I'm actually asking, right now I'm just paying off debt but would be curious what people think. If I didn't have the debt I'd probably buy equities (index fund, etc.) like everoyne else.
Debt is a negative bond, while bonds are currently paying around 0%, while terrible, is still way better than a negative #.
After your debt is paid off, then buy TSM(total Stock Market) index funds. I recently came across an example here of what a TSM index fund can do for one's financial life: https://deepnote.com/project/b7be8d06-b84c-4178-b51a-688bef9...
I'm sure others will have more nuanced options, and I look forward to hearing about them.
You may be thinking of forex trading.
Yeah, that would be it.
This is in part because it is so hard to time the market, and in part because some stocks pay dividends, which you can compound by reinvesting them. Those count as part of your returns too.
I agree gold has had a good run up but the adviser on my managed account just sold the gold position.
You can certainly have (and probably should have) some amount in bonds, etc. but the returns will indeed be pretty low. Unless you're super-pessimistic to the point where you just want to put everything under your mattress, it's hard not to have at least a fairly significant share in equities.
As for real estate in cities, property prices mostly don't yet reflect people moving out and a likely commercial real estate collapse. The other question is whether, to the degree prices in cities come down, people who have been pining to live in some city will still want to do this with so many businesses permanently gone and city services in shambles.
Personally, I would never buy real estate in a big city. I might be biased since the ones around here are the likes of Trenton, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. City services have been in shambles in these cities for a long time. I don't even like to visit them.
And demand for commercial real estate is low due to the whole pandemic situation. If you want to invest in commercial real estate then you are betting that these tendencies towards doing things online are a temporary blip. That could well be false, people are developing new purchasing and working patterns, it's entirely possible that this pandemic will lead to permanent changes in real estate demand.
Ended up in an old cottage well under 100k on 3.5 acres an hour from the city. Which, in retrospect, was basically like hitting the jackpot for pandemic quality of life. Just dumb luck, though.
Although, this is in Europe. A house on 3 acres of land where you could get the train to SF for work in an hour would cost a LOT more than 100k I imagine.
But seriously I do agree — despite it being loved by PF/FIRE crowd — parking all your assets in Index funds with no other competitive option is terrifying.
I agree that it will likely go up. I'm actually in the process of testing software I made to predict and exploit its movement. But since it's just speculative, it will also eventually go down hard like it did in 2018.
You can send money anywhere in the world in any amount for a flat fee. It provides an asset with a fixed supply to prevent against inflation. these provide plenty of utility
What you may mean is that it doesn't generate earnings/cash flow so it's not a productive investment.