If I had $100,000 in the stock market when Trump was inaugurated, how much would I have now?
Let’s assume, to keep it simple, that you had an S&P 500 index fund (and I’m going to ignore fees and other charges). The S&P 500 closed at 2,263.69 on January 20, 2017. It closed at 2,480.64 on March 12, 2020. So your $100,000 would now be $109,583.
However, let’s say to put it all on Apple (AAPL) around Trump’s inauguration. That stock traded at 120.00 around then, so you would have purchased about 833 shares. Today it closed at 248.23, so those 833 shares would be worth $226,775. About a month ago that stock was trading at $325+, so it would have been worth over $270K.
So, it all depends on where you invested, and when you sold.
To put the broader market in perspective, the DOW closed at 19,827 around Trump’s inauguration. Today it closed at 21,200. However, about a month ago it was at all time highs around 29,500+. So, it looks today like Trump’s market is a dud, but a month ago it was roaring. Remember, you only lose money if you sell lower then what you paid. Panic selling will be costly for investors, but if you hold tight the market may recover, and is likely to do so.
It might be more accurate to take the ‘time value of money’ or inflation into account over that period as well.
So then it would be a good idea to panic buy during coronavirus when prices are low and when this is over, it will go back up? 
Perhaps. There was this tweet with similar advice a while back but it appears to have been deleted…
Amen! I’ve lost a lot of money in the last month (some of it in AAPL), but if I don’t sell now, I’ve only lost it on paper. I’ve had a lot of my stocks for 30 years, and have learned to ignore the short-term gains and losses.
I just ain’t cashing out and buying my mid-life-crisis car for a while…
Just a conspiracy theory…I wonder if one could conjure up something like this as a way to try and scare people into selling off all their stocks and take losses while “others” who knew the outcome of this would scoop up trillions in profit afterwards.
Another needed adjustment is that S&P-500 pays dividends. “SPY with dividends reinvested” is a better measure than just “SPY” but it isn’t usually presented that way.
If this was guaranteed, it would already be priced in. You don’t know better than the market, don’t try to time it.
I keep a pretty good spreadsheet of our IRA balances and the recent losses put us back to where we were in January of 2018. Down about 25%.
If you had bet big that coal was going to make a comeback, and invested all your bux in Peabody Energy you would have lost roughly 90% of your investment.
This would be the stupidest way to accomplish that. Look at all the trillions of dollars being lost by those companies because of cancelled events, disrupted supply chains, reduced travel, and lowered consumer demand. It’s possible that many business, perhaps even whole industries, might fall apart. Do you want to own a cruise line now?
If there is any real world analog to cutting off your nose to spite your face, such a stock scare story would be tops.
You haven’t lost a penny and you own just as many shares as you did before this downturn. The dollar value of your shares has gone down, but you won’t lose any money unless you choose to sell your shares now.
Many individuals and institutions leverage themselves into situations where they must come up with a certain amount of cash each month in order to pay off loans. These are the people now being forced into selling in a declining market and are losing their shirts, but they need cash and they need it now. The money they are losing now, is nothing compared to the money lost if they default on their loans.
…aaand today the Dow is up 2000 points. It seems like we’re in for some wild volatility.
Buy into the dips!
Total cumulative inflation since 2017 is about five and a half percent, so it’s not insignificant. The DJI as of right now is still higher than it was on January 20, 2017 een accounting for inflation.
Today it closed at 2711.02 so we are up to $119,759.