“Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength.” – Corrie Ten Boom
There’s an old adage that says that the market takes the stairs up and the elevator down. And what that means is that there are sometimes in history spectacular events that have become noticeable that become memorable like this past week or so when we’ve seen some double digit declines. But stay calm, your long-term investment strategy should remain unshakeable.
Hi there. Mike Brady with Generosity Wealth Management; a comprehensive full service financial services firm headquartered right here in Boulder Colorado. I’m recording this Friday afternoon after a pretty eventful week. A very interesting week hence the reason why I’m doing this video. If you look at the background it’s not my normal one, I happen to be at a conference so this is my hotel room, but it was so important I felt to get to you as quickly as possible that I decided to do it right here in my hotel room. Fortunately, the way I look at it I’m never working and I’m always working. When you love what you do you never work a day so I love what I do.
So, there’s an old adage that says that the market takes the stairs up and the elevator down. And what that means is that there are sometimes in history spectacular events that have become noticeable that become memorable like this past week or so. The market has pretty much every day this week had very memorable, you know, the Dow, which is an unmanaged stock market index, decline of the hundreds if not even over a thousand points. And what that has done is brought us back to where we were eight months ago. I mean let’s remember that this doesn’t mean you lose all your money that you can market has gone down to nothing, this is back to the beginning of June.
I’m going to put a chart up on the screen. One of the reasons why I continually talk, both in these videos and with my one on one client meetings, is that if your time horizon is six months, 18 months you should have nothing in the market. One of the problems with big events like this is it really brings people’s attention to it and they start to question in a one week’s time what a two, five, 20, 30 year goal is, which makes no sense to me. The reasons why you have investments is because you don’t need it in the short-term after a one week, one month, 18 months, two years, et cetera. And even when we look at, I’m going to put a chart up on the screen in just a second, even when we look at the absolute worst time on most of our lives history back to 2008 your breakeven point was depending on whether you were 40 percent stock and 60 percent bond, indexes, that would have been a two-year breakeven or three years if you were 60 percent stock index and 40 percent bond index you would be three years or 100 percent in the stocks your breakeven is five years. Now, that doesn’t mean that the five years is necessarily pleasant or the two years or the three depending on what the mix is, but we can have investments that are short-term. I mean just like when we look back to where we were about eight months ago most of us were feeling great we’re like oh my gosh this is wonderful the market I even heard some people say it must be at a top, it must be at a top, whereas here we are eight months later saying oh my God it’s Armageddon. And neither of them are true, they are both points in time along the path of the multiple year strategy.
If someone is only now paying attention that’s less helpful. There’s another adage that says that worry doesn’t change the future and worries the present and so that’s not very helpful. The reason why we continually talk about in our professional meetings and conversations hopefully if we’re talking to ourselves as investors is hey I’ve got this point in the future that I need to go to and that I want to get to for my financial goals and it’s not next week, it’s not hopefully today. If so you’ve certainly shouldn’t of had any money in the market.
So, the question is how do short-term events impact long-term strategy? And the answer should be not at all. That’s why you do it in advance. That’s why my example of perhaps a fire in a house that’s why you have fire drills in a school, in a house, in a building beforehand because if fire is actually happening it’s too late. And so, we hit certain themes, we being financial advisers, me as your financial advisor, the professionals who was doing this for years and for decades of experiences of seeing this we say this is going to happen.
I’m going to put a chart up on the screen.What you’re going to see is those numbers, double-digit declines, are the normal. The actual unique event is that we haven’t really had many of them in the last two, three, four years. Now, it usually doesn’t happen in one week. That’s interesting. That’s a very newsworthy event, but that’s actually the normal is for there to be double-digit declines intra-year within the year. So, what we’re seeing here I don’t know what next week will bring, but I do know that the strategies that were sound two weeks ago are still ones that are sound today. And so, rest easy knowing that we’re here on this path of two steps forward maybe one step back, but we don’t have the two step forward without periodically having the steps back as well.
Mike Brady; Generosity Wealth Management; 303-747-6455. Have a great weekend. Bye bye.
“By staying calm, you increase your resistance against any kind of storms.” – Mehmet Murat Ildan
Every single year there is some kind of market volatility. It is normal for there to be ups and downs. Therefore, preparing ourselves for it early on is the key. We know it’s going to happen, so we will have a multiple year strategy in mind at all times. And if there are any concerns, of course, you’ll call your favorite financial advisor Mike Brady!
Hi there. Mike Brady with Generosity Wealth Management, a comprehensive, full-service financial services firm headquartered right here in Boulder, Colorado.
Last month I did the year end review and it was a little bit longer so this time I thought I would talk shortly about a topic that I know is going to happen in 2020 which is volatility. I’m big into setting up expectations. I’m big into controlling our emotions and having a plan. The reason why I bring that up is in 2020 like every single year there is some kind of volatility. It is normal for there to be drops in the market. There are ups, there are downs.
I’m going to put a chart up on the screen which shows the market going back decades, and you’ll see on the bottom below the axis there are red numbers. Those are the intra-year declines and it is normal for there to be intra-year, within the year, declines in the stock market, the unmanaged stock market indexes, of double digits or more, 10 percent or more.
I’m recording this at the very end of January and, of course, you’ll get it the first part of February and nothing has happened so far this year. However, we have 11 more months. We have an election. We have many different things. We have a global economy that’s very complex. But one thing that I can almost guarantee is that the market will go up and down at various times. And our reaction to it is going to be much more impactful to reaching our financial goals than that actual event of the ups and the downs. That’s my opinion at least.
Therefore, setting ourselves up now and saying okay, great. I know it’s going to happen. I’m going to be cool. I’m going to have my multiple year strategy in my mind at all times. And if I ever have any concerns, of course, I’ll call my favorite financial advisor Mike Brady.
That’s what I want to talk about this year so when it happens don’t be surprised. With the market as high as it is right now, hundreds of points on the unmanaged stock market index, the Dow Jones Industrial Average doesn’t mean as much as it used to frankly, 5, 10 and 20, 30 years ago. We look at the percentages, we know it’s going to happen but we keep the long term vision in mind. What I believe is one of the key ingredients to long term success is keeping our emotions in check, keeping the big picture in mind and really looking at how are we going to reach our financial goals not only with our investments but with all the financial decisions that are going on in our lives.
Mike Brady, Generosity Wealth Management, 303-747-6455. Thanks. Bye bye. Have a wonderful week, a wonderful month. We’ll talk to you in a month. Bye bye.
“You can’t always control what goes on outside. But you can
always control what goes on inside.” – Wayne Dyer
There are no absolutes in life. When you find yourself making absolute statements, check yourself – are you experiencing a bias or do you need to have some humility about what you’re saying? Then take the next step, which is questioning, is this bias helping hurting me and is it true?
There are so many instances that I can point to where the “experts” firmly believed in the absolutes they predicted, to the point they were blind to any other option to the detriment of those they were providing guidance to. Each one with mixed results, but none on par with the black and white thinking.
Rather than a steadfast absolute, hold tight to the uncertainty, it’s not a negative- it merely means we’re not sure how things will go, but we are sure that no matter what comes our way, we’ll be able to handle it.
Hi there. Mike Brady with Generosity Wealth Management; a comprehensive full service financial services firm headquartered right here in Boulder Colorado.
About once a year I do a video on humility and, well, today is the humility video for this year. Because I think that it is so important that we remain humble as investors, as people trying to reach our financial goals, as people, in just so many different aspects of our lives. Right now the market is doing great. I love that. That’s wonderful. What’s amazing is when I look back at the people that I read, that I talked to, that are friends, that are clients, that are other professionals, whenever they talk in absolutes it’s a certainty that I’m going to react to it because I don’t believe that there are any absolutes in the world. I mean you want to be a good parent, you want to support your child but you don’t want to smother them. The world is filled with all kinds of dichotomies like that. You want to be a good manager and keep on top of things but you don’t want to micromanage, I mean the world is filled with them.
And the reason why I bring this up is the sense of humility about the future, I don’t know the future, you don’t know the future and certainly that guy writing the newsletter or your next-door neighbor or your brother-in-law, et cetera, doesn’t know the future either. And so, when you find yourself making absolute statements maybe check yourself say wow maybe I’m having a bias here or maybe I need to have some humility about what it is I’m saying and then take the next step, which is hey, is this bias is this helping me or hurting me and is it true? Maybe give me a call, give somebody who might have a real sensitivity to this. Some examples of this are about six months ago someone said well we know that after 2018 and 2019 and years going forward are going to be all kinds of volatile, I mean we know when things are going to be volatile. No not really. I’m going to put a chart up there as of September 30th you’re going to see that 2019 has been like 2017 an unbelievably low below average volatile as defined by movements of one percent or more.
I had clients that when after the last presidential election say well the market is definitely going to go down negative. That’s just not true. And on the flipside I had people 12 years ago when another president from the other party came in, you know, Obama said oh yeah this is going to be horrible and the market is going to continue to plummet. And the answer is no that didn’t happen. I mean there’s just so many instances that I can point to, particularly in the investing world, where supposed experts, supposed people who called the 2008 decline and financial crisis now say it’s the time to move into all your cash into gold or all your money into cash or to gold or whatever.
And I’m going to put a chart up there right now it just came out a couple of days ago where some supposed big-name experts called it completely wrong and how people who would have listened to them would be drastically worse off by sometimes over 50 percent of missed opportunity gained. These experts I’m sure believed in what they were saying, but they unfortunately started to believe with absolute certainty what they believed in without any kind of reservation or humility so that’s where things really become a problem.
I’m a believer that if we’re going to have a bias the bias ought to be being fully invested in the market. And the reason why is I’m not looking at one year, five years, ten, I’m looking at decades upon decades. And you’ve heard me talk about this in all of my videos going back multiple years about historically that has been the winning strategy. The future, absolutely could be different. Once again, I don’t know the future and you don’t know the future, however, what I do know is that the instances of our emotions causing us to do one thing over another, those are the things that have caused us to have problems. When we look back at, and I even look back at my anecdotal, okay I’ll even admit it anecdotal conversations with people throughout my 28 years of doing this when someone is so certain about something many times it’s the opportunity that the possibility might be that they’re absolutely wrong. In the late ‘90s, a great example, if you weren’t all 100 percent in tech you were a fool right before the technology bust. Real estate never loses money right until it does at the end of 2000s. So, having the humility, being invested, even with what I’m saying here today that’s why I believe in a diversified portfolio for clients and investors as you reach your goals you’ve got to have that humility and it’s one of the big lessons that 50 year old Mike would tell 20 year old Mike if I could have that conversation.
Mike Brady; Generosity Wealth Management; 303-747-6455. You have a wonderful day. Thank you. Bye bye.
“Optimism is Pessimism about the dangers of Pessimism” -Tyler Cowen
I recorded this month’s video on Monday September 30th, the last day of the quarter. Not only do I give a recap of what happened in the 3rd quarter, but I also reference my previous two newsletters about volatility (below average volatile year) and politics not mixing well with investments. The last time we had a constitutional crises was the impeachment of President Clinton, and the unmanaged stock market indexes were up 28%.
And I reference the importance of keeping your emotions in check, and asking yourself “does my optimism or pessimism help or hurt me?”
The reason I am so specific regarding when I recorded the video is because it was the afternoon before a two-day 800 point decline in the unmanaged stock market index Dow Jones Industrial. This made the national news.
No one likes to sound like Baghdad Bob, so I considered re-recording the video. Wisely, I chose to let the video stand.
I was letting myself fall into the “recency bias” in my decision making, which is weighing more recent data heavier than the data as a whole.
The economy and stock markets are very complex, with many variables and inputs. A few reports and days mean very little in the big picture or over the long run and it’s so easy to let yourself be sucked into the pessimism of one data point or another. We can’t extrapolate good days and assume they’ll all be good, and the same for negative ones. But, this is so easy to do, and we must resist it to be long term successful!
I’ve been meeting with clients for over 28 years; this past week was a good reminder that I’m human too. I’m glad my experience allowed me to acknowledge the feelings I had but not be controlled by them.
I stand by my video, and ask “are your emotions helping or hurting you?”.
Hi there. Mike Brady with Generosity Wealth Management; a comprehensive financial services firm headquartered right here in Boulder Colorado and today I am recording this in Boulder Colorado. Last three videos I’ve done from my cabin up in Wyoming and as you can see the quarter is over, the summer is over and I am now back here working in Boulder. I was working up there, of course, but here I am back in Boulder. Boy there’s a lot of people and a lot of traffic in comparison to where I was.
Sometimes it feels boring when I’m doing these quarterly videos I’m sitting here like “okay what exactly should I talk about, what’s the most impact that I can make in the few minutes that we have together?” The reason why is it comes back to the fundamentals time and time again. First let’s do a quick little recap of what happened this past quarter. It was up. It was another positive quarter the third positive quarter in three, you know, the S&P and the Dow Jones, which are unmanaged stock market indexes, we’re up over one percent, the NASDAQ was pretty much break-even it was down .1 percent give or take a day it was positive or negative. There was a lot of volatility in comparison to what we’ve seen recently this past quarter, but nothing that’s way out of the ordinary. Yes on August 5th there was a three percent decline in one day, but there’s an old adage that the market takes the stairs up and the elevator down meaning that it might go up very slowly and have a dramatic downs, but this is a long-term game that investing is. It’s three steps forward one step back, three steps forward one step back and if you obsess over the backward steps and are fearful of the backward steps you’re never going to have the forward ones. That’s my opinion. That’s why I kind of get down to the fundamentals.
One of the things that this year and last year have shown, at least for me, just I‘m an observer of people I talk with people all day long and clients and just other people out in the world are this obsession with the news and with how that might impact particular investments. And all I have to say is I think that you’re going to be better served by not being super on the high side and super on the low side. The last two or three newsletters that I’ve done I’ve shown how there’s a perception that it’s been really volatile and that’s just not true. Go back and watch August’s video where I talk about that and I throw the statistics in saying that’s just not true. The video before I talked about the presidential impact and how that’s not true either. I think that we’ve got to keep our politics and our investments completely separate. So, if you feel very strongly that what the president does is going to affect your investments, sorry I’m just not on board and history going back I think I did studies all the way back to 1920 will prove that. So, if you still feel that great you’re welcome to go and feel that all day long, I’m just not into feeling how they affect my particular investments.
That’s why when we’re dealing with other people who are getting excited about this particular news item or that one or you hear the news pundits really getting you riled up, better is to be you’ll be well served by doing the middle way as it’s called, not getting too excited on the high side, not getting too excited on the downside. We had normal volatility frankly in comparison. More volatile than we’ve had all year, but this has been a relatively below average volatile year. The S&P 500 I’m going to put a chart up there you’ll see that the S&P earnings are as high as ever and continue to be higher profitability so I’m not sure what the hubbub is. We’ve got fixed income this year, which are unmanaged bond indexes in general are positive again in single digits, not quite double digits, you know, ten percent higher, but very nice if you’ve got bonds. So, the unmanaged stock market indexes are up, the bond indexes are up, I mean yeah let’s be excited about this. Unemployment is at an unbelievably low amount that has been decreasing for the last ten years. We have inflation that is unbelievably low. We have a yield curve that everyone was like “oh my God should we jump out of the window from my big skyscraper?” And the answer is no. Do we even hear anything about that? It’s so important that after four days nobody talked about it anymore.
I talked about this briefly last month’s video I think this was actually September’s video and I just said no I don’t believe that it is a harbinger of what’s going to come or negative things. When everybody is watching something it becomes less affective and we can find, I mean this is a behavioral part of the mind where we find patterns where there may not be patterns and it made lots and lots of news it’s so important that nobody talks about it anymore so that’s just kind of my thought.
Talking about politics, let’s not forget that the market in the early ‘70s when we had a constitutional crisis lost 30 percent. When Bill Clinton had another constitutional crisis that impeachment and then his acquittal the market went up 28 percent, the unmanaged stock market indexes went up 28 percent. So here we’ve got one in the early ‘70s and there was a lot going on there, high inflation, oil embargo, it was not just Watergate. And Clinton other things were going on as well they were very positive, but during that time the market rallied and very nicely. Did it decline starting in the beginning of 2000 due to politics? Absolutely not. It had been a bubble in the tech for a long time and that’s what caused it, not anything to do with politics.
You always have to ask yourself are my emotions helping me or are they hurting me? And I recently read a quote that I want to say here that I just absolutely love and I’m going to put it on my newsletter as well: “optimism is pessimism about the dangers of pessimism”. So, if you’re pessimistic I would argue that doesn’t serve you well. Three out of four years historically have been positive in the markets. Even from the worst of the particular years leading up to elections is still positive. So, optimism is pessimism about the dangers of pessimism. And so yeah I have a tendency to be optimistic, I mean I have been doing this for 28 years, I’ve seen it, most of the time when you talk with me I’m pretty middle of the way hey yeah how does this affect things long-term? I’m sorry, why are we getting all bent out of shape? I’ve seen this only a hundred times. It might be the first time you’re seeing it, but I’ve seen it many times and historically, I’m a student of history, it has happened many times before so how has it turned out from all these other situations even if it might be the first time that you’re experiencing it. And it might be very real to you so I take nothing away from the emotions that you might be feeling, I’m just questioning whether or not those emotions are helping you. So, you ask that of yourself how is it helping you your happiness and your particular investments.
That’s it for this quarter. No reason in my opinion that I’m going to be overly pessimistic. I continue to be optimistic. That has served us well, not only this year but in pretty much most of our years as we’re looking towards and as we look towards long-term being optimistic is much better than being pessimistic, it serves you well. Mike Brady; 303-747-6455. Always here if you have any questions any concerns. Have a wonderful week, have a wonderful quarter and I will talk with you next month. Bye bye.
“Your net worth to the world is usually determined by what remains after your bad habits are subtracted from your good ones.” -Benjamin Franklin
Many folks are worried about market volatility and yield curve. Whether it’s an inherent worry or a byproduct of negative news coverage, it’s helpful to know if it is warranted or not. Some people are excessively worried about airplane crashes, when the greater worry is driving to the airport. But, the first one is dramatic and gets media attention, whereas the second doesn’t.
In this month’s video, I discuss:
Have we had unusual volatility, or has it been unusually calm but it
just seems volatile?
What’s all the hubbub about yield curves? Should I be worried?
Hi there. Mike Brady with Generosity Wealth Management; a comprehensive full service financial services firm headquarters right here in Boulder Colorado. Although you can probably tell by the background that I’m actually at Generosity Wealth Management North, which is up in Wyoming where I do spend some time up at the cabin getting away thinking about the business getting my thoughts in order. Now, the last couple videos I’ve done up here, and you probably have this perception that I’ve been up here the entire summer and it’s just not true. I was in Boulder all of August and all of June and part of July. I just got up here three or four days ago and decided to do the video. I’ll be back in Boulder for the rest all the year and all the way till next June in just a couple of weeks after working up here.
Now, you’re probably wondering why I picked this particular spot in order to record the video. Is it the most beautiful spot? Maybe not. Is it the least windy? Yeah it’s kind of windy up here in Wyoming right now. Is it kind of shady and it’s really sunny out? Yeah it’s shady. But what I’m really proud of is that wood pile right over there that I spent an entire day cutting and stacking. I mean isn’t that a good looking wood pile? I can’t wait to burn it. So, that being said let’s move right on.
The first thing I’d like to talk about is volatility. Someone came up to me two or three weeks ago and said oh my God things have been so volatile it’s just so painful. My answer is has it really been volatile? Up on the screen you’re going to see a graph you’re going to see a bar chart and that is 2019. And on the far right hand corner you’re going to see that the ten year average for plus or minus one percent in movement in one day 72 days in a year. Thirty year average is 86 days. So, 72 to 86 days is the average over a ten or 30 year timeframe for there to be a movement in one day, which means some volatility of one percent or more. In 2017 there were only eight days. I mean it was remarkably smooth. That’s what we got lulled into believing was the normal. 2018 it was a tough year we still were below average at 64 days. And then the number that they have there is only as of June 30 so I pulled my records myself for the unmanaged stock market index S&P 500 and so far this year in 2019, as of September 3rd, which is yesterday, I’m doing this on September 4th, we have 32 days out of 171, which is almost 19 percent, that are plus or minus one percent movement in one day. That means 80 percent of the days are less than a one percent movement, one percent or less. Two percent those are big movements, there’s only been seven days out of 171, which is four percent. Four percent of the days have been two percent or more.
So, I’m repeating myself 80 percent of the days have been relatively low in volatility and we definitely are below the average, both the ten and the 30 year for volatility in a year. So, some things that we believe just aren’t true. We might believe very strongly, we might see it on the news and they pump it up and they get you all excited and that’s not helpful to you. One of the things that I talk about with people is let’s be worried about the right things and this isn’t one of the things to be worried about at this point. So many people are afraid of flying, I mean really their fear should be driving to the airport. That’s significantly more risky statistically than actually being in the plane. Being in the plane is just a more dramatic way to have an accident and there’s no walking away from that.
Now, the yield curve we’ve heard a lot about that in the last two/three/four weeks or so. Am I worried about it? The answer is no. The way a yield curve works is you should have a higher return on your yield on your bonds as time goes by, ten years, 30 years, than you should in the short-term. If that gets reversed where you are actually penalized for holding it for a long time then that’s an inverted yield curve. Yes this has given some indication in the past. The averages are long it’s usually a year or two before there is a recession. My argument would be that that’s not the thing that we need to worry about. The fact that it’s become so common the fact of observing an action sometimes changes that action, it really has to depend on what the Fed does. And so, am I worried that this is going to lead to a recession? The answer is no. Recessions are remarkably, particularly in the last 40 years, infrequent. We had one in ‘73/’75, that’s one, 1980 that was almost 40 years ago, ‘81/’82, early ‘90s, early 2000s, 2007 so that’s six. That’s six of them in 50 years. So, people might say yeah but then we’re due for one. Well, maybe, maybe not. Some of the factors that led to those recessions are not here today and just because it’s been a while since we had the great recession of 2008 that doesn’t mean that we should have one now. It doesn’t have a timer an egg timer. The question is how hot is the economy and how does that relate to the market?
We have had a remarkably, not remarkably, an underperforming, a mediocre is probably the better word, a mediocre recovery since the great recession. And that’s not necessarily bad. I mean if we have a really hot market those things that go really high can come down. It’s like a bright shining star that can burst and fizzle out very quickly. We’ve had a slow burning star for the last 10/11 years and this is a good thing from my point of view. It leads me to believe that it does still have some life. We don’t have high valuations, overly crazy high valuations in the stock market, we haven’t had a lot of the other actions that precede a stock market decline in a recession like people throwing all their money into equities and other things like that so I’m not worried about it.
And the yield curve that’s just one indicator. We joke in our world in the financial services world that economists are always predicting recessions. They’ve predicted nine out of the last three recessions. And so, considering that we’ve had 75 percent, three out of four years are positive, I would rather invest looking towards that than worrying about maybe there’s a recession, which might lead to a stock market decline versus hey I would rather be invested keep this long-term and work on my odds that I believe are in my favor of being in the market long-term. Short-term the recession might happen and if you are in a job that might be recession, the opposite of recession proof capable of being hurt by the recession that’s very sensitive, recession sensitive, then yeah you should worry and make sure that you’re saving a lot in order to whether that particular storm. If you’ve got investments now is a great time, in my opinion, to continue with that strategy going forward.
That’s what I’ve got this particular month. Mike Brady; 303-747-6455. While I’m not always in the office I am always available, email, phone. And one of the things I pride myself on is being particular. Every day is a Saturday and no day is a Saturday as far as I’m concerned because this is what I do and this is what I’m going to do for the next 20 years so I’m very excited about it. To end it here I’m going to take a little pic. There we go. We’ve got that picture right there, which is – can you see that? And we’re going to go around there as well all the way towards our truck. So anyway, you guys have a wonderful, wonderful month and I will talk to you in about a month. Bye bye.
“Finance is not merely about making money. It’s about achieving our deep goals and protecting the fruits of our labor. It’s about stewardship and, therefore, about achieving the good society.” – Robert J. Shiller
This has been an incredible year so far. Pretty much every month in the unmanaged stock market indexes has been positive.
If you remember, last year 2018 was negative and some people have a tendency to allow themselves to get real negative, they extrapolate negative news into “it’s going to be negative forever” or “I told you that it was going to be horrible” particularly if you have a negative bias. Going back all the way until the 1920s, three out of four years were actually positive, so historically the strong majority is up. What we have to do is check our first biases; are we a negatively biased person or positively, and is that helping or hurting yourself?
Watch my latest video for a recap of what we’ve seen so far in 2019.
Hi there. Mike Brady with Generosity Wealth Management; a comprehensive full service financial services firm headquartered right here in Boulder Colorado and here today is actually up in Wyoming. This is 4th July. I wanted to record my video. I’m up here at my cabin. Hopefully you’re doing something wonderful for Independence Day. If you were wondering if I’m in front of a green screen and that’s a picture behind me, the answer is no. That is actually the picture out of the front of my cabin. That’s what I get to look at all day long up here in Dubois Wyoming and frankly I’m working all week because I’ve got a lot of stuff I’ve got to get done. But I want to give you the year to date video and the rest of the year preview and going into next year election year.
So, this has been an incredible year so far. Pretty much every month in the unmanaged stock market indexes has been positive except for the month of May. If you remember last year 2018 was negative and people have a tendency to get real negative, they extrapolate negative news into it’s going to be negative forever or I told you that it was going to be horrible, particularly if you have a negative bias. Going back all the way until the 1920s three out of four years are actually positive so there is a strong probability of the markets going up, but sometimes it does go down. And so, what we have to do is kind of check our first biases; are we a negatively biased person or positively.
I’m going to do a video next month actually talking about election years and what are the probabilities of the year before an election, the year of an election, et cetera, and how politics may or may not affect the stock market. Because the economy and the stock market are also two different things, which I’ll do it in a video going forward.
But let’s talk about 2019. It came roaring back the first quarter of this year, wiped away in general in the unmanaged stock market indexes in one quarter what we had lost last year in 2018. We were looking good in April of this past quarter and then May we gave some up. We never went negative in the unmanaged stock market indexes and all of the losses in May were wiped away in June and then some. So now, with the unmanaged stock market indexes we are at all time high so people might say to themselves yeah but aren’t you really worried that the market is at a high? And the answer is if you believe the market is going to go up then it’s always at highs, I mean that’s the point is that you should hope that there’s going to be new highs. Just because it hits a high doesn’t mean that it’s a ceiling and it can’t go any further, as a matter of fact if you truly believe that why do you have investments at all? That means that where you are today it’s not going to be higher in the future, which makes no sense. Why would you have investments if you don’t believe that it’s going to be higher in the future?
So far this year we are in double digit positive returns for those unmanaged stock market indexes. May was a single digit declines with the S&P 500, which is one of those indexes I talk about, about seven percent decline in the month of May, which we made back up in June. It is normal for there to be double digit declines. Most years have double digit declines and we haven’t even seen that. In 2018 last year we did, we had some real sharp declines. But that was only one out of the last four or five years where we had those double digit declines, so we have had an unusually unvolatile timeframe in the last two/three/four years. So, let’s remember that because if you’re investing for the long-term why make any decisions based on short-term trends?
I’m going to put a couple of charts up there. The first one I want to put up is the earnings per share for the S&P 500 continue to look really nice. Bonds are up as well for this year, single digits but between five and ten percent depending on what area of the bond market that you are invested in. So, stocks are up, bonds are up, unemployment is down, earnings per share is up. I mean if you are a negative person you can try to find something to be negative about, but I would argue that doesn’t serve you any good.
There’s an argument that some people say is like hey better too early than too late in most things. Because it’s looking so good I should move out because I’ll avoid negative things in the future. My answer would be no that doesn’t help you because I have seen in my 28 years of doing this since 1991 that getting out might be one thing, but if it continues to go up you never get back in, or if it goes down you have such a propensity to preserve that it’s also when do you get back in? And so, no, if you’re in this for the long-term, five, 10, 20 years then stay invested, have your plan and stick with it. If you’re going to have investments for a short-term, you know, one month, six months, 18 months why should you have any money in the markets? I mean that’s not even a full market cycle. So, if you judge long-term investments based on short-term trends that’s a recipe for disaster.
The economy, as I mentioned earlier, is not the stock market even though the economy is doing great. Now, you wouldn’t know that necessarily by watching the news. If you are getting whipsawed in your emotions by the 24/7 news cycle I would say don’t do that because if you like that, hey great, that’s wonderful, but don’t make any decisions on it and don’t listen to what they have to say about the economy and the stock market because that is going to cause you lots of angst. For the rest of the year continue to be bullish. You’ve heard me for the last my gosh five/ten years be bullish and that has served us well. I see no reason not to be bullish going forward. As a matter of fact, once again, you’ve got to watch my video next month, but 90 percent, going back to the early 30s of the year before an election, 90 percent of them have been positive and strongly positive. And so, that doesn’t mean that we should be invested because of that, but all the ingredients are there.
That’s it for right now. The rest of the year I never answered that thought I never completed that thought. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know any more than you do. Unlike all those pendants on TV to who say with very little humility that they know what the future is. You don’t know the future and I don’t know the future, but fortunately we’re not investing for the next six months. If you are you shouldn’t have investments. We’re invested for the long-term and I’m going to make the bet that going forward, even if the next six months are down, even if the next two years are down, history has shown that going back to 1950 there’s never been in a diversified portfolio a five year time horizon when you have lost money and so therefore that is a bet that I am willing to take. Even though it’s possible, absolutely, the future is uncertain. However, we can’t live our lives running away from things, we have to live our lives and our investments and the future based on the best data that we have and how we feel we’re going to be best served long-term, not short-term but long-term and so that’s what I think going forward.
Stay tune for that video next month. I have a couple good ones coming forward and I really hope that you watch those and that you have a wonderful – that you had because by the time you get this 4 the July weekend will be over, but anyway hopefully you’re doing well. Mike Brady; Generosity Wealth Management; 303-747-6455. Have a wonderful day. Thanks. Bye bye.
Up on the screen you’re going to see a graph you’re going to see a bar chart and that is 2019. And on the far right hand corner you’re going to see that the ten year average for plus or minus one percent in movement in one day 72 days in a year. Thirty year average is 86 days. So, 72 to 86 days is the average over a ten or 30 year timeframe for there to be a movement in one day, which means some volatility of one percent or more. In 2017 there were only eight days. I mean it was remarkably smooth. That’s what we got lulled into believing was the normal. 2018 it was a tough year we still were below average at 64 days. And then the number that they have there is only as of June 30 so I pulled my records myself for the unmanaged stock market index S&P 500 and so far this year in 2019, as of September 3rd, which is yesterday, I’m doing this on September 4th, we have 32 days out of 171, which is almost 19 percent, that are plus or minus one percent movement in one day. That means 80 percent of the days are less than a one percent movement, one percent or less. Two percent those are big movements, there’s only been seven days out of 171, which is four percent. Four percent of the days have been two percent or more.
burst and fizzle out very quickly. We’ve had a slow burning star for the last 10/11 years and this is a good thing from my point of view. It leads me to believe that it does still have some life. We don’t have high valuations, overly crazy high valuations in the stock market, we haven’t had a lot of the other actions that precede a stock market decline in a recession like people throwing all their money into equities and other things like that so I’m not worried about it.