Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Dow is down triple digits.

"Return on stocks" cannot be used blanketly like that, since everyone's experience with stocks is unique.

Unique, but very similar to overall market performance if your diversified in hundreds of stocks in a mutual fund.

I lost 75% of my savings, that I had in a technology mutual fund, when the Dot-Com Crash of 2001 hit. Mustn't it have been awful for folks who were just going into retirement at that time?

Faith in Zer o has returned.

Yes, but if they were investing like you were then it was their own fault. 75% of your savings in one place is irresponsible if you subscribe to modern portfolio theory. You learned a lesson the hard way, but to extrapolate that ALL stocks, or ALL mutual funds or THE ENTIRE market will ALWAYS behave like that fund you owned is incorrect. I understand that you march to a different drummer, (and I have no problem with that) but understand that some of us chose our own path for (I think) a number of very valid reasons.

24hcf has been home to end-timers for quite a while. Economically, politically, and biologically (remember all the H1N1 kerfuffle around here?)
One day, they'll be right, and we'll never hear the end of it.
Until then, they have been and are wrong-o.

I'm sure it was painful to go through that dot com crash. It caught a lot of people, who thought they were making a fortune with the run-ups they had prior to the pop. I was in the CG, and my supervisor kept trying to get me to invest in funds in the tech sector. He showed me fund after fund where he was getting a steady 20% for several years. Well, even back then I knew that it was impossible for that to be sustained. Pop.

That sounds like the Janus Global Tech Fund (JAGTX). From the high in March 2000 to the low in mid 2002 it lost 75% of it's value. In order to realize a 75% loss in your portfolio you would of had to violate the principles of diversification by investing into a concentrated sector fund, buy in at the all time high, and sell out at the all time low.

So let me ask, how did you pick this fund??

Were you chasing the previous years 211% return expecting it to continue at that rate for another 5 years???

Performance chasing is perhaps the worst way to pick a mutual fund. Those past performances numbers are someone else's past returns, not your future returns.

I was fortunate having a Father, a 37 year scaffold builder, that pushed me to give up my first two years salary increases when I started my career. Not easy given the poor boy life I had in college. "Invest it now, line out then start to enjoy your raises". Exactly what I did, this in 1985/86, though always maximizing the IRS limit on the 401k and eventually getting to where I could put away more than the 401k limits. All I can suggest to others is to get their children saving early, at least. The next step for a young one not wanting or able to chase their investments would be investing in a target date based mutual fund via a Fidelity or similar account. Do nothing but the latter starting young and they will be in pretty good shape when they look to retirement. My two bits that I am "working" on my sons, which ain't easy.

Right now, perhaps. I lived and left West Texas oil in 1997. Boom or bust as they say. So, yes, 150% a year is great, just depends on the number of years. I am guessing part of that annual return includes your income as opposed to return on investment?

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Go figure!

I did just what you suggested, but was far from the only one who did.

Good call Antelope_Sniper. I try to avoid buying at the absolute peak and selling at the absolute bottom.

Of course TRH wouldn't have just googled "losses in the tech bubble" and posted he lost the worst case scenario, would he?

Negative. If there were enough dependable drivers to be found, I'd have 50 water hauler rigs, I can tell you that.

Calvin, thanks. Actually I have no reason to believe he just googled it. I've dealt with many a investors who did exactly what I described, despite our best guidance to the contrary.

They saw the 211% returns for 1999 and greed kicked in and they had to buy.

After the 75% decline, the fear kicked in and they had to sell.

After such an experience during recessionary times you can see how a person might turn to alternative investments such as Gold.

My best friend in high school inherited, at the age of sixteen, a little over $300,000.00 in stocks from his grandmother. The will stipulated, however, that the portfolio would remain out of his control till he was 21, and under the control of a professional money manager assigned by her till then. By the time he was 21, all that was left was a little over $50,000. The money manager had made a series of bad picks.

Such cases abound.

That, or lined his own pockets. Naw, a money manager would never do such a thing.

That, or perhaps he made a series of bad picks with his own money (or that of a "big fish" client), but through the magic of creative record keeping, the bad picks came to be made with my friend's portfolio. I wouldn't be surprised.

More stories from TRH.

That would be a civil, if not a criminal case, either to be covered by errors and omissions insurance, or by going to jail. Managing money in trust comes with some pretty strong requisites.