Volatility’s Back: Be Smart, Not Frightened

But let’s suppose for a moment that you could.

If you had invested just $10,000 in the Amazon IPO in 1997, as of March 2018 — barely 20 years later — you would have nearly $8 million. However, there were significant drawdowns you would have had to endure to get those returns.

How many of us could truly stomach a 90% drawdown and multiple 50 percenters? Even the best possible investments suffer huge (and thus terrifying) drawdowns.

With (always 20:20) hindsight, it may not seem like too big a deal. However, in the moment, our loss aversion and our impulsive performance-chasing militate strongly against our being able to hold on when investments inevitably suffer losses.

The sad reality is that when market volatility seems oppressive, many investors bail. They say they simply cannot stomach the losses. That’s why the “behavior gap” between investment returns and investor returns is so huge and so potentially damaging. Many — probably most — investors who cash out when negative volatility rears its ugly head will see their chances of retirement success decrease significantly.

Stocks generally do not offer Amazon-level returns, of course. But the returns they do provide are very good indeed. Over the 30 years ending Dec. 31, 2017, the S&P 500 returned 10.6% vs. 6.4% for bonds (10-year U.S. Treasury notes) and 3.1% for cash (3-month U.S. Treasury bills) annualized. Everyone knows the differences are significant, but it’s easy to miss just how significant they are.

Over those 30 years, $10,000 in cash netted $24,728, bonds provided $65,123, while stocks earned $205,557. Avoiding stocks to avoid volatility has an enormous cost.

Negative volatility hurts. Sometimes it hurts a lot. However, volatility is the necessary price paid for the much higher returns provided by stocks as compared with other investment choices. Investors would be wise to willingly pay up.

Bob Seawright is the chief investment and information officer for Madison Avenue Securities in San Diego. He is active on Twitter, @RPSeawright, and his blog “Above the Market” can be found at rpseawright.wordpress.com.