Stick with your plan … even when the markets get sticky.
Changing your investment mix can backfire. Consider three hypothetical investors, who took three different paths. As shown in the chart below, each had a 50% stock/50% bond portfolio during the downturn that ended in March 2009. One held tight and maintained the same portfolio, recouping the unrecognized losses in about a year and a half and enjoying the subsequent rebound in stocks. The other two radically revamped their portfolios, one moving all to bonds and the other all to cash. Roughly ten years later, both of the latter portfolios continued to suffer the consequences, with their values remaining below their peaks.