Buy VTSAX now while its this high or wait till a drop?

[habanero]

Last time I checked, there had never been a 20 year period when the stock market had negative returns.  If you intend to live at least 20 more years, stocks start to look like a sure bet.

It depends on how one defines "the stock market". The japanse NIKKEI index peaked at ~39000 at the very end of 1989. It is currently at 22250 or so. It hasn't been above 25000 since 1991.

[UnleashHell]

Last time I checked, there had never been a 20 year period when the stock market had negative returns.  If you intend to live at least 20 more years, stocks start to look like a sure bet.

It depends on how one defines "the stock market". The japanse NIKKEI index peaked at ~39000 at the very end of 1989. It is currently at 22250 or so. It hasn't been above 25000 since 1991.

have you - or anyone you know - put all their money into the Japanese stock market?

you may as well be talking about investing in Tulips.

[habanero]

have you - or anyone you know - put all their money into the Japanese stock market?

you may as well be talking about investing in Tulips.

Nope - but guess it could be a likely strategy (at least a large chunk of funds in the local market, which after all is a very big market) for someone living in Japan. Its quite different from going all-in on Tullips/cryto/whatever.

But someone who invested an equal nominal amount every year in the Japanese market since the hights would still have positive returns today (about 50% more than total put in and inflation has been very low - only about 14% over 30 years)

[DoNorth]

why not rebalance to your desired asset allocation?  If your comfort level and desired asset allocation is with more equities, then buy more.  If not, perhaps sell some equities and rebalance into bonds.  Market highs are a good time to lock in some gains with a few rebalancing trades, then consider DCAing the amount you rebalanced back into VTSAX.  If the market goes down, you've bought new shares on sale.  If it goes up, your new shares are worth more and so on.

[sol]

But someone who invested an equal nominal amount every year in the Japanese market since the hights would still have positive returns today (about 50% more than total put in and inflation has been very low - only about 14% over 30 years)

You're screaming into the wind.  As a general rule, any American who references the Nikkei crash as a reason to be fearful of the US market has no idea what they are talking about.  They usually don't understand the impact of dividends and currency fluctuations and DCA investing that have kept so many Japanese investors wealthy and prosperous despite what looks a horrible market collapse, at first glance.  Those folks also always fail to mention that the index doubled every ~18 months for almost a decade before that historic price drop.

For the minority of readers who don't know better yet, and hear about the Japanese market crash and tremble in fear, spend 30 minutes doing your research somewhere other than zerohedge and you'll probably feel a whole lot better.  Modern Japan isn't exactly a cautionary tale about capital markets.  It's not like an entire generation of Japanese people is eating cat food in their old age.

[habanero]

^ I totally agree, in case there was any doubt. I keep the bulk of my cash in the stock market and intend to continue putting cash to work there at a steady rate as I have been doing. But as most of my money is invested in international markets I get more currency risk than an USD-based investor. But over the long run I dont worry too much about that.

Most major stock indicies are total return indicies btw, so dividends are assumed fully reinvested. Plotting a major index with and without dividends reinvested is a fine exercise for seeing the impact of dividends over long time periods.