Market trends - stock market

That makes sense, you didn't want to be as exposed to the volatility of the markets and wanted some more security. 2020 was one heck of a year in terms of rapid falls in stock prices, the fastest fall in stock market history and then the rapid recovery after march 2020. It seems to be forgotten about now but 2020 hit me much harder than 2008 and 2009 although it was very temporary as I just sat the whole thing out. There is no agony aunt for investors, you are on your own when the markets go crazy.

We are all human I had similar experiences. It just shows you how difficult emotionally stock market investing is due to the volatility. I am not 100% invested myself, but probably 80% of liquid assets are in stocks
 
It's hard to take someone seriously when they say...
galway_blow_in said:
I’m up 16.02% YTD
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Are you this guy?

Man sprints to the start of the London Marathon to lead the race for a memorable 10 seconds

A marathon runner was spotted in the lead ahead of the professional athletes.
www.ladbible.com
 
Being up 16.9% ytd is great for you, but in reality the gain measured over a 9 months is completely immaterial.

Investing is a long term activity and it's the gain over 5, 10 or more years that matters not the short term gains or losses
 
jpd said:
Being up 16.9% ytd is great for you, but in reality the gain measured over a 9 months is completely immaterial.

Investing is a long term activity and it's the gain over 5, 10 or more years that matters not the short term gains or losses
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Agreed , my opening thread was about far more than my YTD , it’s unfortunate the house regulars felt the need to light on this small note
 
galway_blow_in said:
no one here is describing having stuck everything in a Brazilian Brewery or a South African diamond company
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I hold my hands up, I do have a small shareholding in a Brazilian brewery, Ambev, its down 25% so far this year but that goes with investing in emerging markets. Somebody has to own those stocks, if everyone was to invest in the S&P500 etf surely that creates distortions and mispricing in that those stocks become over owned. That's actually one of the criticisms of etfs that if everyone is just blindly buying the etf well then those stocks in that index become over bought
 
Can I respectfully ask what is the point of this thread?

I’m not trying to be argumentative- I genuinely don’t know what the OP wanted to achieve in starting this thread.
 
Reactions: jpd
Sarenco said:
Can I respectfully ask what is the point of this thread?
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We don’t allow discussion of individual shares.

I don’t like this type of pointless discussion either but it gives us an opportunity to tell people that trying to beat the market is pointless
 
Wealth accumulates over time.

My biggest regret is that I wasn't disciplined enough to save a percentage of my salary into the stock market from when I got my first job. I have dabbled in and out but often sold to fund life expenses.

I still don't see why this forum continually promotes an all or nothing approach. Even a pension isn't a 100% allocation to one asset class.

I don't see why it isn't good advice to follow a balanced approach with your investment capital split across pension, mortgage overpayment, cash savings, market indices, individual stocks and even crypto.

All serve different purposes.
 
Sarenco said:
Can I respectfully ask what is the point of this thread?

I’m not trying to be argumentative- I genuinely don’t know what the OP wanted to achieve in starting this thread.
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Are you as equally puzzled by the contributors who claimed that my strategy was akin to “ beating oneself to a pulp with a bat “ ?
 
galway_blow_in said:
Are you as equally puzzled by the contributors who claimed that my strategy was akin to “ beating oneself to a pulp with a bat “ ?
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Not really.

Do you want comments or observations on your investment approach?

Or what discussion were you hoping to prompt?
 
Gordon Gekko said:
My view or Joe Sod’s view is not as valid or valuable as, say, the Chief Investment Officer at Goldman Sachs.
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The chief investment officer of any major investment bank has more training and experience than you do.

He is responsible for investing other peoples money, you are responsible for investing your own money.

He is answerable to a range of people with a range of views some quite ridiculous (ESG for example) some with merit in themselves but no contribution to investment return, (diversity policy, climate investing for example). You are responsible to no one but yourself.

He is a victim of his own prejudices, just as you are of yours, but you don't get be the chief investment officer of any major investment bank with out a bullish aggressive predisposition. A random investor is entitled to believe that they are less exposed to the latest fad, or pressure to follow the herd.
 
You make great points here, there is alot of political and societal pressure on these investment banks and funds to have the "right" kind of stocks and they are essentially not allowed to buy many stocks out there that might make perfect financial sense but don't pass the ESG scores. The universe of stocks that these guys are allowed to buy is actually getting smaller. That inevitably creates a positive feedback loop because they are driving up the prices of the same stocks , I think an extreme example of this phenomenon was Cathy Wood.

I remember in 2020 when the oil price collapsed all these big funds like the Norwegian Sovereign wealth fund and Blackrock announced that they were divesting of all their fossil fuel investments, Last year they quietly shelved that plan as oil stocks shot up and then they meekly said that they were unable to sell them down afterall due to the money that was rolling in which was balancing out the fall in value of other stocks and bonds that had fallen as a result of inflation and interest rate rises
 
You’re right. Some guy down in the pub buying UK equities and avoiding US tech firms has a better chance of managing a portfolio effectively than the Chief Investment Officer at a major investment bank.

The guy down in the pub also does a little heart surgery on the side and drafts legal agreements for aircraft leasing firms.

The public has had enough of experts.
 
heart surgery is not equivalent to an "investment manager" because its not based on technical skill but on your reputation, many of these guys did not study to be an "investment manager" like for example a doctor or an engineer does, many studied arts or classics like Boris Johnson and then fell in with an investment bank. Just read the backrounds and education of these guys.
Mark Woodford was an agriculturalist and was the top guy in the UK for years until well he wasn't .
Its not an exact science because the markets are unpredictable unlike for example the laws of thermodynamics therefore you can never be an expert.
Look at all the mathematicians and staticians working in the financial markets and they still get it wrong. In fact in 2020 they had to stop these algorithmic functions because the algorithms themselves were crashing the markets which made no sense based on fundamentals
 
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