Well, my VGK play is feeling pretty good. It’s only down .43%, compared to the S&P I took the money from, which is -4%
Since I’m a long-term holder, this is one of the days I don’t look at my portfolio. And probably more than a day. It’s very easy to say “stocks always go up over time”, but it’s very hard to do and live that - to hold and never panic sell over that long period of time. I will do it, but it’s not like it won’t phase me or anything.
This is the price you have to pay to make money in stocks. You have to learn how to deal with the volatility.
Well, the indexes are certainly taking a hammering today.
I’m not going to react immediately, but for sure I’ll be watching very closely over the next few days…
Damn, I’m certainly glad that on Monday I liquidated my large-cap index fund holding, which was about 1/4 of my equities. Right now that money is sitting in a money market earning 4.16%. I’m perfectly happy to leave it right there while I decide what to do in the near future.
The rest of my mutual holdings are not faring very well today.
I have your same self-discipline. I just don’t have your self control: I look. I do the same thing up or down - nothing - but I stupidly look.
Part of me really wants to buy an S&P index and get a “free” 4% return right now; on top of the 3’ish% it was already down. I just don’t have the smarts to know if it’s on sale or not.
This is why Buffett sits on mountains of cash. Waiting for opportunities to present themselves and buying up the bargains. He has the smarts to know when things are on sale.
Use the same mantra you use about junk food at the groc store: “If you don’t buy it, you won’t eat it.”
We can’t avoid general news about the economy and stock market just like we can’t avoid grocery shopping. But we can avoid putting the Oreos (or whatever) into our cart more easily than we can avoid eating the Oreos in our pantry. The fewer times you look at your portfolio the easier it is not to do something rash.
Of course that same approach also makes it easier to have your head in the sand as the vandals deliberately collapse the West’s economy in the name of Greater Glory to Mother Russia. While leaving you destitute in the process.
About 41% of the revenues for the S&P 500 come from overseas.
I think we’re just getting started.
Thing is I’m weird. My wife is our household sugar addict. And good stuff not Oreos. My approach is to intentionally go and give it a stare down, a good smell in, and walk away. Every time doing that builds my self discipline.
How does that work? I liquidated half of my holdings earlier in the year, and it’s mostly sitting in my Schwab margin account currently. However I need it to remain liquid if I do decide to spring for a house in the fall.
I think we’re just getting started, too. Since I would plan to hold long-term (10+ years), it doesn’t matter if it goes down more, it will eventually go back up and I will have gotten it at a discount - 4% discount in one day made in part on panic (we need the future to play out to see what sticks). Waiting for it to go down more is greedy/risky. I can lock in an easy 4% now, or gamble on getting 5,6,7..15 whatever. That’s greed to me.
But, the real issue is my confidence level that I’m right is not great. I don’t know with any sufficient level of confidence what is going to happen. Not actionable at least. If I did truly know it would go up or down, then I would be objectively stupid not to buy/sell based on that knowledge.
It’s one thing for me to say or feel what I think is going to happen, entirely different to put my money where my mouth is.
Late: I should add that having extra cash to buy is a huge part of this, too.
I’m a customer at Fidelity. When I sold all shares of the mutual fund, the money went directly into my ‘Core Position’, which is a fund called SPAXX, of which the description is ‘Fidelity® Government Money Market Fund’. It’s currently earning 3.98%. As soon as I was able, I then used that money to purchase shares in another Fidelity money market fund called FZDXX, which is earning 4.16%. Its description is ‘Fidelity® Money Market Fund Premium Class’.
You should be able to find out what your “cash” account pays in interest. It’s probably decent, but maybe not. Some are good like the Fidelity one mentioned above. It also depends on the type of account you’re in (IRA, etc.). So find out.
If it’s not good, you can quickly put cash in a Capitol One savings account that earns 3.7%. Or similar. Super easy/5mins from your phone, super liquid.
The question: is there ANYTHING we could do in response to this?
If the dollar becomes worthless, what is left other than a retreat to a remote rural location, stockpile canned food and ammunition? Which is only temporary of course, since canned food and ammunition need a fairly developed economy to produce them.
We can only hope that a sufficiency of self-interest and negative feedback will stabilize the system over the long term?
We may be starting to see some movement in Congress to curtail this. We’re literally already seeing layoffs start, including 900 from Stellantis, 650 from Whirlpool (though they said that was due to consumer sentiment) and 600 from a steel mill that supplies the auto industry (I forget the name).
The faster and harder he crashes it, the more likely someone will bring him to heel. If we see 10% unemployment, especially concentrated in the working class, primary opponents will no longer be the biggest worry for Congress.
My projection is the dumbass creates another 1929 great stockmarket crash and 1930 great depression. And refuses to allow the few remaining competent folks at the Fed to do anything useful.
So think about how your grandparents lived through the Depression and plan to do that. For about a decade.
That’s what we do as workers / consumers trying to live through a depression. Grow as much of your own food as you can, buy nothing, spend nothing, and expect massive unemployment and widespread malnourishment and privation. Plus some random voilence.
Which does NOT mean heading out to the nearest national forest with a rifle trying to live like a mountain man and shooting your like-minded fellow citizens on sight.
What can we as do as semi-wealthy investors? Get our money out of the USA and out of US dollars ASAP. That’s what. Admittedly very hard to do well. But I’m learning.
What can we do as citizens and voters of this country? Put as much pressure as possible on Congress that this craziness must be brought to heel. As said by others above and elsewhere, Congress can stop trump cold. Once they’re more afraid of us (and their own impending impoverishment) than they are of the MAGAbots.
NIKE is down 15% which actually seems kind of low. I don’t know how you would even run a business like NIKE with 65% tariffs. I guess they can shift their business from places like China and Vietnam to some other poor country that doesn’t have tariffs that high.
I do think some of the fact that stocks like NIKE are down 15% instead of 30 or 40% is that they’re banking on the possibility that Trump changes his mind. A lot of these companies simply could not function if these tariffs stay.
I did a $65 strike price nike put like a week ago for almost nothing and it was up 300% today. Unfortunately I only did it for 8 contracts (800 shares) when I should’ve done it for 50 at the premium I got (around a buck). Ah well.
It doesn’t expire until mid-May. I can sell it now and take a pretty decent profit, or I can stick with it and see how far into a hole it can go. But the risk is Trump calls it all off and it climbs and loses value.
Tesla is crashing hard which is great. But oddly enough my european defense stocks are down too. Rolls Royce down 12%, others down 7% or so. I know there’s the whole “when the US sneezes the world catches a cold” thing, but I thought Euro defense stocks specifically would be pretty resilient, if not boosted, based on that.
My Nike put is up 900%. In a time where I was putting $3000 or $4000 into another TSLA put, for some reason I only put $800 into the nike put. Little frustrated with that one.
Gold has fallen quite a bit which doesn’t make sense in a falling and uncertain economy. Anyone know why? I’m expecting it to bounce back, I may actually throw down some gold calls.
I’m reading it has to do with Powell announcement but not understanding the explanation.