I am

It's a shitty feeling too

What can I do to protect my 401k at this point? I've got about 15-18 years left to work before retirement but by then the age may be jacked up to 85

Most days … I have one foot in and one foot out.

I'm concerned too, but unless you're clairvoyant the best thing you can do is nothing, especially since you have a 15+ year time horizon.

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
I am

It's a shitty feeling too

What can I do to protect my 401k at this point? I've got about 15-18 years left to work before retirement but by then the age may be jacked up to 85

Borrow against it and buy some big land?

I'm buying. Intel @ $48 couple days ago

BPMP energy/coal pays 7.5%

ARLP energy/coal pays 7.5%

When I was 15-18 years out I stayed 100% in the market with one exception. We were transferring for my job 2008 so I exited the market during that transition. (That was my excuse to myself). It's ok, it only cost me about $500,000.
Stay invested. Your time horizon is plenty long.

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
I am

It's a shitty feeling too

What can I do to protect my 401k at this point? I've got about 15-18 years left to work before retirement but by then the age may be jacked up to 85

Don't do anything. You've got a long way to go and your 401K is for the long haul.

Don't be a prognosticator like me and pull your $ out when the Dow was at 20,000.

In all seriousness - this would be a good time to become a little more defensive but I would not completely pull the plug. (interest rates on CD's and MM's are about 1/10 of a point above squat)

As my kids remind me often, “It’s just numbers on a screen dad.” Implying the virtualness/intangibility of it all.

And I tell them to make a room ready for me, lol.

I have been saying it for some time. Hasn't happened, but it will. We're over due and seriously over valued imho.

The best advice I can give is to be comfortable in your risk tolerance thinking.

Also remember that diversification is you friend.

Being comfortable in retirement is a four legged chair. Your 401k is just one leg. the other three legs can be things like your home, insurance, cash, Real estate, Annuity, other things.

You do have time on your side to a degree. But I am really wondering with this debt how is it going to be paid. Or maybe a better way to put it are we headed in to a long term down cycle that will lower peoples standard of living to the point that what is yours in now someone else's. Seem's so to me.
I am not convinced the stock market is where the majority of folks that make $ are going to be putting money. I think it is a "crap" shoot in the future. Think outside the box.

This is a great time to be in the market if you're not trying to retire right now. The more the market drops, the more shares you are purchasing with the same amount of money. If you're 15+ years out, this is fantastic news for you.

We just retired, a bit earlier than expected due to the crazy world.

If you can go to cash in your 401k, that would be one way to avoid riding the market down. My employer's plan did not allow any cash or money market, which is the main reason I rolled it over to my IRA and Roth IRA.

If you must be fully invested, you could see if there is a TIPS bond fund, which is (somewhat) inflation protected. Note that regular bonds are not immune at all to losing value! If you aren't familiar, do some reading. Essentially, most bonds are a fixed interest rate. As the government increases interest rates the new bonds pay better, so the old bonds become less valuable. The take-away is that bonds are not inherently any safer than stocks in terms of losing value.

A dividend fund should contain higher quality stocks, which should go down less than risky growth oriented stock funds. Large established profitable companies tend to ride through the downturns losing less than the smaller companies.

If you have access to a self-directed option it may be worth doing. We had a steep fee in our 401k to go self-directed. In good times it was not worth it to do that, as the standard funds did well enough. However, self-directed means you can pick almost anything rather than be limited to a few choices. You might consider silver or other commodities, which are typically thought to be good inflation hedges.

If you are stuck with only a few funds to pick from, look for lower risk. I don't see any good in the near future in developing markets.

Timing the market is impossible. While it makes sense to shift into items that do better in the expected near-term economic climate, you should still remain diversified. For example, I would not go all-in on silver even though it is a larger portion of my portfolio today than it was a year ago.

Buy the dip! Maximize what you put in as the market goes down. When it does come back you will reap the profits. Don't try to wait until the market bottoms, as you will miss the big up days. Don't sweat the downturn given your 18 yr timeline. Do a little rebalancing, and keep saving the max you possibly can.

Maximize ROTH. When you do retire, everything is income tested, meaning the more income you show the more you pay in taxes and for health insurance. It is almost certainly better to pay the taxes today and then have the ROTH money tax-free in retirement.

I'd put it all in fixed and when the market crashes get back in. If you leave it in through the crash it will take longer to just get back to where you are now. I had my money in fixed before covid hit. When the market dropped I got ba k into it and have made tremendous gains. I'm mainly in oil and uranium, I'll sell my oil at $100 a barrel and I'll stay in uranium for another year or two.

quote:

Originally posted by Perception:
This is a great time to be in the market if you're not trying to retire right now. The more the market drops, the more shares you are purchasing with the same amount of money. If you're 15+ years out, this is fantastic news for you.

I always chuckle at this line. Because it sounds great. And I understand it. But what if we start a downward trend and
it last a dozen years. Do you keep telling your self this for the next 12 years?

I feel like the correction already happened. At my age, whatever happens either way will just be a blip by the time I retire.

quote:

posted February 10, 2022 03:06 PM Hide Post
I'm concerned too, but unless you're clairvoyant the best thing you can do is nothing, especially since you have a 15+ year time horizon.

^^^^^^^^^^^^
Correct answer. You could also dollar cost average.

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:

quote:

Originally posted by Perception:
This is a great time to be in the market if you're not trying to retire right now. The more the market drops, the more shares you are purchasing with the same amount of money. If you're 15+ years out, this is fantastic news for you.

I always chuckle at this line. Because it sounds great. And I understand it. But what if we start a downward trend and
it last a dozen years. Do you keep telling your self this for the next 12 years?

Japan……….

Took a few years to get inflation going… It’s gonna take a few years to undo it if you start acting today. Which by the way, it’s not happening.

Fed 10yr @ 2%
Oil approaching $100/bbl
Stocks still very high even after a rocky 2022
Watching real estate appreciate quickly

Hard to say … certainly would not be in bonds w rates rising.

15-18 years?

My advice is to quit looking at it.

(or take a bunch out and pay your house off. )

You can do what you want with this picture. It's the average S&P 500 return for Year 2 and Year 3 for presidential cycle from 1925 to 2019.

Based on this, I cashed out what I could in Jan 13, 2022. Yes, I missed cashing out during the high of November 2021. My reasoning is why sweat the ups and downs through Q3. My plan is to monitor the changes of the stocks I sold and I expect to buy back near the end of Q3.