‘What I learned losing $50 million of other people’s money’
by Kim Iskyan
Source: True Wealth Asia
http://thecrux.com/former-hedge-fund-ma ... les-money/
The longest bear market didn’t begin in 1929 or 2007, but rather on January 11, 1973 [i].
The 437 days from peak-to-trough gave birth to many well-known value investors and also left in its wake a generation of brokers that would never return to Wall Street.
There are many lessons to be learned from this period but the main takeaway is that stocks can suck for a long, long time.
Thinking that you’re mentally prepared for this type of environment is not enough.
You must have a portfolio that truly matches your risk tolerance- not your risk tolerance today near all-time highs, but your actual risk tolerance.
Statistically, as Mark points out, the likelihood of a crash coming on any given day is small. But that is a little like telling a turkey not to worry because the likelihood of Thanksgiving is only 1 out of 365.
Eventually, all turkeys and all investors get whacked. And, generally, the longer a market goes without a correction, the more it needs one.
The typical investor is in his 50s. If the next stock crash is followed by a big bounce, like the other two crashes in the last 20 years. He will be glad he paid no attention to our warnings and just kept his money in stocks.
But what if the stock market crash of 2016 is more like the crash of 1929, or the bear market of ’66? He could have to wait 20 years to break even. Or if it is like the crash that happened in Japan in 1990, he’ll still be waiting in 2042.
Crashes of at least 20% are incredibly painful because of their rapid pace and long recovery times, but they're also more frequent than you may expect.
Since 1950, there have been 57 such crashes in four of the world's major indexes (the US' S&P 500, the UK's FTSE All Share, Germany's DAX, and Japan's TOPIX).
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