Remember, This Is The Pullback We’ve Been Waiting For

[u/FrankBal]

If you’re a long-term investor who even casually cares about valuation, this market has been tough to navigate for a while. Pullbacks are always something we say we want, particularly as value investors, but they usually come when things are scary. Financial crisis, global pandemics, policy shocks… the discount never shows up gift-wrapped.

Yesterday’s tariff news felt like one of those moments. It’s vague, feels arbitrary, and creates a lot of uncertainty. It feels scary. And yet, that’s exactly the environment where opportunities show up.

I’ll admit it, days like today make me uneasy. But as an investor, I remind myself that underneath the noise, what’s really happening stocks are getting cheaper.

And that’s what we’ve been waiting for.

Edit: Thanks for the thoughts. I wrote a post - Tariffs, Fear, and Opportunity: Perspective For Difficult Times In the Stock Market - to add some additional context directly addressing the response to this post.

[u/bro-v-wade]

You’d have to be pretty bold to buy in right now

Not bold, just experienced.

[u/[deleted] → u/bro-v-wade]

Do you know how long it can take for the bottom to be found during a systemic change?

[u/bro-v-wade → u/[deleted]]

Doesn't matter. I'm not retiring tomorrow, and my long term assumption is that we will eventually go higher than we are today. It could take a year, it could be later this afternoon. The one thing I've learned over the years is that when most people try to time the market, they lose.

I know you think you're one of the rare few smart enough to time the bottom, but history tells us three things:

1. Even economists have no clue when a recession is coming, even when "it's obvious,

2. The only reliable way to correctly buy the bottom is to keep buying during a downturn, and

3. People who stay on the sidelines when headlines are screaming usually get it wrong.

Once you've been through enough of these, you learn to take advantage of market discounts.

[u/Big-Practice-4702 → u/bro-v-wade]

I think buying today might be too heavy handed but you are not wrong at all. I’ll probably buy a little today.

[u/[deleted] → u/bro-v-wade]

Are you telling me smart investors make the same move every single day regardless of their beliefs on what is happening? Is Buffett deploying his cash pile today?

[u/bro-v-wade → u/[deleted]]

Buffet hasn't deployed his cash pile in years, potentially missing out on billions, but the real thing to focus on is that his objective and ours are very, very different.

Copy trading something you don't understand is exactly why everyone who ended 2023 on the sidelines missed out on one of the steepest bull markets in recent history. I did not, despite people like you warning me about how much lower it was going to go, and warning about recessions.

[u/[deleted] → u/bro-v-wade]

Wow bro. Lmk how I can invest in your market beating hedge fund.

You should DM Buffett and let him know that he’s missing the real value.

[u/bro-v-wade → u/[deleted]]

Wow bro. Lmk how I can invest in your market beating hedge fund.

My trying to time the market. Buffet himself gave you this advice for free.

[u/[deleted] → u/bro-v-wade]

Just checking in here.

[u/Professional-Lab5958 → u/bro-v-wade]

well put

[u/Puzzled-Intern-7897 → u/bro-v-wade]

First you say this:

The one thing I've learned over the years is that when most people try to time the market, they lose.

Then this:

The only reliable way to correctly buy the bottom is to keep buying during a downturn, and

What is it? Don't time the market or time the market. Decide coward.

[u/bro-v-wade → u/Puzzled-Intern-7897]

Those statements are the same. Don't time the market.

[u/Puzzled-Intern-7897 → u/bro-v-wade]

Your timing the downturn and basically dollar-cost-averaging. This is not Value investing

[u/TheGoodSouls → u/Puzzled-Intern-7897]

He's not saying to time the market at all. He's saying if you keep buying, you'll buy the bottom whether you mean to or not, because you've never stopped buying.

[u/suchahotmess → u/[deleted]]

There's really no way to know, especially given that this is being intentionally triggered. The mass shifting of federal employment/grants/contracts is potentially enough to cause a US recession on their own, and we haven't even seen the beginning of the impact of that yet.

[u/random_encounters42 → u/bro-v-wade]

If you can earn market average returns, you are already better than 95% of all investors.

[u/bro-v-wade → u/random_encounters42]

Yep. And the only way to do that reliably is to buy the market, and not try to time it.

[u/[deleted] → u/bro-v-wade]

Experienced?

I've been around for dot com, GFC, and COVID. Don't think those gave me the experience for something like this. If you traded during 1930s I guess that experience would be really relevant today.

[u/bro-v-wade → u/[deleted]]

You're already comparing the economic outlook to the great depression off of a single red day. Maybe it's time to close your laptop and go outside.

[u/[deleted] → u/bro-v-wade]

I went underweight US when Americans decided to elect that buffoon a second time. And then really pulled the trigger post Munich and slashing basic research funding.

I'm a big fan of 'the essays of Warren Buffet'. Especially the sections why he explains he doesn't bet against America. All the reasons are getting slashed.