A Simple Investment Strategy That Worked in 2019: Buy Almost Anything

Sure didn't help that 2018 ended with everything being down 15-20%, this year was more of a rebound than a continuous healthy market.

I've seen a few people online giving up jobs, retiring early because they make enough money trading or investing now. Deja vu all over again.

This is a misleading story. Yes, the stock market rose significantly in 2019. But it had also dipped severely at the end of 2018. When you account for that dip, stock performance has been average.<p>Example: On Dec 21 2018 SPY (S&amp;P 500 ETF) was trading for $240.70. Today it is trading for $323.07, which is a huge 34% jump. But on Sep 21 2018 it was trading for $291.99. Compared to that high, the increase is a mediocre 10.6%

All the while corporate earnings didn&#x27;t go up. Go figure.<p>At this point, with so much stimulus, I&#x27;m wondering if the next crisis will be a deflationary one, like everyone is expecting (i.e. a stock market crash, people fired, credit frozen) or the inflationary type (long drag of stagflation).

Except... There were significant performance disparities and risk profiles for each of these asset classes that nominally &quot;went up&quot;

To consider the flip side of a coin. This is the continued devaluation of monetary instruments.<p>You can look at as the s&amp;p500 rose by 29%. Or you can look at it as &quot;The USD&quot; buys 23% fewer shares than last year. (ideally this would be adjusted for profit growth and inflation too)<p>IMO this is totally expected given negative interest rates and QE.