It's been a quiet day for markets across the world,

今天世界各地的市場都相當平靜

reflecting a general lack of a conviction either positive or negative that's been around for some weeks.

這反映出市場這幾周一直存在的現象：投資者缺乏信念，不管是積極的還是消極的都一樣

But you did have one rather intriguing development here in the States, just there was further pressure on Apple,

但是在美國卻有一個相當有趣的發展：蘋果公司的壓力又增加了

which means, as you can see from this chart, that Apple's title as the world's largest company is once again under threat, this time from Google.

如你所見，這張表顯示出蘋果「世界最大公司」的頭銜又再度受挑戰；這次，他們面對來自Google的威脅

You can see that Google briefly overtook it earlier this year, it appears likely to do so again.

你可以看見Google在今年初曾短暫的奪走這個頭銜，而眼下同樣的情形似乎又要上演了

Now, this is part of a longer term pattern.

這其實是一個更長期的規律的一部份

Apple is under pressure, it is now as low as it has been in two years.

蘋果現在飽受壓力所苦。它目前正處於兩年來的最低點

If we now take a look at this next chart, you can see that in the time since it was last at this level,

如果我們看一下另外一張表的話，你可以看到自它上一次處在這種低谷以來

Google has managed to continue to log steady, regular progress.

Google反而持續且穩定的成長

You haven't seen that from Apple, obviously there is a great concern about revenues from the iPhone, they appear to be set to decline.

蘋果的表現就大不同了。不意外的，iPhone不斷下降的銷量令人擔憂

It should of course, always have been in the price that at some point, iPhone revenues will inevitably peak and start to slow down,

當然，蘋果來自iPhone的營收必然會達到頂峰之後趨緩，這個現象倒是可預期的

but it still seems somehow to have taken people by surprise.

但不知道為什麼，人們似乎還是嚇了一大跳

Now, I'm not gonna make any predictions about the short term,

不過，我不會做任何短期的預測

it's quite possible that Google, which is obviously a very great company, will be a great investment for a while,

的確，Google這間公司非常的棒，而在短期內它會是一個很好的投資

but for the longer term I am prepared to suggest that it would not be a good idea to invest in Google.

但從長期來看，我認為投資Google並不是一個好的選擇

Now, we can illustrate that for you if we take a look now at the performance.

讓我透過 Google 過去的表現來解釋一下

This is the market cap of the six companies to have been the largest in the S&P since 1990, in the last quarter of a century,

這是自1990以來，S&P 指數裡的六大公司過去25年的市場資本額

we're excluding Cisco Systems, which was the #1 for a few days back in the madness of the tech bubble in 2000.

我們排除了思科系統公司，它在2000年的科網泡沫時期曾短暫的爬到第一名的位置

And you can see that there is one very clear pattern that emerges from all of those is that companies don't get superseded as the largest by seeing somebody overtake them.

從這張表上我們可以清楚的看見一個現象：一間公司並不會因為被另一間公司取代而失去它龍頭的地位

They tend to get superseded as the largest by falling themselves, you can see that befalling GE, Microsoft, and now it's happened to Apple.

而是因為他們自己開始衰退。通用電氣(GE)和微軟都經歷過這樣的衰退，而現在，同樣的事情也發生在蘋果身上

Now, in many ways, that would make sense.

當然，從很多方面來看這都是合理的

If you get to be the largest company, it implies that you are very fully valued, or that you have a business model that is working about as well as it possibly could,

一間公司之所以可以位居龍頭代表它有足夠的資本，或是它有一個非常良好的商業模式

and that will naturally tends to attract more competition or more attention from the Antitrust Authorities.

而這自然而然會引來更多來自其他公司的競爭和反壟斷執法機構的關注

If we take a look at this final chart,

我們看一下最後這張表

what you can see here is how the four companies that were the largest at some point during the 1990s have faired during this century since the beginning of 2000.

這張表上的四間公司在1990年代都曾經成為世界最大的公司，但是從2000年開始它們的成長都趨緩

This is all relative to the S&P.

這些是關乎 S&P 500 指數的數據

And you can see that only Exxon among these is even managed to be ahead of the market,

而在這之中，只有艾克森美孚(Exxon)還有辦法領先市場

and in Exxon's case that's very much driven by the oil price and it's underperformed very drastically since the top of the oil market in 2008.

但是艾克森美孚的表現深受原油價格影響，而自2008年原油市場達到頂峰之後，它的表現就差強人意

In general, if we've gone back to some of the previous largest companies,

如果我們回頭看以前的一些大公司

like DuPont, General Motors, or Walmart or AT&T, all great companies at one point, all pegged back for good reason.

像是杜邦、通用汽車、沃爾瑪和AT&T，會發現這些曾經規模龐大的公司現在都不如以往

The point would perhaps become even clearer, it's just not a great idea once a company is already the biggest to invest in it.

這之中最清楚的教訓莫過於投資一間規模已經非常龐大的公司其實不是一個好主意

Congratulations Google. For the longer term it's probably not a great investment.

所以，恭喜Google，但從長遠來看，這不會是一個好投資