This is very “investing 101” but I thought I’d share my perspective for people who might be new to the game. You might hear people occasionally1 yell, “the market is down!” with the urgency of Chicken Little. While it’s true that the S&P 500 was down 1.1% compared to yesterday it’s up 24.8% compared to one year ago.

If you’re investing for the long-haul (which you should be) then days like today are just another wave in the ocean. It is good knowing if the market is down today2 but remember that the sky is not falling.3

A friend this year taught me the term dollar cost averaging which says to invest regular amounts of money in regular time intervals. Don’t hem and haw over when to invest $100. Instead put in $1 a day and stop stressing.

  1. and by occasionally I actually mean at every and any chance they can get ↩︎

  2. it might be a good day to invest! “Buy low, sell high” and all that ↩︎

  3. Probably. Also, I’m not a licensed financial advisor so don’t take my word as official advice, yada yada (insert legalese here) ↩︎