FYI: Timing is the bane of investors everywhere.
We fear buying or selling at the wrong time. Given the volatility in markets, bad timing can cost you dearly. Everyone from new investors to administrators of giant pension funds and fund portfolio managers makes these errors.
We calculate Morningstar Investor Returns to understand how investors actually fared in a fund when you take cash flows into account. Essentially, we are asking, How did the average dollar in a fund do over a certain time period? Specifically, we can say the average investor lost 45 basis points to timing over five 10-year periods ended December 2018.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.morningstar.com/articles/942396/mind-the-gap-2019
