Can you actually lose in the long run with investing?

atush

While it is Possible to lose money investing over 30 years or so, you would have to make some really major mistakes to do so. Such as not diversifying, not looking globally but instead UK centric etc.

As long as you invested in a global diversified mixed asset fund such as vanguard, then you should make money over all.

I remember when my dad died back in 1987 (young in his 50s with an aneurysm) and my mom got his insurance check in August, invested it in Sept, then came the crash of 87. So it looked like she lost a whole lot of money. But she was working (so not taking an income off it) and in the end it did make back all the losses and then much more. It was in US mutual funds, so well diversified.

Ray_Singh-Blue

Keeping wrote: »

I just came across a mcdonalds menu from 1937

Maybe be a little wary of that menu

I'm not an expert but I have read Ray Kroc's excellent book Grinding It Out: the Making of McDonalds. It explains that the initial restaurant was founded in California in May 1940. Kroc bought the restaurant and oversaw its transformation into a global brand, from about 1955.

But I think that it is because of the drive and vision of people like Ray Kroc, or Steve Jobs, or Bill Gates, or Elon Musk... that your main observation is likely true. They will innovate and build successful businesses; we mere mortals have the opportunity to hand on to their coat-tails by investing in these businesses, sharing in their rewards and growth.

Dird

Linton wrote: »

To a large extent this comes about from dividends rather than greater than inflation capital growth, so dont ignore them.

Buffetts biggest dividend yield is only 5% :f next one 3.8% https://www.thestreet.com/story/12825278/3/warren-buffetts-top-10-dividend-stocks.html

Linton

Dird wrote: »

Buffetts biggest dividend yield is only 5% :f next one 3.8% https://www.thestreet.com/story/12825278/3/warren-buffetts-top-10-dividend-stocks.html

Normal US dividend yields are generally lower than those in the UK. Historically US investors werent so keen on dividends as UK ones because of the tax system, prefering share buy backs and the retention of wealth within companies which give rise to capital gains. Dividends are subject to both federal and state taxes. In the UK dividends were tax free for basic rate tax payers and have long been seen as a useful source of steady income for the small investor. Whether recent changes in both the US and the UK will make any difference is unclear to me though the £5K dividend allowance should be enough to satisfy most people.

Keeping

Do funds pay dividends though? If you invest in IBM directly you get dividends but if you invest in a fund which has IBM listed as one of their stocks, do you still get dividends?

Linton

Keeping wrote: »

Do funds pay dividends though? If you invest in IBM directly you get dividends but if you invest in a fund which has IBM listed as one of their stocks, do you still get dividends?

Yes - dividends earned by UK funds are either paid out to the unit holder (INC funds) or are internally reinvested in the fund (ACC funds). In both cases outside tax protected environments they are subject to dividend taxation.

Though to take your IBM example I dont know how foreign dividend income is handled.