Its Over, page-20416

I give you two scenarios

Scenario A
You buy CBA now at $115 with lets say $100k, so you get 870 shares (rounding up)
If the US melt up melts down, we could get at best a 20-30% pullback though it could be worse if led by a systemic event. If it is bank related, which means credit markets, a 20-30% correction in CBA is not out of the question. During GFC, CBA fell -57%, and during Covid crash, it fell -27%.
But if it just returns back to level just prior to the Covid crash, at $85, that would be a -26% bear correction relative to $115 price today.
The 870 shares would be worth $73,950.

Scenario B
Staying in cash investing the $100k at 5%, at the end of the year $105,000
After the sharp pullback, you use the $105k to buy CBA at $85, you get 1,235 shares
After a year thereafter, the market recovers and CBA returns to $115, and the value of CBA shares then with 1,235 shares would have become $142,025

The Buy and Hold holder in Scenario A rode out the correction that saw his/her CBA plummet to $85 and then returning back to $115 a year later, recovering back the paper loss earlier without panicking into selling, but received 0% return over the course of the 1-2 years. While under Scenario B, the return was 42% by choosing the time to stay out and time to return to market.

Timing is Important, but Difficult. Mainstream tells us that we can't time the market, because they want everyone to stay in which helps boost the industry; Wall Streeters get big bonuses in bull markets, a feast or famine industry so they are more inclined to perpetuate the glass half full perspective.

So it is up to this to assess if this market can sustain this level, determine the forward outlook for growth, and relative market valuations and speculative fervour and the price levels of stocks like CBA to figure out Where We're At and where we could be heading.

Markets would always blindside us and we could be so just by looking at those indices going higher in the absence of prevailing macro conditions.