My S&S diary - investing from February 2026

DT2001

I first put money into shares through new issues in the 1980’s. Good results. Then tried options - a complete disaster (I don’t know who said a 50% loss psychologically seems more dramatic than a 50% gain). Lesson learnt, prices are based on known information and unless you knew more about a particular sector/stock than most other investors you would eventually lose unless you were lucky. Occasionally since then I have dabbled with small amounts in individual holdings (almost to remind myself about my limited knowledge) however the vast majority of my investments have been long term buy and leave. I used an IFA for a few years when being lucky enough to be paid a one off bonus and not trusting myself with such a large sum. Last year I took back complete control having researched and adopted a two pronged strategy - a global ETF for growth and ITs for income (potentially close to retirement as OH enjoys working so guessing when income will be needed). I have written a plan so when markets are down I can remind myself what I am aiming for and how much the investments have grown over the long term. I have continued to research and adapted the plan (taking on some of the thoughts of forumites on here) to my current experiences. So I wish you luck, as you say learning from experience rather than being told is vital.

LL_USS

4pm 10 March 2026:

I have anticipated once this goes down, it will keep going down. Still it is quite an alarm to see Oil slumps down to as low as p5,122 (vs. the price I bought at, just under p.5,800). Looks like lots of selling towards the end of the day, so much that there was a temporary trading halt:

LL_USS

@DT2001 yes I have tested that feeling of "50% loss psychologically seems more dramatic than a 50% gain" - we do teach that (as "loss aversion": a cognitive bias in behavioral economics where the psychological pain of losing something is about twice as powerful as the pleasure of gaining an equivalent amount) at the business school in one of my modules. However much we are prepared for it- it is really really really a downer, in every sense.

I do have all the notes, including the "principles" and my investment strategy in front of me as I make any moves. Still….. I deviated a lot. Less now than before, thankfully. It was from "seeing red then panic and sell" (luckily that was only a small trial buy on T212), to "buy more when the price is falling to fix an expensive purchase before" (actually this one is worse 🙄- more than 3K already pulled into that now just hope to surface back to get back the money - if am lucky).

I've been telling a friend of mine on the chat group (who sold Oil right away yesterday morning when she saw it was up over 32% over the weekend, crystalising over £600), to be able to trade, it seems we need
(1) a fund substantial enough (when it's too small amount to buy a stock, not quite worth doing that much work for a small gain - actually a substantial fund to play with also means there's money to buy other stocks when one is waiting to be sold, so we don't have to sell before the potential gain from one stock meets your target, say 5%, or 10%)
(2) meticulously following the market before and after your purchase decision,
(3) being very disciplined
and (4) luck on your side too.
I don't have any of these 5 it seems for my play pot T212, it is like gambling at the moment, indeed.

Thank you for your good wishes ❤️. I need it 🤩

InvesterJones

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81916945#Comment_81916945

I think you're setting a really bad example though - you should be teaching your children about investing, not short-term trading. It's hard to be patient, but try it and then look back on the results after several years - your future self will learn and thank you.

LL_USS

@InvesterJones I am quite sure that they will be tempted to do a bit of trading, so I want to do it a bit to see it with my own eyes :-). My son during a summer holiday on a boat trip talking to a day trader from America and he thought it would be so cool he would want to have that job in the future. For now it's not likely a "job" that he wants (he's at university at the moment) but he will need to do his own money management so I am trying this out first.

LL_USS

11 March 2026

Last night when I checked to see that all Vanguard area stocks (on T212, as it's always delayed on Dodl) went up- i was thinking good I had not put in another load of purchases in.

First thing in the morning, I've just told myself to only look "quickly" at T212 to see how things are. EM still going down further???? Okay. Wisdom brent oil recovers a tiny bit. Right so there is still a little bit of hedging effect there, when people are still not sure about the geo-political situation (Trump mentioned about "quick war" yesterday without any support) then oil still holds and sentiment still down for general stocks.

Then I look at all Vanguard area stocks on T212 - true, all going down again. I should have bought more area stocks on Dodl actually. Why did I cancel them?

This is when I realise the market cannot be predicted, up or down, one day is different from the other. That's where they talk about Dollar Cost Averaging I suppose…. fine, I accept that!

I just get on with my day then. I am having this among others in my morning exercises today: Chogada zumba, a colleague of mine introduced this series to me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqyPj1I4ouU&list=PL-L6MiYf33M78ZzXcgK1KNVdHn_QWT8CF&index=6

A friend (the one holding about 500K on their pension and they are managing it themselves) has just told the chat group that they have just sold EYED ishares europe energy (gaining 21% making about 2.6K - actually they say just half of it as energy still goes up) and SGLS gold (gaining 18.11% making about 500), and DFEU defence - having seen the market very volatile and first sign of daily loss. That's day trading I suppose. Seeing examples like this, especially from people in your circle IS SO TEMPTING. But I've tried to follow some of the examples the same person set - I gained about £20 and now in red for a couple of stocks, about £50-90 down each 😅. Still waiting to ride out. I sold NOW earlier for example, and this person held on for longer and made a lot more margin. Though you buy the same thing, roughly the same frame of time - but the amount, the exact time of buying, how long can you hold, exactly what to do - still makes all the difference. The game is certainly not for the faint-hearted. Last night I was thinking the amount in red is one dinner out. But the heartache is real, for such an amount that I would not normally think is significant!

LL_USS

Just before 10am, 11 March 2026

This is normally the time I decide whether or not to confirm the order to buy more area stocks on my long-term pot LISA Dodl, when it is "dripping in" day - trying to follow the pseudo dollar cost average method. No buying today! As planned. The long-term pot looks a bit better today as Pacific ex-Japan already updates its new price. Still about £100 less than my original pot. This action of checking "how much is the pot today" seems to be less and less exciting/ worrying. When I look back of this journey, I am sure I'll say "i used to check the pot everyday, just to see a number that means nothing in the big picture" 😁.

T212 pot - Oil price regains about 4% (but previousday it was down about 10% AFTER I bought). Options running wild in my head. Change my Limit sell to make a bit of profit after this ordeal? No actually just set it at the same price of buying to get rid of this headache is good enough - I can't stand this any more. Well, actually should I set the limit sell price a bit lower, cutting the loss, getting rid of the headache even faster…. Nah. I still keep the limit sell price as the buy price. If not selling to get back just what I put in 😅 then i'd have to hold it longer. When did I say "I'll not sell at a loss, just wait it out"- when I sold Gold Producer and lost £20 (and a few days later the same would be worth £30 more, meaning £50 difference - my goodness all of these amount of tens of pounds decisions taking so much time from me). Indeed time to get to work. Lots of contact hours/ face-to-face work today. At least the sun is shining. Let's forget about investing for the rest of the day. It has been a hard month - I have neglected a few things around the house 😥

cloud_dog

From the outside looking in, your updates are all about your psychology, your struggles, second guessing, FOMO, etc.

If you are unable to control this aspect please stop trading.

LL_USS

@cloud_dog you may not remember me but thanks again for from early days explaining about Lifetime ISA for basic tax payers, how in the number game, it is slightly better than pension contribution if NI is 8%.

Thank you for this message too - bear with me, as I said in the opening post, I need to see this through for certain reasons. I don't think I'll do the trading part much longer anyway.

HedgehogRulez

have you considered roulette instead?