What difference can missing one or two days in the market make in your returns? I downloaded the closing prices of the Russell 2000 index from March 19, 2001 to March 19, 2016 (trailing 15 years). The facts show that missing that one big day of the year makes a tremendous difference.
Looking at $10K invested on 3/19/2001 the following are your returns after the 15 years if you were fully invested and never missed a day, and if you missed the biggest one day each year, and if you missed the 2 biggest days, and so on…
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