻子，娶了一位脱衣舞娘。

And not just conceptually, he would eventually leave his wife and marry a stripper.

是的。

Yes.

在电影里，他们直接说他痴迷于脱衣舞娘。

In the movie, I think they literally say he was obsessed with strippers.

他会把她们带到办公室里。

He'd, like, bring them to the office.

他会一走就是好几个小时。

He'd leave for hours at a time.

他每天下班后都会去脱衣舞俱乐部。

He would every single day after work go to the strip club.

他认识休斯顿附近所有的脱衣舞俱乐部。

He knew, like, all the strip clubs around Houston.

所以电影里，他们展示了大量幕后素材。

So during the movie, they're showing all this b roll footage.

这本来是一部关于会计欺诈的纪录片。

Like, this is a a documentary about an accounting fraud.

但突然之间，毫无预兆地，出现了大量脱衣舞俱乐部的幕后镜头。

And all of a sudden out of nowhere, there's all this b roll footage of strip clubs.

别和孩子一起看这部电影。

Don't watch this movie with your kids.

是的。

Yeah.

而且是极其露骨的脱衣舞俱乐部幕后镜头。

And, like, super explicit B roll footage of strip clubs.

你会忍不住说：哇哦。

You're like, woah.

这到底是从哪儿来的？

Where did that come from?

画面非常露骨。

It was super explicit.

而且这并不是真正的路易在脱衣舞俱乐部的镜头。

And it's not like this was actually footage of Lou in the strip club.

这只是脱衣舞俱乐部的备用镜头。

It's b roll footage of strip clubs.

路易·派。

Lou Pie.

我觉得他做的那件事，简单来说，就是把交易员们聚集在一起。

I think the thing that he did, just to, like, clarify it a little bit, is he basically herded the traders.

想想八十年代的交易员。

Think about traders in the eighties.

他们雇了这样一些人，有句原话是：如果我正要去洗手间，有人跟我说只要踩碎别人的喉咙就能赚双倍工资，我绝对会毫不犹豫地踩下去。

They hired these people who, one of the quotes is, if I was on my way to the bathroom and someone said that I could double my pay by stepping on someone's throat, I would absolutely step on his throat.

他们雇佣的就是这种人，既为安然公司赚钱，也为自己牟利。

That's the type of people that they're hiring to make money both for Enron and for themselves.

而卢·皮则是那种有点像牛仔式的人物，实际上在拖累所有人。

And Lou Pie is sort of the, cowboy who's sort of, like, hurting them all.

所以，卢，我们提到他的另一个原因，是因为他对脱衣舞娘的痴迷，你知道的，本，你说他抛弃了和他在一起二十年的妻子。

So, Lou, the other reason we bring him up, I guess, because of his obsession with strippers, you know, Ben, you said he leaves his wife that he's been with for twenty years.

他跟一个脱衣舞娘私奔了。

He runs off with a stripper.

因此，他和妻子离婚了。

Because of that, he gets divorced from his wife.

他在安然破产前很久就离开了公司，并卖掉了股票，用这笔钱支付了两亿五千万美元的离婚费用。

He ends up leaving Enron well before default, and he sells his stock to finance the divorce for a quarter billion dollars.

他赚了两亿五千万美元。

He makes $250,000,000.

他在股价最高点卖掉了股票。

He sold his stock at the top.

我当时根本没想到接下来会发生什么。

I don't think with any notion of what was about to happen.

他得为离婚筹钱。

He had to finance the divorce.

太疯狂了。

Crazy.

他最终成了科罗拉多州第二大土地所有者。

So he ends up becoming the second largest landholder in Colorado.

直到今天，他仍然是一个身家数亿的富豪。

He's still like a multi hundred millionaire to this day.

太疯狂了。

Crazy.

除了少数几个人后来通过创建真实企业创造了真正价值外，他是所有未被赶出公司的人中经济受益最多的。

Other than a few people who go on to, like, build real value after this by creating real businesses, he's the one who economically benefited the most of any of the unrun

人们。

people.

难以置信。

Unbelievable.

而且他逃过了监禁。

And he stayed out of jail.

因此，斯金林在组建这个部门时做出的重大聘用决定是任命安德鲁·法斯托，他是一位前大陆伊利诺伊银行的银行家，曾在芝加哥的大陆伊利诺伊银行担任结构融资部门的职务。

So the big hire that Skilling makes as he's setting up this division is one Andrew Fastow, a former banker from Continental Illinois Bank where he worked in Chicago, and he was part of the structured financing division at Continental Illinois.

大陆伊利诺伊银行曾因成为历史上最大的银行倒闭案而声名狼藉，直到金融危机期间华盛顿互惠银行出现才被超越。

Continental Illinois had the inglorious honor of becoming the largest bank failure in history until Washington Mutual during the financial crisis.

这就是法斯托的背景，而斯金林招募他来执掌安然的结构融资业务时，正是看中了这一点。

This is the sort of cloth that Fastow is cut from when Skilling is recruiting him to come in and run structured finance at Enron.

他和他交谈。

He talks with him.

他了解了法斯托的经历，然后心想：你，先生，正是这个职位的不二人选。

He hears about his experience, and he's like, you, sir, are the man for the job.

当你看到安迪·法斯托，听他说话时，你就会有点想信任他。

And you look at Andy Fastow and you hear him talk, and you kinda wanna trust him.

他简直就是一位精致、深思熟虑的金融高管，凡事都考虑得滴水不漏。

He's the picture of a polished, thoughtful finance executive who's thought this through, who has all the i's dotted and the t's crossed.

他长得挺帅。

He's good looking.

他就是那种八十年代自信成功的商人形象，但一点都没有油腻感。

Like, he's the picture of the, like, successful eighties confident businessman, but with no slime on him.

当你听斯金格说话时，你会觉得：我不确定。

When you hear skilling talk, you're like, I don't know.

我不确定这家伙是不是真心为我着想。

I'm not sure this guy has my best interest at heart.

关于法斯托，你真的会觉得他是真心为你着想的。

The thing with Fastow is you actually do think he has your best interest at heart.

他就像《美国派》里那个人。

He's like the American Psycho guy.

他就像个银行家。

He's like a banker.

是的。

Yes.

他确实是个银行家，只不过他来自历史上最大规模破产的银行。

He is a banker, except he just comes from the bank that was the largest bank failure in history.

于是他进来后，斯金林让他负责结构性融资。

So he comes in and skilling sets him to work doing structured financing.

他们主要做的事情是打包Enron最初为生产商和钻探公司开展的这些融资交易。

The primary thing that they're doing is they're packaging up these financing deals that Enron had started doing for the producers, for the drillers.

记住，他们试图启动市场，为这个衍生品市场培育初始供给。

Remember, they're trying to kick start the market, bootstrap supply for this derivatives market.

所以他们在为各地的石油生产商做各种融资。

So they're doing all these financings for drillers out there for oil producers.

他们并不真的希望这些资产出现在Enron的账面上。

They don't really want those assets on the Enron books.

因此，他们设计了一种方案，通过安达信会计师事务所的审计师们了解到，利用特殊目的实体来打包他们对生产商的投资，从而把这些投资移出Enron的账目。

And so they devise this scheme that they become acquainted with through Arthur Andersen, through the accountants and auditors of using special purpose entities to package up these investments that they're making in producers and get them off of the Enron books.

结果他们发现，在当时，如果你从公司中设立一个独立的法律实体——即特殊目的实体——这与今天人们用于投资初创企业的特殊目的载体不同。

And it turns out they learn through doing this that at the time, if you set up a separate legal entity from the company, a special purpose entity, this is different than a special purpose vehicle that, you know, people use for investing in startups today.

这是一种特殊目的实体。

This is a special purpose entity.

只要你设立的这个实体中，至少有3%的资本来自外部投资者，即使公司本身拥有该实体97%的经济利益，也可以将其从合并财务报表中移除。

If you set this up, as long as at least 3%, 123% of the capital in that entity comes from outside investors, you can still have the company itself own 97% of the economics of that entity and you can remove it from your consolidated accounting books.

你可以直接从会计账目中抹去它，声称现在这个实体由独立的第三方拥有和控制，而判断其独立性的标准是：至少有3%的资本来自外部来源。

You can just wipe it out of your accounting, say this is now owned and controlled by an independent third party entity and the test for it being independent is that 3%, a minimum of 3% of the capital comes from outside sources.

我们生活在一个

We live

助长了这种欺诈的体系中。

in a system that enabled this fraud.

我想一遍又一遍地反复强调这一点。

I wanna keep reiterating that over and over and over again.

直到2002年因这一丑闻及其他一些丑闻——但主要是因为安然事件——通过了《萨班斯-奥克斯利法案》，我们一直生活在一个系统中，所有这些漏洞都可被利用，只等一个毫无道德底线的人出现，彻底利用这些漏洞。

Until Sarbanes Oxley passed in 2002 because of this scandal and some other scandals, but largely because of Enron, we just existed in a system where all of this was exploitable and just waiting for someone who did not have the scruples to just finally come in and exploit all these loopholes.