The Money Mustache Community
General Discussion => Welcome and General Discussion => Topic started by: FoundPeace on November 02, 2018, 12:57:40 PM
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I just logged into my various investment accounts today to update my FIRE spreadsheet (I do this monthly) and was surprised to see I'm down by $13k. I feel queasy, but at the same time I'm excited, because that means that my investments are now capable of making or loosing more than I can make with my job in one month.
Just wanted to tell someone, but most people I know wouldn't get it. I imagine many of you lost at least that much in October.
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I've been there. You'll get numb to it.
I lost 13k in a day this past month and didn't phase me in the least. I bought more shares.
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Were you not invested in February?
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This was my first time experiencing this too - although I'm only down about $2k, since I don't have as much invested. Still, this was the first time it went down enough to sting a little.
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If you have a balanced and diversified portfolio, losing five figures in a bad month means you are kinda wealthy. 🤑 I get the queasiness, though, last month was quite the plunge for us, too.
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Our accounts are down a shitload more than that. Why? Because we never panic when the market adjusts and now we have more money than we ever thought possible. Just keep telling yourself it's not a loss because you aren't selling. This shit works. In time, you will laugh that you were fretting over a mere $13k. The market is on sale, keep buying.
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Was the market down for October? I don't pay attention that closely. Just keep shoveling in cash, buying according to my IPS.
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I saw some headlines about the sky falling, it I just don’t look at my investments that closely. Like Dicey, our portfolio fluctuates by five figures easily with market gyrations. I expect I’ll see fluctuations in the range of $100k as well. Kind of amazing to think about, but that is just how this ride goes. Don’t look too closely and find something else to do with your time.
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I'm basically just investing automatically every month and figure I'll check sometime around my 30th birthday to see how close I am to FIRE. I would guess that we're not quite in the five-figure loss club though. How sad. :P
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Since I started tracking my networth in 2013 I do a month end analysis each month. October was my biggest loss ever since I started tracking. My networth dropped from 1127K 9/30/18 to 1070K 10/31/18.
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What's funny is that the latest market fluctuation dropped our portfolio almost as much as the total $ amount we lost in the 2008 crash. Back then, it seemed like a huge amount of money, and now I barely blink at it. It's not unusual now for month to month fluctuations in our investment accounts to almost exceed my annual income.
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Good buying opportunity could be ahead!
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Whenever I get nervous, I just read this thread again.
https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=79939
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What's funny is that the latest market fluctuation dropped our portfolio almost as much as the total $ amount we lost in the 2008 crash. Back then, it seemed like a huge amount of money, and now I barely blink at it. It's not unusual now for month to month fluctuations in our investment accounts to almost exceed my annual income.
Very true here too! Had about $15k in 2008, saw it go down to $8k. Seriously thought about taking the money out for doomsday reasons. Now lost about $15k and its NBD.
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Congratulations, @FoundPeace! Seriously, good perspective, and thanks for sharing.
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OP: This month might seem quite dramatic to you. My advice to you is to ignore this, and continue on your course of just continuing to work and invest. Don’t change anything. Here is my perspective:
For the 2008/09 crisis, I was only a few years out of college. I saw the market gyrations. I saw my investment account balances fall by many thousands of dollars. It was kind of terrifying for me at the time.
I keep a spreadsheet of my net worth (all my assets, minus all my liabilities), updated monthly.
At the time, in 09, I saw what were really dramatic dips in my net worth, due to the market falling. It made me angry.
Since then, I have still been keeping the spreadsheet, updating it monthly with my net worth. When I look back toward that crisis time a decade ago? I don’t even see the blip on the graph! The graph is like a hockey-stick going up.
Stay the course. Ignore the noise. The market does whatever. Some perspective: Last month, there was a time when I was down about 200K in net worth, simply by market movements. Don’t worry about it. Just keep throwing money into low cost index funds. You will win in the end.
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Yes, we lost more than our combined net income this month. It was awesome to think that our investments can fluctuate more than what we shovel into savings each month.
Also, when I feel queasy/sad, I find that the “Top is In” thread is a good read. The people posting there are hilarious and reading that helps to put things into perspective.
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I don't like seeing my balance decrease, but I keep enough in cash so I don't have to sell anything. This is my first year of retirement, so I would be scared if I allowed myself to think too much about it. I try to just shrug it off, since as someone else said, I'm not selling.
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If market dips of this size make you feel sick, then I suggest you adjust your assets to a more conservative asset allocation.
It'll stop you panic selling when we experience an actual market drop.
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It might be fun to start a thread where all the old timers like me tell you about our worst month/year in investing. Back in 2008, between losses in my stock portfolio and losses in home equity, I was down over a half million. I had been through it before in 1987 and 2000. Did not sell anything and kept on buying all the way down to the bottom in 2009. By 2015 I had fully recovered and then some. Retired Jan.1, 2015.
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It's just as important to maintain equanimity when the market is doing well as when it does poorly. The discipline to do so will keep you from foolishly doubling down when it's about to tank as much as foolishly pulling out when it does tank.
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It might be fun to start a thread where all the old timers like me tell you about our worst month/year in investing. Back in 2008, between losses in my stock portfolio and losses in home equity, I was down over a half million. I had been through it before in 1987 and 2000. Did not sell anything and kept on buying all the way down to the bottom in 2009. By 2015 I had fully recovered and then some. Retired Jan.1, 2015.
@Greystache I would totally read a thread like that! What you posted was actually quite helpful because you also talk about what you did when the market crashed and how long it took to recover.
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It stressed me out big time July 1 2015 - Feb 1 2016, it would take VTI 11 months to hit a new high in June of 2016.
This most recent drop has us down nearly $30k earlier this week.......no stress with 12 years of expenses saved.
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Was the market down for October? I don't pay attention that closely. Just keep shoveling in cash, buying according to my IPS.
Basically lost all 2018 gains in October. We are down about $120k this month.
OP don't sell and you haven't actually lost anything.
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Well, VXUS has had a negative return over the past 5 years -_-
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I've not got a ton invested, so I'm only down a few thousand. My boyfriend hasn't got any investments yet (but we're planning on investing his savings when we get married). I've been talking him through the ups and downs, people freaking out the past few weeks, etc. I've told him that the way I see it, I haven't actually lost anything. I own the same amount of shares today as I did yesterday (unless my paycheck hit... in which case I own more).
I was a lot more stressed about the few hundreds I was losing in 2015(?). I had just found MMM and started investing. I started right at the beginning of a 3-4 month slide. But. MMM said to keep going and ignore it. So I did. And it was fine.
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When you really feel queasy is when your net worth drops more in a day than you spend in a year...as your net worth grows you are going to have those. (Assuming you don’t let your lifestyle inflate)
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If market dips of this size make you feel sick, then I suggest you adjust your assets to a more conservative asset allocation.
It'll stop you panic selling when we experience an actual market drop.
Don't do this if you ever hope to reach FIRE. Instead, read, study, and LEARN. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time here.
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If market dips of this size make you feel sick, then I suggest you adjust your assets to a more conservative asset allocation.
It'll stop you panic selling when we experience an actual market drop.
Don't do this if you ever hope to reach FIRE. Instead, read, study, and LEARN. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time here.
I agree with aGracefulStomp. It's hard to know how you'll react emotionally to a big drop, no matter your expectations or intentions, especially if you've never experienced one. This is an excellent opportunity to observe your own reactions and see if you need to adjust your AA. Neither of us is suggesting that you do this every time the market dips; we're both saying the opposite, that you need to be sure you have an AA you can live with comfortably even through big drops. If where you're at now isn't it, adjust until you're there.
And then let it ride, through thick and thin, knowing you can sleep soundly at night.
I've spent the last week laughing every day that I see the stock market plunge, because a) it's on sale; b) I'm playing the long game, I don't have to sell stock right now, and I trust it will recover; and c) there's a chance that big stock market drops will affect the upcoming elections, because whether it's rational or not, the public holds the incumbent party responsible for the economy, and a lot of people panic and think doomlike thoughts when the stock market drops fast.
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Was the market down for October? I don't pay attention that closely. Just keep shoveling in cash, buying according to my IPS.
Basically lost all 2018 gains in October. We are down about $120k this month.
OP don't sell and you haven't actually lost anything.
Oh, sweet. My entire net paycheck (less one penny) went into the 457 November 1.
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I just started investing in August. So far, I'm down about 8% but thanks to the good people of this forum, I'm not worried, even if there is a bit of grim fascination in watching my money decrease.
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Was the market down for October? I don't pay attention that closely. Just keep shoveling in cash, buying according to my IPS.
Basically lost all 2018 gains in October. We are down about $120k this month.
OP don't sell and you haven't actually lost anything.
Oh, sweet. My entire net paycheck (less one penny) went into the 457 November 1.
That's awesome. Great time to buy! Keep doing it.
This drop is bad if you are already retired and drawing down
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This drop is bad if you are already retired and drawing down
It's not "good", but I think "bad" might be taking it a bit far. If you retired with a reasonable plan (at least as reasonable as 4% SWR or better) it'll still just be a blip. Nothing to see here.
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Was the market down for October? I don't pay attention that closely. Just keep shoveling in cash, buying according to my IPS.
Basically lost all 2018 gains in October. We are down about $120k this month.
OP don't sell and you haven't actually lost anything.
Oh, sweet. My entire net paycheck (less one penny) went into the 457 November 1.
That's awesome. Great time to buy! Keep doing it.
This drop is bad if you are already retired and drawing down
Thanks! Timing was automated - that's when my employer puts it in. I was able to ramp up the 457 when MrsTX went back to work. It will max out with the December paycheck, with $2,300 of overflow into the 401k.
This drop doesn't even approach "bad" for a reasonable FIREd person. The market will go up, the market will go down. I wouldn't worry about it unless you have drops over 40%, or an extended duration flat/down combined with high inflation.
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If market dips of this size make you feel sick, then I suggest you adjust your assets to a more conservative asset allocation.
It'll stop you panic selling when we experience an actual market drop.
Don't do this if you ever hope to reach FIRE. Instead, read, study, and LEARN. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time here.
The difference of FIRE would be a few years (depending on how conservative you go, but I'm not suggesting people hold 60% in cash).
A huge part of investing is learning about the markets but also learning about yourself.
Absolutely keep learning about the quantitative components but feeling ill over a tiny bit of volatility indicates that the investor, based on their current quantitative knowledge, is not going to cope nor manage to make good decisions when there's actually a drop.
Many people on this forum (myself included) haven't experienced a market crash. The fact that there were people posting about being strong and stoic in the face of the recent "drops" has me a bit worried... :/
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quoteinvestigator.com
“The stock market will fluctuate”—J. P. Morgan
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Watching the market when you’re not even close to retiring is boring. I realized this when my colleagues started watching CNBC <gag> in the office lounge. I’m sure all those “experts” hyperventilating on TV know that this drop is nothing in the grand scheme but are acting just to get people who don’t know any better in a tizzy and stay glued to the TV. I saw so many “worst loss since February!” infograms that I changed the channel to NASA’s satellite feed to calm everyone the F down. Call me when something really bad happens, but I’ll probably know from all the foreclosure signs in front of McMansions.
/rant
It sucks the first time but after that you ignore it and do more useful things. Either that money is gone forever or it isn’t. Changing course now won’t help either way in the long term.
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Abe,
I think some of us pay attention to the markets because we want to see another 50% off sale. But yea, much less than that and it isn't terribly interesting.
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Yeah that would be interesting. We do get into lay-off territory there so not great for people with non-essential jobs. I agree that a little dip never hurt anyone, though.
I did look back at the times I invested more than usual after a dip and found the extra money it earned me is a rounding error compared to steady investments over time. Less than 5% of total value. I may just suck at timing, but I bet that’s not far from average
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For those who just retired, how are you feeling about it? @sol?
Meh, the only thing I worry about is that I'm totally not worried at all, but maybe I should be? Like I'm not even exactly sure how much my accounts have dropped, which is an absolutely shocking thing for someone like me to say given that I spent the last ten years of my life obsessively tracking my account balances on a day by day basis.
Part of my reason for not worrying is that after I picked a retirement date in about April or May, the market bumped like 10% while I was still working and by the time I officially did my last day in August I felt like I had a solid 10%+ buffer, such that even an immediate correction would still put me at a number I was comfortable with. Part of it is that I'm not 100% stocks, so when the market drops 10% my assets drop by something less than that. Part of is that I have several other little income streams (rentals, etc), and a huge buffer of accessible assets I could tap if necessary, but so far I have needed neither. If things got super dire, I could sell a rental and immediately pocket over 100k after taxes and fees, and that sort of cash buffer would support my family for more than long enough for me to find another way to make more money, if it came to that. It hasn't! I've been actively turning away hints that I might dip my toe back into the workforce. Screw that noise, man, working is for suckers.
But honestly I think the biggest reason I am not at all stressed about the current market declines is that retirement has handed me a completely new mindset about money. Now that I've FIREd, it's like the money side of things is just solved, and I don't worry about it anymore. I don't stress about making purchases, I don't stress about market gyrations, I just don't generally consider the financial side of most decisions. I mean I'm not blowing huge amounts of money on stupid shit, but after decades of frugal living I've developed a pretty instinctive understanding of what my expenses are and as long as I'm still living the same kind of life I've always lived, then I have confidence it's all going to work out.
Okay, you convinced me to go check the markets and put dollar amounts on my hypothetical losses. It looks like the market is back to where it was in July? Was everyone freaking the fuck out back in July? Does the extra four months without a positive gain since then somehow justify a new freak out now that wasn't justified then? Suddenly all of this talk about "major losses" seems kind of silly to me. No matter how big your paper losses look, if you're right back where you were four months ago then you really haven't lost much of consequences. Some years you'll be negative for an entire year, and that happens all the fucking time! Like every four years, on average in the historic record, on our way to that ~9% long term CAGR.
I am back to not being worried at all. Financial freedom is great. The markets go up, the markets go down, I am still rich either way.
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I have no idea what we've lost. I'd guess it's solidly in the 5 figures range somewhere. To figure it out, I'd need to go back and find the historical data for the high (of that's the benchmark we are using for "lost") and then update to current values. That's a lot of work for data that is in no way actionable. Come July (my annual reckoning and rebalancing date), I'll update everything again. And I still won't really care what the number say.
If it truly bothers you, stop looking. If you aren't planning to retire or cash out for other reasons any time soon, you don't really need to know.
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It might be fun to start a thread where all the old timers like me tell you about our worst month/year in investing. Back in 2008, between losses in my stock portfolio and losses in home equity, I was down over a half million. I had been through it before in 1987 and 2000. Did not sell anything and kept on buying all the way down to the bottom in 2009. By 2015 I had fully recovered and then some. Retired Jan.1, 2015.
Greystache sums it up. Warren Buffet has said that you cannot go broke betting on the US economy. Old timers have been here before, and like Greystache I rode out the 1987 bust. Do not sell.
For perspective I attach a link to the Dow Jones over the last 100 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dow_Jones_Industrial_Average#/media/File:DJIA_historical_graph_to_jul11_(log).svg
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Its perfectly normal and reasonable to be worried or freak out when the market drops like it did in October. You should not however take action on it. I was down over $120k at the end of October. Not a great number. But the logic side is this put be back to December 2017. I lost unrealized gains. I am still miles ahead from if I stuffed it under a mattress.
I have been through a few big drops since I started investing in 1996. Still haven't sold yet. One thing that is helpful is to make notes of how you feel or your market predictions after a big swing. Maybe make a comment at the end of each month in your tracking file. Or just go look at the "top is in" posts and match them up to the actual historical market. For me looking back at my balances for 20 years I can see that I never would have guessed when the top or bottom was. If I bought or sold based on emotions and fear I would have lost out on lots of gains and be constantly second guessing my trades every day. Instead I could stick to the plan, let the money ride and hope that history repeats itself.
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From the October peak to the October bottom our portfolio lost more than our last house was worth. We finished funding the HSA at that time and diverted an entire pay into her 457 to top it up. Now not only are those buys in the green but we have extra cashflow to put into our robo-invested, taxable accounts.
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If market dips of this size make you feel sick, then I suggest you adjust your assets to a more conservative asset allocation.
It'll stop you panic selling when we experience an actual market drop.
Don't do this if you ever hope to reach FIRE. Instead, read, study, and LEARN. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time here.
i think you're being a bit dogmatic there. said another way, an investor could never fire with a conservative asset allocation. clearly untrue.
some folks are fine at 100%+ equity exposure. Others, not so much. there's different ways to skin the cat and to each their own.
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If market dips of this size make you feel sick, then I suggest you adjust your assets to a more conservative asset allocation.
It'll stop you panic selling when we experience an actual market drop.
Don't do this if you ever hope to reach FIRE. Instead, read, study, and LEARN. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time here.
The difference of FIRE would be a few years (depending on how conservative you go, but I'm not suggesting people hold 60% in cash).
A huge part of investing is learning about the markets but also learning about yourself.
Absolutely keep learning about the quantitative components but feeling ill over a tiny bit of volatility indicates that the investor, based on their current quantitative knowledge, is not going to cope nor manage to make good decisions when there's actually a drop.
Many people on this forum (myself included) haven't experienced a market crash. The fact that there were people posting about being strong and stoic in the face of the recent "drops" has me a bit worried... :/
well put.
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I just logged into my various investment accounts today to update my FIRE spreadsheet (I do this monthly) and was surprised to see I'm down by $13k. I feel queasy, but at the same time I'm excited, because that means that my investments are now capable of making or loosing more than I can make with my job in one month.
Just wanted to tell someone, but most people I know wouldn't get it. I imagine many of you lost at least that much in October.
Having gone through 2008, I didn't even bat an eye this past month.
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I just logged into my various investment accounts today to update my FIRE spreadsheet (I do this monthly) and was surprised to see I'm down by $13k. I feel queasy, but at the same time I'm excited, because that means that my investments are now capable of making or loosing more than I can make with my job in one month.
Just wanted to tell someone, but most people I know wouldn't get it. I imagine many of you lost at least that much in October.
Having gone through 2008, I didn't even bat an eye this past month.
I didn't even notice until people started talking about it here.
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If market dips of this size make you feel sick, then I suggest you adjust your assets to a more conservative asset allocation.
It'll stop you panic selling when we experience an actual market drop.
Don't do this if you ever hope to reach FIRE. Instead, read, study, and LEARN. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time here.
i think you're being a bit dogmatic there. said another way, an investor could never fire with a conservative asset allocation. clearly untrue.
some folks are fine at 100%+ equity exposure. Others, not so much. there's different ways to skin the cat and to each their own.
This is laugh out loud funny. Do you ever read the actual blog? The whole point is to retire As Early As Possible. I did not say "never", but this is not the place for people who want to maybe retire...someday.
FFS, Pete himself doesn't carry homeowner's insurance and doesn't even wear a helmet. He scoffs at the fearful.
And for the record, it's the timidity I responded to. I made no asset allocation recommendations. The way to conquer fear is through education.
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FFS, Pete himself doesn't carry homeowner's insurance ...
From a financial perspective of having so much money he would just buy another house with his stash.
That's not a financial position most people are in.
Context matters.
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FFS, Pete himself doesn't carry homeowner's insurance ...
From a financial perspective of having so much money he would just buy another house with his stash.
That's not a financial position most people are in.
Context matters.
Hey SwordGuy! I just read both of your journals today - you're killing it! I hope both of your girls are all recovered from their travails and your back is back to normal.
I agree with you a thousand percent! We don't encourage people to go all conservative if they hope to achieve the E portion of RE, much less FI.
On a personal note, regarding Homeowner's Insurance, I could do the same thing. No fucking way would I take such a risk. Not the same as going all conservative with your investments any time the wind kicks up a little. Insurance was just an example that the whole MMM/FIRE thing is not based on being afraid of a reasonable amount of risk. MMM takes more risks than most, not less.
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Glad to hear that for the majority of you this dip was no big deal. I was never at risk of divesting, because I understand the math.
Honestly most of my fear was around what would happen if my wife looked at our accounts. For better or worse, that is pretty unlikely. She’s more frugal and concerned about money than I am and I “manage” our investments because looking at the peaks and dips would increase her already high anxiety levels.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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For those that are heavy stocks, think about switching out some of your total stock market for VDC defensive plays, it pays a little less then VTI in strong bull markets, but does much better in down markets. My portfolio is actually up since July.
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For those that are heavy stocks, think about switching out some of your total stock market for VDC defensive plays, it pays a little less then VTI in strong bull markets, but does much better in down markets. My portfolio is actually up since July.
Switching my asset allocation in response to market swings is exactly what I should not do. That is exactly contrary to what all of us have been saying: just hang tight and keep investing. Things will work out for the best in the long run if you do not try to time the market.
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If market dips of this size make you feel sick, then I suggest you adjust your assets to a more conservative asset allocation.
It'll stop you panic selling when we experience an actual market drop.
Don't do this if you ever hope to reach FIRE. Instead, read, study, and LEARN. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time here.
i think you're being a bit dogmatic there. said another way, an investor could never fire with a conservative asset allocation. clearly untrue.
some folks are fine at 100%+ equity exposure. Others, not so much. there's different ways to skin the cat and to each their own.
This is laugh out loud funny. Do you ever read the actual blog? The whole point is to retire As Early As Possible. I did not say "never", but this is not the place for people who want to maybe retire...someday.
FFS, Pete himself doesn't carry homeowner's insurance and doesn't even wear a helmet. He scoffs at the fearful.
And for the record, it's the timidity I responded to. I made no asset allocation recommendations. The way to conquer fear is through education.
Not the message I got. I thought the whole point of this blog was life optimization with a heavy tilt towards using money to achieve that end?
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The only reason I mind the recent dip is because it makes updating my monthly progress in the "Race from $X to $X" thread less enjoyable.
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Not bothered at all. Went through 2008 and this so far has been nothing compared to that. Just being consistent and buying as usual.
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My portfolio was pretty much down exactly % of the Drop in the Nasdaq. Always seems closest to my portfolio with a 60/40 allocation at Vanguard. But like Dicey mentioned you just keep going with it. Its healthy for the market as well since we really havent had much of a correction in the longest time.
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Its healthy for the market as well since we really havent had much of a correction in the longest time.
This sort of attitude is absolutely subversive. Don't you watch Cramer? You're supposed to be having an emotional meltdown right now so you can sell low and help people like me (and Cramer) take ownership of your distressed assets. You're supposed to be whipsawing your entire financial empire from Netflix to bonds to Tesla to gold every few days, generating transaction fees for money managers and creating artificial bubbles in a rotating list of hot new investment opportunities. Didn't you learn anything from bitcoin? How am I supposed to generate 30% per year returns if I can't profit from your stupidity?
All of this calm cool and collected MMM-style asset management is just ruining the markets. You passive people are going to turn into super-wealthy scions and then I'll have to share my slice of the US economy with you. It's much better for me if you all go back to relentlessly chasing an extra 1.8% per year by hopping on every new bandwagon that comes along. Please ignore the healthcare, finance, and durable consumer goods sectors and go all in on marijuana stocks, or maybe a hot new AI startup.
They sky is falling, we're all going to die, and so you should sell me all of your index funds at fire sale prices.
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One too many Bloody Mary's, sol?
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FFS, Pete himself doesn't carry homeowner's insurance ...
From a financial perspective of having so much money he would just buy another house with his stash.
That's not a financial position most people are in.
Context matters.
Hey SwordGuy! I just read both of your journals today - you're killing it! I hope both of your girls are all recovered from their travails and your back is back to normal.
I agree with you a thousand percent! We don't encourage people to go all conservative if they hope to achieve the E portion of RE, much less FI.
On a personal note, regarding Homeowner's Insurance, I could do the same thing. No fucking way would I take such a risk. Not the same as going all conservative with your investments any time the wind kicks up a little. Insurance was just an example that the whole MMM/FIRE thing is not based on being afraid of a reasonable amount of risk. MMM takes more risks than most, not less.
@Dicey , thanks for the compliments! The ladies of the house are healing but still injured. I'm hoping all will be well by the end of January. Fingers crossed!
Now that we're no longer working we cut our term life insurance. We don't need the insurance money to pay for funeral bills or get by, so it made sense to cut it out of our budget. It was costing about $5k a year for the two of us. (Remember that we're older than most MMM readers.)
We're keeping health insurance (for the obvious reasons) here in the US. Our daughter just got prescribed some medication that will cost $2,000 a month for the next 24 months. We're hoping insurance will cover it. If not, we'll just cough up the money and be glad we saved for a rainy day.
We keep insurance on our home and our rental properties. The rental property coverage is pretty cheap, actually. Even so, it adds up with all our properties.
Our top 4 annual expenses are the home mortgage, medical insurance & fees, property tax, and property insurance.
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Its healthy for the market as well since we really havent had much of a correction in the longest time.
This sort of attitude is absolutely subversive. Don't you watch Cramer? You're supposed to be having an emotional meltdown right now so you can sell low and help people like me (and Cramer) take ownership of your distressed assets. You're supposed to be whipsawing your entire financial empire from Netflix to bonds to Tesla to gold every few days, generating transaction fees for money managers and creating artificial bubbles in a rotating list of hot new investment opportunities. Didn't you learn anything from bitcoin? How am I supposed to generate 30% per year returns if I can't profit from your stupidity?
All of this calm cool and collected MMM-style asset management is just ruining the markets. You passive people are going to turn into super-wealthy scions and then I'll have to share my slice of the US economy with you. It's much better for me if you all go back to relentlessly chasing an extra 1.8% per year by hopping on every new bandwagon that comes along. Please ignore the healthcare, finance, and durable consumer goods sectors and go all in on marijuana stocks, or maybe a hot new AI startup.
They sky is falling, we're all going to die, and so you should sell me all of your index funds at fire sale prices.
LOL.... there’s a lot going on between those ears...
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Besides the race to threads I only track year end numbers in my spreadsheet and my spreadsheet doesn't start until 2013. This is great for not sweating the monthly bounces. However, it makes me very curious about these downturns because I know was putting money into a 401K in 2008 & 2009 but I don't have those numbers to see what my personal bounce was and I want to know. I know that I changed jobs and rolled over my 401k in late 2008 which means I probably locked in a LOT of loss but I can't see how much and it annoys me. I obviously wasn't putting in very much money because the dollar amount that I have for 2013 year end is pretty small compared to what I would have liked to see (looking back). I can see that 2015 year end was barely up over 2014 year end so I am guessing that year was not awesome but it was still positive, maybe due to contributions but I doubt that my contributions were that high as that was the 1st full year of baby 1 and I am pretty sure I lowered contributions (obviously before I started reading MMM).
Anyways, what I wanted to say is that the data of tracking these things monthly are fun to look back on but that is about all they are good for. If it stresses you out or makes you worried, then stop tracking them monthly and pick a bigger interval (quarterly, semi-annual, annual, etc). I have been watching this bounce really close because I am fascinated with it and have even complained about what it is doing to my $$ balance but ultimately I will only "track" my Dec 31st total so this bounce might not even show up on my graph (similar to 2015). I just watch, sometimes with my mouth hanging open, and wonder how big and when the next up tick will be. I do have goals damn it and I don't need some inanimate object (like the market) dictating if I can reach those goals or not ... wait that is probably not true.