Attention, discount shoppers, the recent stock market dive is like a holiday weekend sale. This is your chance to get stocks for less.
There has been a lot of advice for investors. Don’t panic, the experts say.
“Stay the course. This is normal, despite the very placid market environment we saw in 2017. Markets go up and down, not just up,” says Greg McBride, Bankrate.com’s chief financial analyst. “But they go up a lot more than they go down, so hang in there and consider buying more.”
But what about the folks who don’t have any money in the market? What should they be doing?
If you’re not in the stock market, now is the time to go shopping. Stocks are on sale.
“Although a massive market drop can be attention-grabbing, it can also present a buying opportunity,” wrote Kathryn Vasel, personal finance reporter for CNNMoney.“Before the 2008 financial crisis, 62 percent of U.S. adults, on average, said they owned stocks. Since then, the average has been 54 percent, including lows of 52 percent in 2013 and 2016. Given that relatively few Americans in lower-income households invested in stocks before the 2008 financial crisis and upper-income households show no change in ownership, it follows that middle- and upper-middle-income households have largely driven the decline in stock ownership.”
As Scot Lance, managing director at Titus Wealth Management, told Vasel: “The stock market is the only place I’ve ever seen where when something goes on sale, no one will touch it. But if the price is going up, that is when everyone wants to buy it.”
