Flying Fuck! Can you believe I just got into the stock market about 6 months ago, right before the financial world started rapidly heading south (I’m quite young, so this was my first real investment)?! I’m fortunate enough to have decades left in the market, but what few assets I have are getting raped in the mouth, ears, and beard. I don’t really have much more to say than this; I just needed a place to vent.
Aye-aye-aiaiaiaiai.
Damn, what a landmark of a threshold - below 10,000.
You’re kidding me, right? For most of my life, the DJIA has been well below 10,000.
If I had any extra money, now would be the time to buy. Those that do are going to be sitting on a mountain of cash in a few years.
As long as the investment is not in a business that goes kaput. 
An overall market decline of the type that is happening now, tends to drag the good companies down with it. As long as you invest in stocks of companies that have been around for a long time, have consistently performed well and produce stuff that people will always need, you are relatively safe and will end up making good money on your investments.
I second Justin_Bailey’s sentiment.
Nobody panic. It’s a perfectly normal part of the End Times.
I lost about 25% of my savings. Today.
So… I feel ya. I’m a little bit in awe. I thought I was well diversified and up until today nothing of mine had gone down. The sad thing is, I was depending on this money to finance my education and now I don’t think I’ll be able to afford my next semester without loans. Assuming there is anyone left to loan to me. Assuming they will even give me a loan.
I’m seriously worried about my future.
Shit.
Just to keep some perspective, the Dow was at 7,500 back in late 2002. So we’re not quite in End Times territory yet. I think we’ll look back at today’s minimum as a good time to buy, even if it’s not the absolute bottom.
That said, the suddenness and sharpness of the drop immediately after the damn bailout bill was passed really shocked me. The bill falters in the House and the market nosedives. The bill finally passes, and the market celebrates by…nosediving. WTF, market? What do you want from us??
I don’t know how far this is correct, but someone on one of the TV channels said that this is because the bailout was late and a good bit of the damage was already done.
I had a 'tard of a financial advisor who lost me money over the course of many many years. I was trying to dump most of my stock at the end of 2007 and his hemming and hawing caused me to lose quite a bit more. Fortunately, I managed to dump most of my stock when the DJA was at 13,100 or so. I’m looking like a genius, but I foresaw the mortgage meltdown years ago. I’m hesitant to jump back into the market, but now is the time to start to seriously monitor the market for bargains. I hope that dickwad is out of a job by now.
Of course they did. We passed a trillion dollar bill in less than a week but it was too late. BS. They spent months deciding what to do then gave us a 3 page ultimatum giving Paulson dictatorial powers. They claimed this was a fix. Now it is not their fault.
Not quite yet. Give it a couple of months. Then weigh in with everything you’ve got.
Did you not see the rally in the last hour? The Dow was down by over 800 points and overcame more than 400 points in the last hour.
Sure, but I think that was bargain hunting, not the bailout bill.
Some of the CEOs seem to be rejecting the strings on the money:
Not surprising. I thought the bill should have been structured as a direct offer to stockholders, not to boards of directors or senior executives. Don’t give the failed leadership a say, let them suck on their failure while the people holding the paper decide.
Our money, our strings. Seems so damn obvious from where I sit; that’s what THEY would tell anyone asking THEM for money …
What wisernow said. These are excellent conditions to buy stocks for income because the rout has driven dividend yields higher.
Following are just a few of the non-financial/real estate companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index whose yields are now 4.5% or more: Freeport-McMoRan, Pitney Bowes, Philip Morris International (recently spun off by Altria), Eli Lilly, Merck, Newell Rubbermaid, Lorillard, Dow Chemical, General Electric, Bristol-Myers, Altria, Pfizer. I haven’t even mentioned the utilities. None of this constitutes a recommendation to buy or sell securities of any kind, of course.
Fuck 'em. Were this a civilized nation, they’d be getting a single round to the back of the head instead of a golden parachute.