I keep a share in my portfolio - I call it my memento mori - it lost 96% of its value. I’ll never sell it.
Thanks RBS for teaching me humility.
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That particular share is unlikely to go to 0 (i.e. bankruptcy), but many do. I somehow managed to avoid RBS but it was at one point seen ss a safe bet, then it bought ABN Amro, and the rest is history (Barclays almost bought it just before). I like the idea of a momento mori investment Dave, it’s also nice to see people sharing their losses, not just successes.
Merry Christmas everyone.
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To be sold as a Capital Gain writeoff for the Freetrade profit… 
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Unfortunately it was in my SIPP!
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Hope your SIPP was diversified or you’ll be working until you’re 100 
It is, that was part of my attempt at a HYP, which overall is doing ok but far too much work for me. Mostly in VUKE, VWRL, VGOV and GOLD now.
My biggest loss is on Merlin Entertainments, 4.88% down 
This is very impressive - i’ve stopped looking, it just makes me sad.
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I am up 20% this year 
Cashed out all my positions at the recent all-time highs, only left my position in Randgol, which I closed earlier this month aswell. Currenty sitting at a good old savings account and couldn’t be happier.
There are a lot of very compelling companies right now though , waiting for Freetrade US stock and will start getting back into the markert slowly but surely.
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Gold hasn’t done so well in the last few years. Have a look at the iShares page for that ETC. From what I recall Gold prices rise when Stocks go down and vice versa.
Warren Buffet spoke on Gold investing vs Shares earlier on in the year and said for every dollar you could have made in American business, you’d have less than a penny of gain by buying into a store of value which people tell you to run to every time you get scared by the headlines - source
The interesting thing about gold is that it has been a real store of value over the years - as one of my former mentors said, an ounce bought you a tailored toga in Roman times and it buys you a very nice suit now.
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They kind of do but kind of don’t. There is an older reply which looked at 30 years’ Gold vs S&P 500 prices and how those correlated with each other. Whilst the correlation is negative, it is very weak and very close to “no relationship at all”:
In any case, stocks are significantly more likely to outperform gold in long term 
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At this rate, a very long term 
But hey, what else did Warren Buffett say:
If you expect to be a net saver during the next five years, should you hope for a higher or lower stock market during that period?
“Many investors get this one wrong. Even though they are going to be net buyers of stocks for many years to come, they are elated when stock prices rise and depressed when they fall. In effect, they rejoice because prices have risen for the ‘hamburgers’ they will soon be buying.
“This reaction makes no sense. Only those who will be sellers of equities in the near future should be happy at seeing stocks rise . Prospective purchasers should much prefer sinking prices.”
Source: Warren Buffet on Hamburgers
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It is time in the market that counts. Timing the market is fiendishly difficult. A strategy which is difficult to beat is investing little and often, pound cost averaging. This is the principal reason why I was drawn to Freetrade in R2 onwards. You can do this at little or no cost.
What with current state of sinister panto politics and levels of uncertainty high, market volatility will continue. I’ll personally be drip feeding into the markets throughout and keeping quite a bit back to invest a little heavier closer to Brexit.
Cheers
Peter
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Totally agree on that investing often and consistent is the best way to beat down trends and gain on uptrends.
As for Brexit, its kind of gamble/luck. If they find a working solution and agreement to continue with the trade even after the brexit the market will go up. But if they cant find a solution and the deadline passes then the market will surely go down. Neither way its good to have cash for buying cheap before the uptrend again. 
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It was a tough / interesting year. Glad to hear that most people weren’t hit too hard by the downturn.
I somehow managed to have a good year overall. I would love to say it was skill, but I was forced to make some big sells in the middle of the year to generate cash, and it worked massively in my favour. Interestingly - none of my assets sold in 2018, were also bought in 2018. I take that as a positive, with respect to my investment horizon.
Best Trade - Statpro [SOG]
Worst Trade - Centamin [CEY] - Lesson: Focus on operational details, not just financial metrics
Fave Trade - Mastercard [MA] - This has been on my watchlist forever, finally got in!
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I accidentally “timed the market” during a switch of my ISA from one platform to another. I sold everything a little while before the drop, and the new provider had a bug and failed to carry out my buy order to reinvest after the transfer. The buy order only went through after most of the drop had occurred. I’m down fractions of a percent since then, but when the market recovers I expect to see big gains.
My JISA transfer wasn’t so lucky and was down something around 10-20% at worst. Now it’s back up to 5% loss. I’ve no doubt it will also recover.
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Being a first time investor this investing lark is incredibly addictive
I’m seeing +++ for the first time and can’t keep away 
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Markets are recovering a bit, I’m now only 4.8% down. Not sure I am happy as I am only into month 5 of my 15 year plan!
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It’s a great time to be at year 1 of your 15 year plan really. Stocks are on sale, and might even get cheaper this year as it goes on. If you’re saving for 15 years ideally you want to get as much as you can into the market in the next few months IMO (as long as you’re not picking risky stocks but big solid companies which will still be there in 15 years).
So personally I think being down at present is totally fine, and is an indicator you should buy some more at the moment if you can afford it, then wait for it to go up.
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