The $2,000,000,000,000 loss reflects how much has been lost in American retirement plans and I had to use all the zeros for the best effect. The link to the complete article will be below, but here are some quick thoughts and comments.
That works out to be about a 20% decrease in value in just over a year on average. Even with the slow down in the housing market here in Alberta, neither us or any of our investors and partners have been hit anywhere near that bad. It didn’t hurt that 80% of our properties were purchased before 2007 either. On top of that our Real Estate provides cash flow which also helps.
As several other investors have commented to me in the last month, aren’t you glad you aren’t in the stock market? And if you are, when are you getting out? Love to see some comments.
The Link >>>>>>>>>> Retirement account losses near $2 Trillion
The million dollar question, eh? Well, first I do have mutual/RRSP funds which are invested in the stock market and my profits over the last 4 years just vaporized in the past several months. Not good. Yes the market will come back but as the $700B. bailout demonstrates, investing in the stock market is pretty risky business (and people buy mutual funds for security. Hmmm, a few people may be rethinking that).
As far as when am I getting out of the stock market, soon, very soon. I’m entertaining some opportunities to move away from the stock market, where I have no control, to real estate where I have control.
Then my biggest problem will be explaining my decision to people I know who have no idea what I know and what I do. At least I won’t need a financial bailout to help me with that!