Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Zero expectations of some stock picks or useful information - which should be why we are all here.
A lot of expectations of pointless arguments about nonsense.
You argue just to argue and in all honesty I haven't seen you contribute anything to these boards.
It was a very valid question in terms of your response. If you really didn't have much to lose saying you lost nothing zero is put into perspective. The fact you feel I've contributed nothing is irrelevant as I have done a fair amount of educating and learning here
It was a very valid question in terms of your response. If you really didn't have much to lose saying you lost nothing zero is put into perspective. The fact you feel I've contributed nothing is irrelevant as I have done a fair amount of educating and learning here
It wasn't valid at all, it was you stirring the pot.
I've been investing for 25 years. So yeah, I had $$ that could have been lost in the '08 meltdown.
It wasn't valid at all, it was you stirring the pot.
I've been investing for 25 years. So yeah, I had $$ that could have been lost in the '08 meltdown.
It was entirely valid based on the conversation that was going on. When did you go into cash or cd? Was that in 07 or 08? When did you get back into the market?
I have a naive but entirely serious question, aimed at everyone who moves large amounts of their portfolio based on news or hunches or whatnot (I'm not referring to high-frequency traders): how does one muster the gumption to do such a thing? I'm a buy-and-hold investor, not because I pray to a statue of John Bogle in my basement, but because in my personal credo, it's just - how shall I say? - irresponsible to do anything else. Some other stance might be wiser or more profitable. I'm not debating that. I'm not asserting that the passive approach is superior, or even good. That's another debate. Merely I ask: how can anyone, staring at their life's accumulation of assets, ever take any substantial action, other than of course nibbling at the edges (trading with play-money, annual rebalancing, trimming a cash-position in favor of equities during another dip, etc.)?
Last edited by ohio_peasant; 05-18-2016 at 12:08 PM..
It was entirely valid based on the conversation that was going on. When did you go into cash or cd? Was that in 07 or 08? When did you get back into the market?
I had quite a bit in cash but the real reason I broke even was that I was TRADING. When I saw good quality companies that were way down in price I would try to pick them up on the cheap, ride them up a few dollars and then sell. The strategy worked on some, didn't work on others and since it's been almost 8 years I can't remember specific tickers. Hope that's ok with you, or do you want to me dig up the brokerage statements.
They will go lower and then up and lower and then up. Nobody knows how low, when, when they would turn again, and how high before dropping again. For those that keep large amounts in cash, have you done the math on what you have lost / are losing?
I still have a relatively small account and the only reason I sit on cash is to put together larger buys so that the flat fee for stock trades isn't as big as a hit. I did that a few months ago. I held the cash for two months.
Last month I went ahead and opened a new position in a different ETF (free trades on many ETFs). This month I split the contribution between 3 ETFs.
I have a naive but entirely serious question, aimed at everyone who moves large amounts of their portfolio based on news or hunches or whatnot (I'm not referring to high-frequency traders): how does one muster the gumption to do so such a thing?
I've only done it once, during 1999-2000. This wasn't based on a hunch, but rather purely on the numbers. Emotionally it was not an easy thing to do, but the warning signals were clear. Many big-cap stocks were so expensive that I couldn't justify owning them even with a 20-year outlook. In my 401k I did not have many alternatives, so I ended up shifting a lot of money into bond funds. In taxable accounts I sold the high flyers, with the proceeds reinvested partly in low-valuation REITs, financials, etc... and partly in rental properties.
I was not happy with the allocation, but had resigned myself to possibly being a big bond investor for a long, long time. Of course it didn't take too long for prices to right themselves, and especially during 2008-2011 one could buy all of those high-quality companies (that rarely go on sale) at very reasonable valuations.
Comparing today to 2000, stocks are quite a bit cheaper, but bonds are much more expensive. I've not made any big shifts in allocation. Yes there will be another bear someday, but of course they do not arrive on any particular schedule. We can see two bears in five years, or go ten years without seeing any.
I had quite a bit in cash but the real reason I broke even was that I was TRADING. When I saw good quality companies that were way down in price I would try to pick them up on the cheap, ride them up a few dollars and then sell. The strategy worked on some, didn't work on others and since it's been almost 8 years I can't remember specific tickers. Hope that's ok with you, or do you want to me dig up the brokerage statements.
You could dig up the statements if you wanted to but you've provided enough to support how iffy your didn't lose money didn't make money statement was
I personally always question those that say they "knew" when to sell and they "knew when to buy. If they happened to get lucky with one of the calls the odds of getting the other side right increases even more dramatically. I was talking with a FA the other day that was telling me how he knew something wasn't right and got his clients out of the market before the crash..my question to him was & when did you get back in?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
