Flash Sale on Index Funds!
As Coronavirus panic spreads faster than the actual virus, there is a silver lining - if you have cash lying around and are wondering what to do with it, stocks are on sale!
If you’re down with 2008 free internet games, Pandemic 2 is a great way to understand global epidemiology!
Right now coronavirus is impacting my life in two major ways - delaying our move to China and causing our net worth to plummet. But as a public health nerd who spent a lot of time in grad school playing Pandemic 2 (warning: highly addictive and very hard to kill off Madagascar), I’m more interested in seeing how the virus is spreading than freaking out about things I can’t control.
Where we are, the government is unlikely to publicly confirm any cases, just as with an Ebola scare last year. Covid-19 is a lot less scary than Ebola in terms of fatality and awful symptoms, but a lot more contagious. We are just operating under the assumption that it’s here, just like malaria, typhoid, and lots of other stuff that can kill you.
So as I spend my time planning safaris, swimming in the ocean, and occasionally renting boats (early retirement is hard), I’m also taking advantage of this sale on stocks. I’m shaking the cushions for any cash to buy low-fee total market ETFs as the market crashes. This plan is working under the assumption that either the market will recover, or we are entering a post-apocalypse type scenario in which case it doesn’t matter what you do with your money now, because you will probably be dead! #YOLO
I’d rather be on this yacht than in quarantine… #nofilter
I am actually fairly risk-adverse, but my investment strategy is simple and I trust data more than feelings. Read more about simple investing at JL Collin’s stock series. While tax-avoidance strategies make my eyes glaze over - and the overly complicated tax loopholes that help the rich get richer in the US frustrate me to no end (if you want to figure out how to do it, check out the Mad FIentist) - buying index funds with very low/no expense ratios makes sense to me and buying on the way down during a crash is like buying during a sale - which in real life is the only way I shop!