The government will decide what you are worth. Be thankful there’s anything left at this point.

youre investing in the wrong index fund. as of today , total US  stock market is down 3.98% from the top. SP500 is down 3.41 % from top

And there it is. Most people don’t know what they’re buying in their 401k nor the fees. That’s why I keep posting in these threads. Know what you’re buying, understand the fund, it’s goals and the fees.

Damn, I'm only up 14% over the past 12 months!

They go up, they go down.

Keep on buying, keep on holding.

Attached File

My 401k “lost”  $86,000-ish in the last 14 days.  It “made” $17,000-ish today.  You don’t lose money if you don’t sell/move things around.  This is just a blip.

I'm up just over 16k today. Not too bad, wish I could do that every day

Don't want to be in cash, cause Biden is fucking cash up.

I'm invested but my particular investments are doing crappy.

Not sure what to do

Will it indefinitely outrun hyperinflation, invasion of illegals, orwellian dystopia, etc etc etc?

I you look the historical trends of the market on average it makes around 5% a year.  If you look at it year to year then one year it might be 30% gain and the following year a 20% loss.  If you can time the market to not take the loss but capture all the gain 100% of the time.....you would the best financial advisor/stock guy ever.  

If you know the market is going to tank its is best to put your shit in low funding bonds, it won't keep up with inflation but you will get a minimum gain without taking a loss.  The biggest question is when to move your shit to capture the most gain and no loss and Vs versa to move from bonds back to high gain funds/stocks.  I tried a few times to "time the market" I lost my ass every time.  

That being said, normally I just ride the wave but with 5 years of good gains with a big but short speed bump mixed in due to Kung flu we are due for a hit in my book.  This is because you have inflation on the biggest trend in 30+ years then to add all the dumb ass polices and bills.  Combine this with nobody wants to work and the supply chain is shit and Xiden is begging OPEC lower the price of oil (IE. produce more) I have no faith in the market.  I did something I might regret and moved some of my assets in the past month, before Thanksgiving.  I now sit with 75% in a no risk fund but pathetic gain and all my future purchases are in high risk stocks so I hope to buy at bottom barrel prices.  My mix before had less than 15% of my investments in a no risk fund.  I timed the market back in March 2020 and started my ROTH IRA with 2019 funds and 2020 funds.  I successfully made a very rare market timing event but pretty obvious if you looked at it from the outside.    The big question will be is when will the market hit a low and move my stuff back to a higher risk fund.  If I can't time this right I will loose the point of moving it to start with.  Not sure if I can get lucky twice in less than 3 years. This is assuming the market goes down and starts to recover in the next year or two.

As a note I learned back in 2009 what the effect of buying low and selling high meant.  I maxed out my 401k at that point ever since then, before I was just using my employer match.  I should have done it a year earlier but wasn't paying attention yet...

Inflation is insane. Wages have not gone up. Cost of living not affordable. Nobody is buying anything. Not that there is anything on the shelves.
Billionaires, CEO's and other insiders are pulling their money out or just sitting it out.
Real estate is insane and unsustainable. It will collapse.  
The wildcard is whatever the hell the .gov is going to do. We'll find out soon enough.
I personally believe if the market was truly a free market without any QE the S&P would be valued around 2000. What we're seeing now is pure greed. I believe if it crashes, it'll crash hard and we won't see the 4500's again in the S&P for decades. It won't be no cute little "V" shape recovery like the hiccup we had in 2020.
Just my prediction and worth exactly what you paid for it.

Demand for damn near everything is through the roof.

What I'm seeing in my little retail corner of the world and what numbers are being published about black friday and general retail suggests otherwise.
I think demand on certain items seems high because of the shortages in the market like cars, building materials and toilet paper.

I can't deny this but not sure if it is a keeping it in stock problem due to shipping, not enough workers to produce the product to ship it, or everyone is still buying or increased buying shit.  The first two reasons go back to supply issues, the last one is the key which I do not have the answer to.  I will say I have been more "loose" with my CC lately just because if I don't buy it now I might not be able to get it in the next 6 months....  This goes back around to the big shit ticket debacle of 2020, how many at least doubled the amount of TP on hand after that?

Even completely ignoring what the stock market is doing and just looking at reality, it doesn't look good. It just doesn't compute on how we're going to get out of this without massive pain.
Average household income in the US is something like 70k a year. Now take that and the knowledge that the average family doesn't have $1000 in savings saved up for emergencies. Something like 70%? The majority at least.
That average household didn't get a raise between now and the past 2 years. But look what's happened. A family can easily be spending nearly double on groceries and other essentials just to keep the house and kids going.
Now compound that with normal maintenance is nearly impossible to accomplish. A washing machine or fridge broke? No parts, pretty much stuck with having to get a new one. Car break down? Going to be several weeks before it can be fixed. Families all around just opened up their heating bill for the first time this year since turning their natural gas furnaces on and noticing prices have nearly tripled.
All these people are just cutting things out.
Now, hundreds of thousands have died from the 'rona and there was a big transfer of wealth. A lot of the younger generation is probably spending a lot of that money driving up demand for home improvement supplies and real estate for somewhere to park that money.
But for the majority of the country, the spending has stopped.
In my little part of the world, I sell appliances. I bought this store at the beginning of 2020 (what I wouldn't do to change that!) in addition to another business I own and your average every day run of the mill Speed Queen w/d set sells for around 1800 for a TR3/DR3 model up to about 2200 a set for the TR7/DR7 set, with the popular 5's and the TC5 set somewhere in the middle.
Just got the notification that the 7 set is going up, to around 3200 a set. A straight up $1000 increase from when I started not even 2 years ago. Speed Queen isn't even making the cheap ones right now, so you pretty much have to buy the top of the line.
Now imagine the family coming in to replace their old machines with salaries the same as always and less than $1000 in savings and generally afraid of what the future may hold for them in terms of their aging car, questionable employment, etc.
Retail isn't doing so hot. What a person buys is going to make that other thing the person wants to buy impossible. Can you hear the sound of wallets slamming shut when you close your eyes? I sure can.
To make it more difficult, I'm in the middle of farm country. Costs of fertilizer tripling and other farm inputs, plus the drought, and at the minimum we're looking at even higher food prices for next year and even a shittier retail experience for me and my part of the world.
Now take a look again at the stock market. Does it really belong up in the clouds where it is right now? Are things really that good? Are we really in a better spot than we were 10 years ago? By 3x margins?
Is there something I'm completely missing?
People "feel" richer now because the stock market and home prices are up right now, but if that were to all go away tomorrow and people are right back to where they were in 2009, what's that going to do to the economy? Pull the rug out from underneath, make people lose all faith in ever trusting investments in the stock market again? Making a short term recovery impossible?

I’ve been taking a bath as well.  403b to be exact since I got a new employer in May of this year that’s a non-profit and rolled my 401K into a 403b.

It drops 600 points I lose $10000, it goes up 600 points I make $4000 back.

Buy buy buy when it is down, so easy a cave man can do it.

YTD return is +14.50%

1 year is 20.5%

No complaints here except on the stupid weed stocks and meme stocks I was playing around with.  Should have used that cash to pay down debt

Stop looking at it.  

Yes.  I look at my accounts four times a year when I get my quarterly statements.  Sometimes I don't bother looking even then.  Just because every company has an app for instant access to check every speck of financial data, doesn't mean we should incorporate that routine into our lives.  

Sometimes it's better to check often. You don't want your accounts hacked and money drained. If you don't catch it and several months pass, it can make it harder to recover it

If you are still making automatic contributions, it was simply a bargain buying moment.

A good fund manager took advantage of this opportunity.

Unless you needed all your money, right now, to pay for a kidney operation, you’ll be fine.

I understand the concern.  Unfortunately, once the money leaves the institution it's probably 50/50 it's coming back if caught same day because the receiving bank might be able to stop it before the next transaction.  If longer than that, it's gone forever.  The good news is generally speaking, 401k fund providers have pretty good controls in place for verifying the client is the real person.

I didn't pull out then, either. In fact, I never pull out....

Yep

Yeah, but after inflation you are probably just breaking even for the year.

Not kidding.

You are drunk.  Other parts in your post may be true but to be this far off on these two key assumptions should put any conclusions you've made up to this point into question.

I love GD stock market threads

And there lies the problem. Ready to go. But now not so much.

However , even though it lost , it's still up 12.5% for the year.

It's full of Chicken Little "The sky is falling!" And I'M A Boss "And never lose!"

The people in the middle just keep doing what they always do and averaging in for the long haul when they aren't staring down the retirement shotgun barrel tomorrow...

It's kinda funny. I check my 401k's maybe twice a year max. I kinda just leave them on autopilot. However when it comes to crypto I monitor my holdings all day everyday.

Do you need it days from now or years/decades?

VTSAX FTW

Today got worse. Much worse.

I don't worry about it and just let it ride. Even since the COVID slump of Mar 2020, I've nearly doubled my money, despite some huge dips in some months. You have to realize the more you have in the accounts, the greater the highs and lows will be - numerically, and just be willing to recognize that.

Think about it...if you only have $100k and you lose 10% in one month (before bouncing back), then your loss is $10k. Now, let's say you have $1 million and take the same 10% loss. Well, that one is a temporary $100k hit. Obviously a lot more money, but still the same percentage. Mathematically, when you recover that 10% on the $1 million, the increase will yield more because the steady % increases are compounded on a higher amount. Does that make sense? You'll potential increases loss on the 10% will be more significant on the higher amount, but you'll recover more in the end. Regardless, don't worry about it.

The “Average income” family doesn’t buy a Speed Queen.   It would be Arfcom type dudes who make 3-5 times your cited average.  
Fwiw, we also repair our current washers with Youtube and $30 valves from Ebay.

You do make some good points, about the other stuff.

If your 401k contributions buy today you should be happy.

I bought more ET this AM.

What timing. Don't fuck up putting it back in like most people do. Often times ending up worse off than if they just left it alone.

I put half of my portfolio into cash back in February when GME was going on.  I figured that was Peak Insanity.  But apparently, not yet...

LOL. Rookies!  Let me introduce you to the late 70's. If you don't recognize this as a buying opportunity, get out now and don't ever jump back in.

The gov is looking at it too, don't worry. You'll help a lot of people when all is said and done.

The 70's was probably one of the best decades in USA history. Patriotism was high, things were still made here.
Compare that with today and the level of optimism isn't quite the same.
There will be a good opportunity to get back in. We have a ways to go. We aren't even close yet.

Ahh, yes.  Let's all harken back fondly to the glory days of 20 percent inflation and the Carter administration

Well thank goodness I don't have access to log in and look today. Vacation Friday!

Nope. I have no worries.

Normally I wouldn't be concerned. However either this month or January i'll most likely be retiring.

Like most , I would just look at the quarterly statement and kind of shrug.

But the past few months I've been like a hawk.  It goes up it goes down, well now its down more than I wanted it to be before I pull the plug.

I looked at mine too.... FJB... And China