Private Markets, Software Repricing and Capital Allocation | Marc Rowan on a16z
10 stocks right now in the US are nearly 50% of the S&P and they're all levered to the same trend.
美国现在有 10 支股票占标普 500 近 50%，而且全都押注在同一个趋势上。
The same thing is happening in the global fixed income market.
全球固定收益市场也在发生同样的事。
And so if you're an investor and you're looking for diversification, there's no place to get it other than private markets.
如果你是一个寻求多元化配置的投资者，除了私募市场，你无处可去。
Great companies, Enthropic and every one of those companies is private, multiple trillion dollars, and yet most investors have zero exposure to them.
优质公司，Anthropic 以及其他每一家公司都是非上市的，市值达到数万亿美元，但大多数投资者对它们的敞口是零。
And wrote this piece over a decade ago that software's eating the world.
十多年前他写了那篇文章，说软件正在吞噬世界。
And that feels more true than ever as AI proliferates all parts of the economy.
随着 AI 渗透经济的每个角落，这句话比以往任何时候都更真实。
We operate under the assumption that every job is going to be replaced or enhanced.
我们的基本假设是：每一个工作岗位都将被替代或被增强。
2025 was just proof of concept that data centers and chips and energy were all needed.
2025 年只是一个概念验证，证明数据中心、芯片和能源确实都是必需的。
2026 the market is starting to recognize that if this continues, everyone who is an investor is going to be
2026 年，市场开始意识到，如果这个趋势继续下去，每一个投资者都将……
Mark.
Marc。
Thank you so much for joining us and and for hosting us here at your office.
非常感谢你加入我们，也谢谢你在这里的办公室接待我们。
Uh nothing better.
再好不过了。
My absolute pleasure.
我非常高兴。
I thought we'd start by maybe going back in time.
我想我们不如先回到过去。
Um, you joined Drexel coming out of Wharton, I believe, in 1984.
你是从沃顿商学院毕业后加入 Drexel 的，我记得是 1984 年。
Um, what did you see in the firm at that time?
那时候你在这家公司看到了什么？
You know, it was an interesting thing.
这说来有意思。
Um, everyone who had come out of my program at Wharton had basically gone to Goldman Sachs.
和我同期从沃顿毕业的，基本上都去了高盛。
Yep.
对。
And what struck me about Drexel's business, which was financing entrepreneurs, financing new companies, is that you didn't really need to know all that much about finance.
而让我对 Drexel 业务感兴趣的，是它在为创业者和新兴公司融资，这其实不需要太精通金融。
You needed to know a lot about business
你需要的是对商业有深入的了解，
because these companies were not the Exxons of the day or the top-notch companies of the day.
因为这些公司不是当时的埃克森美孚，也不是顶级蓝筹企业。
They were companies where legitimately there were questions on the business model.
它们是那些商业模式本身就存在真实疑问的公司。
And I was always much more interested in business than I was in the nuances of finance and public offerings and things like that.
而我对商业的兴趣，一直远大于对金融细节、IPO 流程这些东西的兴趣。
And I was not disappointed.
我没有失望。
It was awesome.
那段经历棒极了。
Yeah.
是的。
Yeah, I mean I think one of the most remarkable things about uh kind of the diaspora from from Draxville in that especially in that period is just I mean you can almost trace every major credit firm you know back to that kind of cohort of people.
我觉得那个时期 Drexel 人才散落出去最令人称奇的事，是你几乎可以把今天每一家主要信贷机构都追溯到那一批人身上。
Was there something about the culture
那里的文化有什么特别之处，
maybe the focus of of your clients at the time that sort of shaped you know that sort of incredible kind of diaspora talent?
还是说当时你们客户的属性，塑造了那种令人惊叹的人才散射效应？
Look this business first mentality and really understanding the business is ultimately about making credit decisions.
这种商业优先的思维方式，真正理解业务，归根结底是为了做出信贷决策。
These companies were not investment grade.
这些公司不是投资级的。
they were below investment grade.
它们低于投资级。
It really forced you to understand the fundamentals of their business, not to rely on third parties, but also a whole market was being created.
这迫使你去真正理解它们的基本面，不能依赖第三方，同时还涉及很多其他层面。
There were no high yield bonds.
当时没有高收益债券。
There were no levered loans.
没有杠杆贷款。
There were no ETFs.
没有 ETF。
There was no real securitized product.
没有真正意义上的证券化产品。
All the products that we take for granted today that exist did not exist.
今天我们习以为常的那些产品，当时根本不存在。
This forced you into clean sheet thinking.
这逼着你从空白纸开始思考。
The whole notion of pick I believe was created in one afternoon solving a problem.
PIK，即实物支付债券的概念，据说就是某天下午为了解决一个问题临时想出来的。
The notion of silver b silverbacked or silver index bonds solving another problem
银背债券或银指数债券的概念，是为了解决另一个问题。
and so on and so on.
如此等等。
The notion of a highly confident letter, the notion of bridge financing.
高度信任函的概念，过桥融资的概念。
All of these things were basically problem solution, problem solution.
这些东西基本上都是：发现问题，解决问题，再发现问题，再解决问题。
And that mentality of understanding the business, understanding the credit, but also having clean sheet thinking is certainly what powers Apollo today.
理解业务、理解信贷，同时保持从空白纸出发的思维方式，这些对我来说确实是一种灌输。
And I know you know Michael Milin has been a mentor for a long time.
我知道 Michael Milken 多年来一直是你的导师。
I guess what are some of the most valuable lessons you've learned from him over the years?
从他身上你学到的最有价值的东西是什么？
They're just innumerable.
说不完。
But I I the story I tell about Mike is um I was um like a smart young guy.
但我关于 Mike 会讲的那个故事是，当时我是个聪明的年轻人，
I had mastered my craft.
我已经精通了自己的专业。
I was well thought of.
我也很受认可。
But and so every time the market kind of went sideways, I would get a call from Mike and Mike would say, "Could you come from New York to California?"
但每当市场出现动荡，Mike 就会给我打电话说，你能过来一趟吗。
I would of course ask when.
我当然会问什么时候。
This would Monday.
他说周一。
He'd be like, "Tuesday."
他会说，周二。
So, uh, the immediiacy of how you dealt with problems and the business first mentality was definitely a micism.
那种应对问题的紧迫感，以及商业优先的思维，确实是一种深入骨髓的影响。
And I sat on the trading desk and at the end of every trading day, Mike would walk by my desk and I was supposed to have all the answers because Mike was doing a million things.
我坐在交易台旁，每个交易日结束时 Mike 都会走过我的座位，我应该向他汇报一件事。
I was just doing one thing.
我只做了一件事。
And every day he would ask me a question that I did not know the answer to.
每天他都会问我一个我不知道答案的问题。
And he didn't do it to provoke me or to show me how smart he was.
他这样问，不是为了刁难我，也不是为了显示自己有多聪明。
He was showing me to connect the dots.
他是在教我把各个点连起来。
And I do think that that's a big part of what goes on in our world today.
我确实认为，这是当今世界运作的一个重要组成部分。
Can you take what's happening geopolitically?
你能把握地缘政治正在发生什么吗？
Can you take what's happening in technology?
你能把握技术正在发生什么吗？
Can you take what's happening in financial markets?
你能把握金融市场正在发生什么吗？
Can you take all the personalities and people and can you put it together in a coherent way that makes for good relationships, good deals, good partnerships, things that benefit the world.
你能把所有人和人性都纳入进来，最终整合成一个有意义的、连贯的判断吗？
And I think that's the primary lesson I took out along with
我认为这是我从他那里学到的最重要的一课，还有一点，
the pathiest thing is sometimes the most valuable.
那就是最简单的路，有时候是最有价值的。
And the thing that he said is you either accept change or change is vis visited upon you.
他说的一句话是：你要么主动接受变化，要么变化会强加到你身上。
And we're certainly in that moment where you either accept change or change is going to be visited upon you.
我们现在就处于这样一个时刻，要么主动迎接变化，要么变化会强加于你。
Totally.
完全同意。
And and you've you know shaped a lot of Apollo you know over the years which I'm I'm excited to chat about.
你多年来在很多方面塑造了 Apollo，这也是我特别想聊的。
Maybe um just going back to 1990.
也许我们回到 1990 年。
Can you kind of talk through the origin story of of starting the firm?
你能讲一下创办这家公司的故事吗？
Um sure.
好的。
Um, think Lehman Brothers 2008 because a lot of this audience will not know what was going on in 1990, but 1990 was a global recession, a banking crisis, a Texas real estate crisis, a New York real estate crisis, a savings and loan crisis.
想象一下 2008 年的雷曼兄弟，因为很多听众可能不了解 1990 年发生了什么，
It was kind of a mess.
那是一团乱。
Yep.
对。
And I went into my office or I left my office on Friday.
我周五离开了办公室。
I came back in on Sunday and I left with all my belongings in a cardboard box and Drexel was out of business.
周日回来，拿着装满个人物品的纸板箱走出来，Drexel 倒了。
A great lesson.
很深刻的教训。
Financial services firms die from one of two causes.
金融服务公司的死法只有两种。
Heart attacks or cancer.
心脏病发作，或者癌症。
Heart attack is funding risk.
心脏病发作就是流动性风险。
If you lend long and borrow short, you have funding risk.
如果你借短放长，你就有流动性风险。
We saw this in Bear Sterns.
我们在贝尔斯登身上见过这个。
We saw this in Lehman Brothers.
我们在雷曼兄弟身上见过这个。
We've seen this again and again.
我们一次次见过这个。
I will tell you that formative lesson.
我想说，那是一堂奠基性的课。
We will never see that at Apollo.
在 Apollo，我们永远不会遇到这种情况。
It is ingrained in our culture to understand this funding issue, this heart attack risk.
理解流动性风险、心脏病发作风险，这已经根植于我们的文化之中。
And then the cancer risk of course is the addition of bad assets over a long period of time which again we as a principal mentality firm do not allow to happen.
而癌症风险，当然就是长期累积坏资产，随着时间推移逐渐吞噬机构。
We admit our mistakes.
我们承认错误。
We move on.
我们往前走。
We take our losses.
我们认亏出局。
We don't double down and triple down and do these other things.
我们不会加倍下注、三倍下注，不会做那些事。
But back to 1990, imagine being an unemployed investment banker in the midst of a global financial crisis.
回到 1990 年，想象一下，在全球金融危机的漩涡中，你是一个失业的投行人。
This is not a great situation for career employment.
这种情况对职业发展并不理想。
Um, fortunately, a group of us had been sharing office space.
幸运的是，我们一群人一直共用一个办公空间。