History Course: Great Depression

Now I am not comparing the curreny meltdown directly to the Great Depression...but it is important to know thy past.

1. Dow fell from ~400 to ~40...~90%.  Currenly we are only down about 40%.  Just imagine how you would feel if this were just the halfway point...

2. It took the Dow about 25 years to recover to par value (1929 to 1954)

3. From the low of ~40 it took only 3 months for the market to double back to 80...and then stabalize at 60.

4.  If you had waited for the market to stabalize and then invested in Q4'32 (DJI=60), you would have made 500% (6X your money) by the time the market returned to pre-crash levels.  You need to invest once a bottom materializes. It is less important that you find the exact bottom...you can wait for some stability before pulling the trigger.