As the saying goes, marry in haste and repent at leisure. A similar philosophy in the stock market would be, one who exits in haste would regret far later. The art of making money is a function of behavior and not intelligence. The human mind is very tuned to fearing and it often fails to remember the distant past and clearly remembers the recent events and extrapolates it to a permanent tune that would play out for ever.

There is enough noise and global panic, right from rising US rates, bank diamond merchants funded by crooked bank officials, LTCG and more. In this cacophony, sanity can can not much prevail. But any situation of disarray is the hunting ground for the intelligent investor. The same principle and fallacy of human mind would play out later if you could pick stocks that are falling out like 9 pins.

When you use any electronic device you could hear the background hiss behind the music. But in an investment parlance, noise is considered as news, views and data. Among all this halla bulla, the basic principle of investment, i.e. time in the market is more important than timing the market, is buried very deep and far away which does not catch the eye of any investor.

If you had the habit of watching the market once in 5-10 years, you would never see any loss in your capital or for the fact of the matter, very reasonable post tax gains on your principle. It’s all like the difference between listening to music in a noisy environment or with a headphone that cancels the noise. Your advisor/consultant should act as the noise cancelling headphone. Be aware the next time, if an investment consultant is selling you something or making noise himself.