Billionaire investor Warren Buffett said Saturday that he was"dead wrong" with a prediction that the U.S. housing market would begin to recover by now, but he remains optimistic about the nation's economy.

　　股神巴菲特週六在致伯克希爾 哈撒韋公司股東的公開信中認錯，表示自己在去年對美國房地産市場的復蘇判斷“錯得離譜”。但他表示還是對美國的經濟持樂觀態度。

　　In his annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders, Buffett said he is sure housing will recover eventually and help bring down the nation's unemployment rate. But he did not predict when that will happen.

　　在致伯克希爾 哈撒韋公司股東的年度報告中，巴菲特表示他相信房地産最終會復蘇，並降低美國的失業率。但他沒有預測樓市復蘇將在何時出現。

　　Buffett said housing "remains in a depression of its own," but he predicted, in typical plainspoken style, that the housing market will come back because some human factors can't be denied forever.

　　巴菲特在公開信中承認目前樓市“還是很低迷”，但他還是直言不諱地預測，因為人為因素的影響，房地産市場還是終究會復興起來。

　　The housing prediction proved painful for Berkshire Hathaway. It owns more than 80 subsidiaries, including the Geico insurance company and See's Candy, and five of them depend on construction activity.

　　巴菲特去年的樓市誤判讓伯克希爾 哈撒韋公司很受傷，該公司擁有超過80家子公司，其中包括政府僱員保險公司和喜詩糖果公司。旗下有五家公司主要經營建築業務。

　　Those businesses, which include Acme Brick, Clayton Homes and Shaw carpet, generated pre-tax profits of $513 million last year. That's well off the $1.8 billion those companies added to Berkshire in 2006.

　　巴菲特投資的5家房地産相關公司，包括艾可美磚料、克萊頓房屋公司和逸夫地毯公司，在2011年稅前利潤為5.13億美元，與2010年相當，但明顯低於2006年的18億美元。

　　Berkshire's insurance companies took $1.7 billion in catastrophe losses last year, including from the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Berkshire reported only $154 million in underwriting profit, down from $1.3 billion the previous year.

　　伯克希爾的保險相關公司在去年承擔了17億美元的災難損失費用，其中就包括日本的地震和海嘯。年度報告中顯示公司的承保利潤只有1.54億美元，遠低於上一年的13億美元。

　　Buffett reassured Berkshire shareholders that the company has someone in mind to replace him eventually, but did not name the successor. He emphasized that he has no plans to leave.

　　巴菲特還在公開信中向股東確認公司已有了接班人的人選，但並未透露繼任者的名字。他也強調目前並無離開的計劃。