When do we think we should do a Lump sum investment?

[Bubblegun]

Doesn't answer your question directly. But here's a data point for you.

I did a lumpsump into emaxis all country on May 22.
I was down around 3-5% a couple of weeks back, but now its about +2.25% from when I went in.

Thanks for that, and every bit helps us. But could I ask, what was your thinking? buying the dip? Just drop the money in, because you had it?
I'm rather boring when it comes to long term investing, but this time my financial circumstances are different, and inflation could erode the value of what I have.

Firstly, I am not a seasoned investor, or even remotely close to retirement like most members here.
(so even if I lose every penny, I can probably chalk it off as a steep learning curve at my current phase of life)
I started putting money into NISA and such investment vehicles only from earlier this year.
(I have invested some amount in my home country for more than a decade now)

So, when I started earlier this year, I was sitting on about a year's worth of savings.
Monthly equal investment into regular NISA only took so much from that.

And then I saw the market dropping.
Then the JPY started dropping too, which negated the market's drop.

Then finally, I thought there are just too many moving parts, and I am far less knowledgeable to understand (predict/forecast) any of this.
Keeping the money at near to 0% in bank doesn't make sense. So, I jumped in!

So, it was probably "just drop the money in, because I had it", while thinking that "I was buying the dip".

Sometimes I feel there are too many moving parts myself and for every, person who is a doom predictor there are those who think its gonna be ok or rosie.
I'm not a seasoned investor myself, although I am rather seasoned myself. Getting up there but not sure If I'm close to retirement or not. Its about 12ish years.

I do like Warren buffets idea,I think he mentioned previously about watching what's happening in the street or stores, and how that can be helpful.( a bellwether) From what I hear from my brother, who works in housing,(howdens UK) has noticed footfall is down quite a bit, and he said it was similar to 2008. The plumbers, carpenters electricians,and painters just aren't coming in to the wholesalers anymore, and even though his company has to call them, he noticed that they just aren't picking up the phones anymore. He think its because interest rates are up, people are paying over the odds for their homes, and they don't want to do any more upgrading now.And of course there is the petrol and inflation and gas, electricity hikes all taking its toll. and housing is such a huge part of the economy. But good to read about your thinking and what actually triggered you to buy.

[Bubblegun]

Thanks sharing your thinking on when to drop in a large amount of cash. So I'm assuming you just watch the news and the graphs and will pull that trigger, when the bear comes.

Even easier: I just look at the price of the eMaxis Slim All-Country fund and go off that.

I see. I suppose that means you have the eMAxi Slim All=country fund?
If your watching that, how far back would you look back.( ironically every one says past performance is no guarantee of future performance) but investment doesn't just live in the here and now, they always seem to tell us to look back.(historically) and are happy to reel off historic figures. Probably just a business get out Claus to cover their posteriors.

I'm invested in the s&p500 so I guess I should just watch that, which is what I've been doing.

[goodandbadjapan]

I too have quite a lot of cash which I have been gradually dripping into mutual funds. Basically I put the same amount in at the start of every month no matter what, but if there is a biggish drop somewhere in the month I will put a bit more in at that time. It's still DCA, really, but hopefully ensures that I am just topping up more when the drops happen.

[Bubblegun]

I have a large amount of cash at the moment, which I am DCAing into mutual funds. At the current rate of purchase (I do an order on Rakuten every time the previous order clears), it will take 15-20 months to be fully invested.

I plan to do a lump sum investment if markets fall considerably/the yen gets stronger/both.

So far that has not happened.

I'm assuming there would be no extra costs at buying more often, compared to a single large purchase then?

[RetireJapan]

I'm assuming there would be no extra costs at buying more often, compared to a single large purchase then?

No charge to buy mutual funds through most brokers (some funds have purchase and sale fees, but the eMaxis Slim range does not).

[Bubblegun]

I'm assuming there would be no extra costs at buying more often, compared to a single large purchase then?

No charge to buy mutual funds through most brokers (some funds have purchase and sale fees, but the eMaxis Slim range does not).

I didn't think there was any obvious charges.( that I could see in my limited Japanese)
Anyway, it seems the key psychological trigger is basically just watching things go down, which is basically what I'm doing. I'm not sure if its stupid but I lived through the early 1980s recessions, black monday, housing crash, dot.com bubble, 2008 crash, and now we are seeing the return of inflation, as ive gotten older, it just seems normal.

[goran]

as ive gotten older, it just seems normal.

I want to be this when I grow up.
Be able to see things as normal.

[Bubblegun]

as ive gotten older, it just seems normal.

I want to be this when I grow up.
Be able to see things as normal.

Well, I wouldn't say I've grown up, but I think I've gotten use to the BS the financial markets/ salesmen go on about.
This time it's different.
The new paradigm.
It's gonna change the world.( It might, but it took over 50 years for the car to replace the horse.)
Everyone is an entrepreneur, but before, they just started a business, or they were self employed.
Everything is bespoke now, but when I was younger it was called custom.So maybe the big investors have it right, buy boring companies, that are going to be there in 50 years. Of course if they can, enjoy and afford the risks, they can go for it, but I do find it hard to think maybe I'm missing the boat by not buying Tesla, ( god knows how that was more valuable than Honda/ford et al) and the new wonder currency Bitcoin. or dogecoin. ( I still think its called DOG e COIN. cause it was based on a DOG.

I wish I had the wisdom and patience of YODA, but I feel like LUKE.

[Moneymatters]

I do find it hard to think maybe I'm missing the boat by not buying Tesla, ( god knows how that was more valuable than Honda/ford et al) and

I’ve given this some “thought” but then I’ve also been thinking about switching to a purely kebab based diet so proceed with caution..(people should also follow me with great caution..)
I think Teslas appeal to a few groups, those that don’t want to be part of something with an ICE history, certain technologists, people with a utilitarian view of what a car should be. I wanted to put my name on the wait list for the model 3 and it’s a lot of car for the price (unless you want to buy in game credits for the real cool stuff.) but then I looked at it a bit more and all I could see was the Johnny Cab from the one true Total Recall film.

The financials for Tesla will consider such things as revenue from Software as there is massive margin on it and potential for recurring revenue. Then add on the lack of an expensive dealer network. But only if they can sell batteries and license their software to many other makers do I see them becoming more like a Microsoft of cars. They aren’t first to market but they are clearly ahead of the curve with factory investment and they aren’t faced with the retooling exercise the competition has. Then we can see with the power walls, solar roof they aren’t afraid to leverage core competencies and I’m sure we’ll see more examples in the future. Personally I can’t see any big car maker willing to be seen to rely on Tesla for the future of their own existence. That isn’t to say they don’t preserve their current valuation, or rather recover to what it was six month ago... I just feel they need stuff to go their way to move beyond and in this resource and supply chain challenged world I’m not sure how quickly they can scale.

Anyhow, I’m not picking up the stock beyond what’s already pumping up some mutual funds because. 1. The cars are ugly. 2. Their figure head is a loon.
Like many others I’ll wait for my manufacturer of choice to offer what I want in EV form in a timeframe that suits me.

[captainspoke]

... recensions, ...

A complete tangent, but it's interesting that spellcheck would go with something likely very rare, and it is a word, tho a new one for me:

"recension: a revised edition of a text, an act of making a revised edition of a text"