Episode summary
What Should You Do When You're Nervous About the Stock Market?
The Dentist Money Show
· · 49 min · Hosts: Matt Mulcock, Rabih, Jake
Summary
The host, Jake, and Robbie argue that feeling nervous about the stock market is normal, but moving to cash because of political or geopolitical headlines is usually the wrong response. They frame the concern around a client who wanted to sell most of his equity positions and wait for a short-term crash, then explain why that instinct often leads to missed gains and permanent behavioral damage.
Robbie says the same scary headlines can be interpreted inside a broader framework, and that election years are not historically abnormal for returns: he cites average election-year returns of 12.11% and 10.96% in the following year. He also argues that portfolios are mechanical and can be designed to be less exposed to specific shocks, especially through global diversification across sectors, styles, and asset classes.
Jake emphasizes that the real issue is not whether markets can fall, but whether an investor needs the money soon. If the funds are long-term money, he says short-term price drops should matter less than staying invested to capture compounding. Both host and analyst stress that trying to avoid short-term pain usually creates long-term suffering through missed rebounds, opportunity cost, and the difficulty of getting back in.
Key takeaways
- The host and Jake say nervousness about elections, war, inflation, or AI is normal, but it does not justify abandoning a long-term plan.
- Robbie cites election-year data showing average returns of 12.11% in election years and 10.96% in the following year, arguing fear is often already priced in.
- Jake says if money is not needed for 5 to 10 years, short-term declines should matter far less than staying invested for compounding.
- Robbie argues a globally diversified portfolio can be built to reduce direct exposure to any single macro shock.
- The host warns that trying to avoid pain often compounds into worse long-term outcomes through missed gains and repeated bad behavior.
Notable quotes
“I feel uneasy and I'm trying to like I just don't want to see my portfolio value decline and that is scary to me and uneasy to me”
“It absolutely is is not new. How many elections have we had in this country and how many wars have we had in this country”
“the average return during the election year on average has been 12.11% and the average return in the year after is 10.96%”
“if you're not planning on selling this this money in the market soon, it kind of does not matter to you if the value goes down”
“Far more money has been lost in people preparing for corrections than in the corrections themselves”
How the episode opens
Consult an advisor, or conduct your own due diligence when making financial decisions. General principles discussed during this program do not constitute personal advice. This program is furnished by Dennis Advisors, a registered investment advisor. — Welcome back to the Dennis Money Show where we help Dennis make smart financial decisions. I'm a guy named Matt, and I'm here with Hot Take Jake and the professor Robbie Demotski. How are you guys?
Good. How are you? — Doing great. — It does feel great to be here. Yeah. — Doing good? — Yeah. — We got winter upon us. It feels draining like every day in Utah. — Sunny — Today's beautiful, but it's been a very, very wet kind of end of October.
I think we're in for a wet and snowy winter, which we did not have last year, and it was chaos, but I I'm just getting this sense. This is not based off any science that we're going to have a lot of snow.
But apparently this is a big winter. Robbie Robbie probably knows the history of the Ninas. — It's El Super — El Supra Nina. — There we go. — El Nina this year. It just means there's a higher temperature than usual at the equator, which means more water evaporates, which would lead to more downfall in other regions that are not around the equator. So, it's it's more downfall but higher temperature, so but I think Utah that will mean it's snowy
And a perfect ski season, Robbie. — Yeah. — We need it, Robbie. We need it. Uh okay. Well, again, uh as always this show is brought to you by Dennis Advisors, dental specific financial planning and accounting firm. You guessed it, just for dentists all over the country.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- market volatility
- political uncertainty
- stock market timing
- missing best market days
- emotional investing
Watch the episode
Watch “What Should You Do When You're Nervous About the Stock Market?” on YouTube
Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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The Dentist Money Show, this episode and its artwork belong to Dentist Advisors - Financial Planning and Investment Management. Octagon is not affiliated with the show; this page is an independent summary.
