My retirement fund that I just started was worth $15k in December of 2021. Then, May of 2022, our area was hit really hard. My retirement plan went down to $7k. Today, it’s worth $11k. I lost $4k on my retirement plan. It’s invested in total market funds, some tech, some big cap companies, and healthcare. But every sector has been ravaged by the stock market changes.

  • partial_accumen@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    12 days ago

    I lost $4k on my retirement plan. It’s invested in total market funds, some tech, some big cap companies, and healthcare. But every sector has been ravaged by the stock market changes.

    Its not your total market fund killing you, its your individual stocks. I don’t recommend picking specific stocks for your real savings. Save individual stock picks for money you can afford to lose. In your case it cost you $7,000.

    I used your same data and here’s what it would have looked like if all of it was in your Total Market fund.

    You would have $18,679. This would have been a gain of $3479 or a 22% return on investment in only 2 years. That is crazy good! Retirement isn’t a total scam, but unless you are VERY lucky, picking individual stocks is risky. You can successfully save for retirement with just one, two, or three funds: Total Stock Market fund, Total Bond Fund, and perhaps an International fund. I mainly focus on just the boring Total Stock Market fund and it performs fairly consistently well over time.

    • Dkarma@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      12 days ago

      This this this. Op is a shit investor using his 401k to buy individual stocks.

      Tldr; he’s doing it wrong.

      • Poik@pawb.socialEnglish
        0·
        12 days ago

        Stop. The Vanguard retirement funds all did this if the target is before 2060. And those are invested in index funds by professionals. OP likely had the VTINX or a total bond fund, both of which did this that year and were recommended for during retirement. This is likely the more liquid portion of the portfolio, not the penny stock portion.

        • partial_accumen@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          12 days ago

          Stop. The Vanguard retirement funds all did this if the target is before 2060. And those are invested in index funds by professionals. OP likely had the VTINX

          OP’s losses are more exagerated than just the Target Date fund experiencing a dip from bond exposure.

          Here’s OP’s same initial investment on the same day but 100% in VTINX:

          So instead of a $4k loss that OP showed, it would been a $71 loss. OP went picking individual stocks and got burned (assuming they liquidated their position after seeing their portfolio balance).

          • Poik@pawb.socialEnglish
            0·
            12 days ago

            Yeah. You’re right. And their recounting of what they invested in makes no sense. I caught that later. So there’s definitely poor choices somewhere they aren’t mentioning.