6 ms·

Compounded interest is your friend. Start using the stock market. It's the only way to make money without working "hard." Rule of 72 is something you can read

Compounded interest is your friend. Start using the stock market. It's the only way to make money without working "hard." Rule of 72 is something you can read about.

joejerryronnie 8y ago
This is a very easy statement to make in the middle of an unprecedented bull market. But you know what they say about things that go up . . .
- Judgmentality 8y ago
  ...they go into orbit? While I'm a big believer that we're going to see a big correction in the next couple of years (the kind that will make 2008 look like a foreshock), nobody knows how much higher the market can go and for how long. Maybe it will still be going up before I die. The conventional wisdom is to never try to time the market. Buy and hold, and in the long run you'll make money.
  - derangedHorse 8y ago
    I agree. I'm still waiting on my dogecoins to make me a millionaire!
  - joejerryronnie 8y ago
    Yes, but a good number of individual investors will pour money into the markets only when things get super frothy and exciting (i.e. at the peak) and then freak out and pull all their money out of the markets when we see a huge downturn.
    - waterphone 8y ago
      And those people are the reason everyone else says not to do that, not to time the market, and to invest for the long term. If you stick to an established plan, adjust your allocation according to that plan, and don't panic sell, historically you will have always come out ahead. http://awealthofcommonsense.com/2014/02/worlds-worst-market-timer/ http://awealthofcommonsense.com/2014/02/worlds-worst-market-...
      - joejerryronnie 8y ago
        Correct, but I think this is easier said than done sometimes - especially if you've only been investing during a huge bull market. As Mike Tyson once said, "Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face."
        waterphone 8y ago
        All the more reason to constantly tell people the right thing to do and why and strategies to avoid letting fear and other emotions get the better of them in those situations. We can all be susceptible to such things, but with a little education and discipline can avoid making terrible mistakes like that.
        Aeolun 8y ago
        Not really, regardless of the state of the market, you are probably better off keeping your stock than selling it.
        vldx 8y ago
        This seems true, however the following quote is worth mentioning: “The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.” https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/08/09/remain-solvent/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/08/09/remain-solvent/
      - loeg 8y ago
        The important thing the linked article shows is that even if you're always investing right before crashes the market still trends upwards and you still come out ahead — as long as you don't panic sell.
        Scea91 8y ago
        Of course, there is a difference of how much ahead. If you would have invested few months later you could have come much more ahead.
    - RickJWagner 8y ago
      As Warren Buffet once observed, the stock market is just a device for transferring money from the impatient to the patient.
      - dredmorbius 8y ago
        Or the desperate to the well-bufferred.
  - Fnoord 8y ago
    > Buy and hold, and in the long run you'll make money. Is that where Bitcoin's HODL "wisdom" comes from? Also, don't bet on one horse.
    - tormeh 8y ago
      That's why you should buy a fund/ETF tracking the All Country World Index.
- Hydraulix989 8y ago
  Even true over the entire historical performance of the S&P 500. You just have to look at a longer time horizon. Busts are temporary.
  - tspike 8y ago
    Unless you're Japan.
    - marketgod 8y ago
      This deserves upvotes. Edit: Also, everyone should investigate this.
      - joejerryronnie 8y ago
        And China's debt profile is starting to resemble Japan's before the lost decade.
- marketgod 8y ago
  There are opportunities in bull and bear markets. Also, has the $SPY ever gone to $0? If you have the belief that it will, well, when that happens, we are all screwed. No point thinking doomsday. But let's step back and calculate suppose you got into $SPY in 2007 at 155. If you had kept the $10K in there, it would be worth $20K today almost. However, if you had kept adding money to it each year, your return would be massive. As you get older, you move from more index holdings to bonds, which guarantees you to hold your money. Another method is dividends, if you had AAPL shares, suppose 1000 shares @ 0.50 per quarter, that's $2.00 a year on 1000 shares, $2000 a year. If you had a family member who doesn't work and owns all the shares, in Canada, that would be up to $60,000 each year you can earn tax free. I don't hold any stock, although I believe it is safe to do so, I currently only own 2 shares of TSLA as I wanted to be eligible for the class action lawsuit if there ever was one. I only trade options and I believe that is the safest way to make money and never go bankrupt. Also, if you buy stock you can also sells calls/puts against your shares to protect you from a downside/flat days. To reiterate, the statement above, is always easy to make, because this is the only way to make money. If you don't get into the market, then each year your money is running away from you, see inflation. Ally savings accounts just aren't as helpful. Hopefully I have changed your mind and you will start looking into Vanguard funds at the minimum.
  - joejerryronnie 8y ago
    This is all very true but you mentioned not working hard in your previous post. It seems that you are working hard to research the best opportunities, hedge your positions, etc. (it's not like you're digging ditches but still). Perhaps I was too quick to judge your post as a "make tons of money without any work" comment. I would agree that being passively invested in the market is better than sitting in cash or trying to time it. With that said, I am nervous about the current market. I'm still invested but am starting to diversify into buy and hold real estate in established locations. One thing I don't like about the market is the impact that some random geopolitical event can have and I don't see the world moving toward more stability at the moment.
    - marketgod 8y ago
alanfranzoni 8y ago
The stock market is just a mean of transferring wealth. It won't change anything in the "real world". You're not generating value for anybody by investing in it. If that makes your existence fulfilling, good for you. But I'd just feel a crook.
- tested243 8y ago
  Secondary markets exist because they give businessmen and investors incentive to create and fund risky but potentially lucrative businesses. Your view on the stock market is warped if you think investors are crooks. The stock market doesn’t deprive people of things and is simply a group of people freely exchanging what they own.
  - alanfranzoni 8y ago
    I never said investors are crooks. I said that I wouldn't be satisfied by just doing stock market investing, even though that leads to more money. I want to do something that has a minimum of meaning. And i'd probably take a basic but meaningful job (plumber?) If it brought me enough money.
    - softawre 8y ago
      The point of this chain was to gain agency of your life. You don't just go work the market, you go do something meaningful and take some of the money you earn and put it into the market so you can have more agency in your life later on.
- mjfl 8y ago
  I would say that the stock market is a means of exchanging ownership of these exponentially growing assets we call companies, and that a public market exists for doing so is tremendously egalitarian. Any average Joe can become a part-owner of the Apple's of the world and ride with them to pre-eminence. Apparently that makes the average Joe a crook? I don't know, I don't see it.
  - 8y ago
jondubois 8y ago
Even though wealth has been concentrating in corporate stocks for the past century or so, a lot of things have changed since then so we can't guarantee that this trend will continue. Access to easy money has made corporations extremely innefficient and wasteful. Also people have already started to complain about centralization so already there are social forces that are starting to push back against the corporate trend.

Compounded interest is your friend. Start using the stock market. It's the only way to make money without working "hard." Rule of 72 is something you can read about.

joejerryronnie 8y ago

This is a very easy statement to make in the middle of an unprecedented bull market. But you know what they say about things that go up . . .

Judgmentality 8y ago
...they go into orbit? While I'm a big believer that we're going to see a big correction in the next couple of years (the kind that will make 2008 look like a foreshock), nobody knows how much higher the market can go and for how long. Maybe it will still be going up before I die. The conventional wisdom is to never try to time the market. Buy and hold, and in the long run you'll make money.
- derangedHorse 8y ago
  I agree. I'm still waiting on my dogecoins to make me a millionaire!
- joejerryronnie 8y ago
  Yes, but a good number of individual investors will pour money into the markets only when things get super frothy and exciting (i.e. at the peak) and then freak out and pull all their money out of the markets when we see a huge downturn.
  - waterphone 8y ago
    And those people are the reason everyone else says not to do that, not to time the market, and to invest for the long term. If you stick to an established plan, adjust your allocation according to that plan, and don't panic sell, historically you will have always come out ahead. http://awealthofcommonsense.com/2014/02/worlds-worst-market-timer/ http://awealthofcommonsense.com/2014/02/worlds-worst-market-...
    - joejerryronnie 8y ago
      Correct, but I think this is easier said than done sometimes - especially if you've only been investing during a huge bull market. As Mike Tyson once said, "Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face."
      - waterphone 8y ago
        All the more reason to constantly tell people the right thing to do and why and strategies to avoid letting fear and other emotions get the better of them in those situations. We can all be susceptible to such things, but with a little education and discipline can avoid making terrible mistakes like that.
      - Aeolun 8y ago
        Not really, regardless of the state of the market, you are probably better off keeping your stock than selling it.
        vldx 8y ago
        This seems true, however the following quote is worth mentioning: “The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.” https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/08/09/remain-solvent/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/08/09/remain-solvent/
    - loeg 8y ago
      The important thing the linked article shows is that even if you're always investing right before crashes the market still trends upwards and you still come out ahead — as long as you don't panic sell.
      - Scea91 8y ago
        Of course, there is a difference of how much ahead. If you would have invested few months later you could have come much more ahead.
  - RickJWagner 8y ago
    As Warren Buffet once observed, the stock market is just a device for transferring money from the impatient to the patient.
    - dredmorbius 8y ago
      Or the desperate to the well-bufferred.
- Fnoord 8y ago
  > Buy and hold, and in the long run you'll make money. Is that where Bitcoin's HODL "wisdom" comes from? Also, don't bet on one horse.
  - tormeh 8y ago
    That's why you should buy a fund/ETF tracking the All Country World Index.
Hydraulix989 8y ago
Even true over the entire historical performance of the S&P 500. You just have to look at a longer time horizon. Busts are temporary.
- tspike 8y ago
  Unless you're Japan.
  - marketgod 8y ago
    This deserves upvotes. Edit: Also, everyone should investigate this.
    - joejerryronnie 8y ago
      And China's debt profile is starting to resemble Japan's before the lost decade.
marketgod 8y ago
There are opportunities in bull and bear markets. Also, has the $SPY ever gone to $0? If you have the belief that it will, well, when that happens, we are all screwed. No point thinking doomsday. But let's step back and calculate suppose you got into $SPY in 2007 at 155. If you had kept the $10K in there, it would be worth $20K today almost. However, if you had kept adding money to it each year, your return would be massive. As you get older, you move from more index holdings to bonds, which guarantees you to hold your money. Another method is dividends, if you had AAPL shares, suppose 1000 shares @ 0.50 per quarter, that's $2.00 a year on 1000 shares, $2000 a year. If you had a family member who doesn't work and owns all the shares, in Canada, that would be up to $60,000 each year you can earn tax free. I don't hold any stock, although I believe it is safe to do so, I currently only own 2 shares of TSLA as I wanted to be eligible for the class action lawsuit if there ever was one. I only trade options and I believe that is the safest way to make money and never go bankrupt. Also, if you buy stock you can also sells calls/puts against your shares to protect you from a downside/flat days. To reiterate, the statement above, is always easy to make, because this is the only way to make money. If you don't get into the market, then each year your money is running away from you, see inflation. Ally savings accounts just aren't as helpful. Hopefully I have changed your mind and you will start looking into Vanguard funds at the minimum.
- joejerryronnie 8y ago
  This is all very true but you mentioned not working hard in your previous post. It seems that you are working hard to research the best opportunities, hedge your positions, etc. (it's not like you're digging ditches but still). Perhaps I was too quick to judge your post as a "make tons of money without any work" comment. I would agree that being passively invested in the market is better than sitting in cash or trying to time it. With that said, I am nervous about the current market. I'm still invested but am starting to diversify into buy and hold real estate in established locations. One thing I don't like about the market is the impact that some random geopolitical event can have and I don't see the world moving toward more stability at the moment.
  - marketgod 8y ago

alanfranzoni 8y ago

The stock market is just a mean of transferring wealth. It won't change anything in the "real world". You're not generating value for anybody by investing in it. If that makes your existence fulfilling, good for you. But I'd just feel a crook.

tested243 8y ago
Secondary markets exist because they give businessmen and investors incentive to create and fund risky but potentially lucrative businesses. Your view on the stock market is warped if you think investors are crooks. The stock market doesn’t deprive people of things and is simply a group of people freely exchanging what they own.
- alanfranzoni 8y ago
  I never said investors are crooks. I said that I wouldn't be satisfied by just doing stock market investing, even though that leads to more money. I want to do something that has a minimum of meaning. And i'd probably take a basic but meaningful job (plumber?) If it brought me enough money.
  - softawre 8y ago
    The point of this chain was to gain agency of your life. You don't just go work the market, you go do something meaningful and take some of the money you earn and put it into the market so you can have more agency in your life later on.
mjfl 8y ago
I would say that the stock market is a means of exchanging ownership of these exponentially growing assets we call companies, and that a public market exists for doing so is tremendously egalitarian. Any average Joe can become a part-owner of the Apple's of the world and ride with them to pre-eminence. Apparently that makes the average Joe a crook? I don't know, I don't see it.
- 8y ago

jondubois 8y ago

Even though wealth has been concentrating in corporate stocks for the past century or so, a lot of things have changed since then so we can't guarantee that this trend will continue. Access to easy money has made corporations extremely innefficient and wasteful. Also people have already started to complain about centralization so already there are social forces that are starting to push back against the corporate trend.