After reading "Capital Returns," it's easy to understand why Marathon Capital has never invested in A-shares and H-shares. Even the legendary investor "T 神" only bought two stocks with very small positions after reviewing many A-shares and H-shares. The fundamental reason is the lack of shareholder returns, which is the core source of investment returns. The main reasons for insufficient shareholder returns include: first, excessive capital liquidity; second, the absence of a capital return culture; and third, excessively high valuations leading to a low base for capital returns.

However, the fact is that Warren Buffett invested in PetroChina in 2003, with an average cost of around HKD 1.62 per share. At that time, PetroChina's P/E ratio was 6.36x in 2002 and 4.3x in 2003. It's hard to argue that PetroChina's macro environment was significantly different from other companies back then—it was still in an era of capital excess and poor capital return culture, making long-term capital returns uncertain. But when prices are cheap enough, a sufficiently large capital return base can already deliver substantial current shareholder returns, making the decision much simpler.

While qualitative analysis is important, quantitative analysis remains quantitative—only hard numbers can support final investment decisions.

Yesterday, I came across an inspiring signature worth sharing: "Be more data-dependent... Stories must always be quantified into valuations."