The Closest Thing You'll Ever Get to a Surefire Stock Tip
To some, investing in the stock market can be incredibly tricky. If we look back at the broad-based S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC) since this century began, the index has encountered two major corrections of roughly 50% during the dot-com bubble, and 57% during the Great Recession.
The magnitude of these bear market moves is a big reason Gallup recently reported that the number of investors in U.S. stocks has tied an all-time low. Just 52%, or roughly one out of every two adults, owns stock. The worrisome aspect of this data is that the stock market has shown, time and again, that it's the greatest wealth creator of all asset classes. Be it gold, oil, bonds, or housing, the 7% annual return in stocks, inclusive of dividend reinvestment, tops them all. The 48% of adults who don't own stocks runs the risk of having an insufficient nest egg come retirement, or, worse yet, being trampled by the national inflation rate and losing purchasing power with what they do have put away for retirement.
Image source: Getty Images.
Source: Fool.com
