UTGrad98

Someone please explain. What Im not understanding is how the VIX could get to 65 today and close at 38, something it hasnt done since 2020 pandemic and before that times like the dot com bust and great recession. It doesnt make any sense. Another thing that doesnt make much sense is how Japan's stock market can lose 17% in 2 days including 12% in 1 day. Is it all because of this "carry trade" and the BOJ raising rates 25 basis points? Or the fact that the Fed chose NOT to lower interest rates by a quarter point 4 days ago? Those take 9-12 months to take effect anyway. These dont seem like fear inducing catalysts to me. What am I missing here? The global markets were frothy and we are getting rid of some of that froth. Seems pretty standard. Why so much fear? Ill hang up and listen.

For today. It looks like we've bottomed for today

Yea 508 was the -10% from all.time high resistance level and I think it hit that in premarket trading. Damn premarket, always gets the cool stuff.

Pretty good bounce off of spy 510 so far.

I think we bounce off the 200 day moving average. Stocks don't just fall straight down. And Japan has been following our moves from the day before the last 2 sessions.

200 day moving average for SPY is right at 500. Did not think we would get here so fast. If it goes below 500 and closes below 500 in the next few days, look out below. 450 and 440 are in play

Not a great Monday opening overseas. And that after their 5% selloff Friday

Same. I looked in 2022 at my 401k and saw my bond fund was down 10%. Never been so furious in my life in terms of managing my money. You can throw a rock and you will see 60% stock 40% bond portfolio advice so I never put in the work to understand that a bond fund trades just like a stock does and can absolutely lose principal. Huge lesson. Never again. Bond funds can suck my dick.

Markets doing bad

Looks like we bumping up against the 100 day MA right now

holy shit VIX gonna hit 30 before noon. Its been at like 12 for most of the year.

Yea money is a good word too. People like money.

For those of you who like to day trade on the way down, the first truly big resistance points are 515ish for the fibonacci retracement of the 565 high and 351 low of the SPY and 508ish for the 10% correction. The initial 10% correction bounce in 2022 was one of the biggest just reviewing the notes I made. The initial 20% drop also had a big bounce back in 2022. The last 3 recessions had an average of a 41% drop. The more the merrier as far as I'm concerned as i will be trading at these levels like I always do.

This is just my opinion but I think the word 'stocks' or stock market is your biggest buzz word that would drive eyes and traffic and should be in the title somehow. I'm partial to 'Stocks and Business- let your nutz hang' but that's just me. You could go a step further and do something more youthful and say 'Stocks/Business/Crypto' for the young kids.

I think they are going to be late. Last 2 days have been blood baths with the data that has come in. Sahm rule triggered. Vix north of 20. Talk of a 50 basis point cut in Sept now. I remember an article I read 6 months or so ago which said when the fed starts cutting rates is when you should feel nervous not before. That will be especially true if they feel they are behind and have to cut 50 basis points for their first cut. It will basically be admitting a mistake.

Here comes.your traffic...

I'm a pharmacist so in regards to finding part time work it's much easier for me due to how my profession is. The only other type of profession I have a handle on is finance which is what my wife does and she says she will consult part time once she is ready. When I read about others who transition into part time work not in their field of study, they look for something that has part time benefits and low stress. One insurance option for us if neither can find work with benefits is ACA. We are a family of 3 with my wife and i both 49 years old and if you look at the ACA subsidy chart, we need to make less than 97k a year and we will receive a subsidy on our medical insurance. I think it comes out to $600ish a month as ACA states they can't charge you more than 7.8% or something close to that of your adjusted gross income per year for insurance. That is for the silver plan. ACA also works for us because with my wife being from Mexico she can navigate their health system so we have access to that as well which drastically reduces our cost burden.

1. I usually work Wed and Thurs each week at 8 hours/shift. Usually once a month I only work once that week. And 2 or 3 times in this past year I took 2 weeks off for various vacations. I just got back from a 10 day trip to Mexico last week. 2. I prefer not to answer what our net worth is although I will say I rarely include my home equity as I don't place as much value in that because you have to live somewhere. I will say I went part time right when the math worked out to where a 5-6% average return / dividends meant we would never have to touch our principal amount in savings/401k and that we could live off only the returns. We are now 13% higher than that minimal amount now and that will continue to grow for at least the next 4-5 years which is why I think I wanted too long to do this.

Imma wants some more discussion on the business board so I figure Id give everyone an update on my (sort of) FIRE status since it will be 1 year on Aug 12th since I quit full time work and went down to about 6-7 shifts per month. So far, so good. In fact, I still think I work too much. I rarely if ever get bored when I am off and I just feel so much less stressed. Sunday nights have been an absolute treat. I dont dread Mondays anymore. Sports are much more enjoyable, especially Sunday and Monday night football. Ive been working out almost daily since I stopped full time work and the video game my brother and I and best friend are creating is coming along (somewhat nicely). Financially, we increased our nest egg about 13% since August 2023. About 10% due to gains in the market and 3% in terms of money we put in. And this is with us being quite conservative in our stock/MM allocation. In fact, I am starting to believe I waited 1 or 2 years too long to make this move. Issues that I have overcome have been 1. not saving/putting nearly the same amount of money in Vanguard as I used to. I save a fraction of what I did BUT I have allowed myself to spend more on wants and other more frivolous things like a nice $1k gaming laptop that I never would have bought before. That was a mental hurdle I had to jump over. And 2. my wife getting used to me being home more. At first she kept questioning when I would go back to full time, but now she actually is put off when I go in to work because of all the stuff I do when Im home to help her out (groceries, taking/picking up up our kid from school, cleaning, general errands etc). I keep telling her she needs to go part time as well but she isnt there yet. She is getting closer however. All she needs is a job that makes her 25k a year as that is her yearly part of our household expenses. She absolutely can consult part time but whatever. I dont push too hard. My next change will be working less than I do now ( going down to 1 shift a week) while still increasing our nest egg each year, albeit much more gradual, The mental hurdle here is I will begin to actually take out a small amount of funds yearly. So far I have estimated that once I go down to 1 shift weekly, I will need to take about 7-8k a year to supplement. That is going to be a tough one for me and it is still most likely 2 years away before I make that move. All in all, no regrets what so ever. Well, I know now I waited too long to do this so that is my only regret. I hope some of you jump in soon. The water is nice and warm. Life is too short not to.

My big question is did the fed wait 1 meeting too long to lower rates. Will be curious to see if they say in hind site, they should have started lowering rates in July vs Sept. More of the economy is starting to show cracks and its looking like investors have overshot the AI craze. Yearly bottoms the past 2 years have been in October. Curious if it will be this year as well.

This is one of the forums I visit (almost) daily. I enjoy reading the content here and Ive learned a lot in terms of other peoples' questions and views they have on money management. 2020-2023 were all pretty crazy in terms of global shocks and I think drove a lot of the traffic here on the business board. 2024 so far has been pretty tame. I think most everyone has been lulled by the market this year with not much else happening that would affect it. Rates have not changed. Not much is new. It's probably the main reason why my personal engagement on this particular board has dropped.

Dallas Austin

I'm excited to vote this year because... 1. I prefer we keep our democracy. 2. I prefer a woman have control over her own body 3. In regards to social security, Medicare, and our deficit, I prefer we tax the ultra wealthy to help keep those programs afloat/control the deficit rather than cut benefits. (Although managing the deficit will require both increasing taxes and cutting spending) 4. I prefer to help the Republicans see they need to change their platform and ideology in order to have any hopes of winning another election rather than having trump win and reinforce their current platform of overt fascism. I prefer a 2 party system where I have to put thought into who I will vote for in any given election.

It will come down to whether the military will follow orders from a Democrat president in January 2025. If it gets to that point, that is. Until then everything else is just grandstanding and empty threats and I'm not super worried about an actual civil war. If the schisms in the military are worse than what most would believe, then my family's move to mexico will have to be moved up a couple years.

If you're gonna cleanse our race, close our borders, you gotta have enough poors to do the shitty jobs. Isn't that the end game?