Investors have been in denial for five years. Stocks went up 26% in 2009, but two-thirds of investors thought they fell. Stocks rose 15% in 2010, but half of investors said they went down. Stocks rose in 2011, yet more than half of investors said they declined, according to surveys from Franklin Templeton.
Volatile… but normal
Last year, Gallup showed that the average American thinks very little of the stock market. Only one-third agreed that it was an "excellent/good" way to grow assets. Millenials use words like "casino," "rigged," and "crapshoot" to describe stocks.
But if you calculate every five-year period since 1871, the last half-decade ranks as the fourth-best time to have been in an investor. Adjusted for inflation, the S&P 500 gained more in the last five years than it did from 1995 to 2000, during the roaring bull market of the 1990s. The difference is, back then, investors were obsessed with the market's gains. Today, they're oblivious.
Here's the truth: The last five years will probably be the best five-year period you'll ever experience as an investor. The last decade has been average. If you've struggled through this period, or keep telling yourself that buy and hold doesn't work, or that the market is a scam, it's your own fault. Stocks have done over the last decade what stocks have done for countless decades: offered a pretty decent return with lots of volatility mixed in the middle.
The fact that the average investor has been oblivious to this progress shows that the average investor is participating in a game he or she does not understand and doesn't agree with. That's unfortunate. But it means there's a simple answer to all the stories you hear about investors not trusting the market: the market isn't the problem. You, and your expectations, are the problem. You are your own worst enemy.
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