All Bad Things Are Temporary

We are expecting. The past few weeks I have been busy because I just found out that my wife is pregnant with our first child. I have been busy scrambling off what to do. Asking people for advice. And honestly, just plain excited of the thought, that I wasn’t able to focus on the blog nor the Investing Philippines youtube channel. Or anything… 🙂

Its exciting and scary at the same time. Having to rear a child in this uncertain times. Many questions popping in my head as to being a father. I can now understand what my father went through when we were born.

It’s a huge responsibility. Being responsible for a human being’s life. And all the things he will need for a better future. I don’t think most people know how big that responsibility is.

Anyway, enough of that, we are going to talk about investments.

The current state of affairs in the world is that, COVID-19 vaccine is in the works. And there’s a lot of promising developments in this field. Moderna and Pfizer has more than 90% effectivity rate for their vaccine. Its only a matter of time before we get to have everyone vaccinated and put COVID behind us.

The US have a new president and the world is starting to recover… Maybe.

Japan actually grew their GDP of around 5%. A first time in a long time.

A couple of typhoons hitting the Philippines.

There’s a lot of good news lately, that the market is starting to go up. The PSE index is now at 6,959.14. Just -10.90% year to date. A very good improvement from the -30% or so a few months back.

And what can we learn from all of this?

That the world, is a cycle. There are times when people are so happy and everything is doing fine. All your stocks are going up. More portfolio screenshots everywhere. And a lot of people telling you to invest now. Gurus are telling you that their trading strategy works. Buy and hold is dead.

And then it turns.

Now, everyone is in a state of fear and panic. A pandemic hits everyone. Stocks go down. Less portfolio screenshots. People telling you to NOT risk your money. Buy bonds! Not stocks. Gurus now teaching long term investing, telling all of us that its better to have the best of both worlds.

You will realize that people are people. There are people who just get carried away by the wave of the cycle. Changing strategies when one is not working. Still failing to realize the basic truth in the market and its participants.

If you’re an investor, you don’t participate in this madness. You have to know the cycle and not be a participant in it. If people are going crazy in a pandemic, you should be the one buying. If they are going crazy about the stocks that are going up, you should be the one selling. We are in a way, contrarians. And bad things don’t last forever. There are bad things that last far too long, but its not a permanent thing. There will always be something to look forward to. You just need patience.

The pandemic has taught me this truth. And it reinforces all the things that happened the previous crash. That is, no matter how difficult or bad the situation is, its only temporary. And sooner or later, things will get better. And there will be things to look forward to. In my personal experience, that even in the most difficult times, we are still happy because of our little bundle of joy that gives us hope and optimism.

On being an investor, which time is it better to invest? On the time when everything is bad? Or when things are getting better? If it’s in the bad, do you have the courage to be against the crowd?

I hope you know the answer to that question. Stay safe everyone!

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