advice for falling market

DiamondLil

boingy said:

If The "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" had instead been called the "Hitchhiker's Guide to Investing" the cover would have said, in large friendly letters:

SIT TIGHT AND DON'T PANIC

The tariffs are unsustainable and the markets will recover. It may take a while but that's investing for ya. 

  and immediately Corporal Jones came to mind...

Albermarle

RandomUser004 said:

Ivkoto said:

RandomUser004 said:

Firstly I don't know much  about stocks, and I don't monitor the markets closely, so this is a no-brainer question please bear with me.

I have an overall savings pot of  @ 550k invested largely in the Vanguard life strategy 40% equity fund. I chose vlVanguard because it's supposed to be a relatively safe haven for inexperienced investors like myself.

I have a year or two before retirement. I also have some cash savings but the bulk of my retirement fund is in stocks and shares.

With the global mayhem at the moment my fund is falling, or at least the equity part is. 

I don't want to lose too much from my retirement fund.

So, would you:

1.  sell now and put the money into cash or bonds? 

2 grit your teeth, ride out the turbulence and stick with the vanguard funds? 

3. something else?

I realised no one has a crystal ball... Just seeking thoughts from people more experienced than myself in this area.

Thanks in advance! ☺️

The Vanguard Life strategy 40 is de risked enough in my opinion. If it was me, I would sell the whole portfolio and buy VLS60 ( replacing 20% bonds for 20% equities) at discount price right now. I suppose your money will be invested for many years and depending on how much you need a year, it may not last for long with so small part in equities.

Interesting... convert to a higher risk profile.

Would you do that if you were planning on retirement in the next couple of years?

Be aware that beyond some basics, investing strategy is largely a matter of opinion and personality.
Probably most would agree that a higher equity content is appropriate for younger people ( <50) but for a retirement drawdown, for a more cautious personality, reducing down to 40% equities is quite normal, although often 50 or 60% is usually recommended.
If you are going to drawdown over many years, then probably better not to go below 40% though.

twopenny

I remember getting on a plane around 2009 just after hearing that all the European banks were going down or some such scarey story on the news.

We all continued our journey for a no news, no shoes 2 weeks and thinking we may not have a home to come back to but nothing we could do.

Returned a fortnight later and everything was hunky dorey.

Don't Panic!

RandomUser004

MEM62 said:

RandomUser004 said:

I have an overall savings pot of  @ 550k invested largely in the Vanguard life strategy 40% equity fund. I chose vlVanguard because it's supposed to be a relatively safe haven for inexperienced investors like myself.

I have a year or two before retirement. I also have some cash savings but the bulk of my retirement fund is in stocks and shares.

The first statement means that the second cannot be true.  At least 60% of your pension is not in equities.   

With the global mayhem at the moment my fund is falling, or at least the equity part is.

Such events happen from time to time.  It is not a reason to panic.    

I don't want to lose too much from my retirement fund.

So, would you:

1.  sell now and put the money into cash or bonds?   Absolutely not.  Personally, think your are too light on equities already.  

2 grit your teeth, ride out the turbulence and stick with the vanguard funds?   Grit your teeth yes, but consider weighting your weighting should be more towards equities.  

3. something else?

I realised no one has a crystal ball... Just seeking thoughts from people more experienced than myself in this area.

Thanks in advance! ☺️

No panic needed.  Stay invested and concentrate on your long term goals.  

Point taken. Thanks  !

lolamancity

I sought advice on this forum a fair few years ago when starting up investment accounts for my kids savings - I chose Vanguard LS80 in the end, and I vividly remember the posters telling me to not check the accounts, just leave them be and focus on the long term. I'm curious by nature and instead periodically check the financial times graphs rather than the accounts (psychologically easier to take when the news is bad, as checking the vanguard account shows real personal monetary value unlike the chart!) but I haven't even checked the graphs this turmoil round (covid times hurt!) because it's all about the long game, and they do recover, and I don't really want to be upset by what I see. I know your case is different as your money is needed more immediately than mine/my kids, but if I were you, I'd still keep buying but obliviously to everything else!

Albermarle

 I don't really want to be upset by what I see. 

You should be happy what you can see. Despite the current drops, you are still 50% up over the last 5 years.

lolamancity

Albermarle said:

 I don't really want to be upset by what I see. 

You should be happy what you can see. Despite the current drops, you are still 50% up over the last 5 years.

I know, but it's still not nice seeing huge chunks vanish overnight, is it.

boingy

I do sometimes reflect on how knowledge is not always power. Being able to track our long term investments minute by minutes is not always healthy.

Back in the day you'd put money into your works or personal pension without any real visibility on how it was invested or even how much you were paying in costs, because the companies you dealt with were experts at obfuscating the details. You'd get a statement every year and that was about it. You didn't worry about day to day fluctuations because you couldn't!  I'm not suggesting those days were better but long-term investments are best ignored except for a review every 6 or 12 months. Of course, I can't resist looking every day too. 

Hoenir

boingy said:

I do sometimes reflect on how knowledge is not always power. Being able to track our long term investments minute by minutes is not always healthy.

Back in the day you'd put money into your works or personal pension without any real visibility on how it was invested or even how much you were paying in costs, because the companies you dealt with were experts at obfuscating the details. You'd get a statement every year and that was about it. You didn't worry about day to day fluctuations because you couldn't!  I'm not suggesting those days were better but long-term investments are best ignored except for a review every 6 or 12 months. Of course, I can't resist looking every day too. 

Back in the day there were less options to invest internationally. No ability to trade instantly , waiting weeks for the sales proceeds. All while the markets were moving downwards. Daily fund values were published in the pink paper. 

Despite access to more information. Decision making generally hasn't improved. Takes a black swan event for some people to revisit their thinking. 

dunstonh

boingy said:

I do sometimes reflect on how knowledge is not always power. Being able to track our long term investments minute by minutes is not always healthy.

Back in the day you'd put money into your works or personal pension without any real visibility on how it was invested or even how much you were paying in costs, because the companies you dealt with were experts at obfuscating the details. You'd get a statement every year and that was about it. You didn't worry about day to day fluctuations because you couldn't!  I'm not suggesting those days were better but long-term investments are best ignored except for a review every 6 or 12 months. Of course, I can't resist looking every day too. 

I had someone who had invested for decades approach me after the 2018 crash saying that his value had gone down and it never had before and what was going wrong.      He had invested through dot.com, 911, American accountancy scandal, credit crunch and the 2015/16 falls but he had never seen them.    This time, it was a combination of the EU directive that required quarterly statements instead of annual statements.(2015/16 drop and recovery happened between statement dates) and that he never looked at the earlier ones as it was just a paper statement that he never took any interest in.   

Nowadays, you get people looking at these things far too frequently and as a result many are actually investing lower than their risk profile of the past because they cannot handle the day to day volatility  that they can now see but used to have when they were not looking at it.  As a result, their returns are lower over the long term.