Trials and Tribulations: Coronavirus Market Correction

With the drama that I had experienced most recently with my only two hot picks in individual stocks, CLH being on its continued trading halt which has now extended until mid March and UNV being subject to a hostile takeover bid from TER, I really thought that I had seen enough drama to last a year. (ᗒᗩᗕ)

That is, until the markets this week undertook one of the biggest corrections in recent times with the index going down 9.8%, taking $210bn from the markets   ᕕʕ •ₒ• ʔ୨. As someone who doesn't buy shorts or puts, obviously I took on a fair amount of collateral damage.

As someone who tried to go into this journey with a certain amount of mental preparation, I too was caught off guard as to my personal responses to this black swan event. Early on in the week, my ボーイフレンド and I spent most of it indulging ourselves in schadenfreude when we watched everyone around us and in online forums lose their minds over the daily 3% drops Σ(･ω･ﾉ)ﾉ！ . It had gotten so bad that even my colleague Mr D was finally pushed over the edge and cashed out his holdings on Thursday and dived in on inverted indexes (BBUS and BBOZ), cashing out at the lowest point, thereby crystallizing his losses before buying into the already relatively higher inverted index. I can only hope that he doesn't crash and burn too hard that he can no longer be redeemed.

As for myself, I had high hopes that with my mental preparation, I would be able to separate myself from the numbers as the fell. During the start of the week, I could definitely say that I managed to do so with relative capability. Having said that, by the end when it neared a 10% drop, I too succumbed to a slight bout of sadness when I realised that half a years' worth of my savings was gone on the papers. When you consider than in real terms of how many bleary eyed mornings I had to force myself out of bed to get onto the bus and deal with stupid people at work, it did make me fairly sad. Despite my disappointment in myself for having feelings when I expected none (◞ ‸ ◟ㆀ), I can still gladly say that I did not once have my finger on the "sell" button, which is testament at least to a level of discipline and rationality.

So to drown our sorrows for losing that much on the markets this week, at least we could still enjoy two minute noodles and tendies to commemorate our week of losses. As for what I will be doing next week? I will be increasing my DCA and putting my March funds into WGB. For those who are wondering, I couldn't convince Mr A to go buy in the dip, but at least he also stayed the course and is continuing his regular investment ʕ´•ᴥ•`ʔσ”.

An interesting note though, as an ironic silver lining to this week, the trading halt from CLH happened to cushion my fall a bit, cos 0% is still better than being negative. 

By 小福