英文早讀第256篇，選自巴菲特年度信，友才翻譯。
Ben Rosner’s record at Associated Retail Stores continues to amaze us. In a poor retailing year, Associated’s earnings continued excellent ‐ and those earnings all were translated into cash. On March 7, 1981 Associated will celebrate its 50th birthday. Ben has run the business (along with Leo Simon, his partner from 1931 to 1966) in each of those fifty years.
本·羅斯納在聯(lián)合零售商店的業(yè)績(jī)一直讓我們驚嘆不已。在零售業(yè)不景氣的一年里，聯(lián)合零售商店的盈利依然出色，而且這些盈利都轉(zhuǎn)化為了現(xiàn)金。1981年3月7日，聯(lián)合零售商店將迎來(lái)其50周年店慶。在這50年里，本（以及他1931年至1966年的合伙人利奧·西蒙）一直經(jīng)營(yíng)著這家公司。
Disposition of Illinois National Bank and Trust of Rockford On December 31, 1980 we completed the exchange of 41,086 shares of Rockford Bancorp Inc. (which owns 97.7% of Illinois National Bank) for a like number of shares of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.
關(guān)于羅克福德伊利諾伊國(guó)民銀行及信托公司的處置情況，1980年12月31日，我們完成了以41,086股羅克福德 Bancorp 公司（該公司持有伊利諾伊國(guó)民銀行97.7%的股份）的股票交換同等數(shù)量的伯克希爾·哈撒韋公司股票的交易。
Our method of exchange allowed all Berkshire shareholders to maintain their proportional interest in the Bank (except for me; I was permitted 80% of my proportional share). They were thus guaranteed an ownership position identical to that they would have attained had we followed a more conventional spinoff approach. Twenty‐four shareholders (of our approximate 1300) chose this proportional exchange option.
我們的交換方式使得所有伯克希爾的股東都能保持他們?cè)谠撱y行的持股比例權(quán)益（我除外；我只被允許持有我按比例應(yīng)得股份的80%）。因此，他們可以確保獲得的持股情況與我們采用更傳統(tǒng)的分拆方式時(shí)所能獲得的完全相同。在我們大約1300名股東中，有24名股東選擇了這種按比例交換的方案。
123.amaze：使驚奇；使驚愕
124.conventional：傳統(tǒng)的；常規(guī)的
