IN THE BACK
My first market crash
Until recently , we were a terribly risk-averse bunch here in the UK , with a passion for building societies and searching the small print in broadsheet newspapers for the best rates on current accounts . Yes , a small and enthusiastic band of investors were playing the stock market and dabbling with funds . But these were definitely in the minority . Then three things happened to change us from a nation of savers into investors : the internet , Covid-19 and inflation . In combination , we had the means and motive to turn flaccid saving returns into impressive growth stories – we could almost do no wrong as we watched our portfolios zoom upwards . Vanguard UK said the number of new accounts opened in the first quarter of 2020 rose by three-fold compared with the same period in 2019 , and most major platforms reported similar increases . Meanwhile , a survey conducted by price-comparison website Finder indicated that there had been a 50 % increase in share ownership in the UK between 2018 and 2020 , rising to 33 % of the population . We became just like our cousins in the US – a nation of equity investors and even crypto speculators . Now here we are in the middle of 2022 with a veritable army of people invested in the stock market and it ’ s all going dreadfully wrong . Returns are down and many of our favourites have crashed and burned , including the mighty Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust . Tech stocks , such as Tesla , Alphabet , Apple and Meta , have all suffered significant falls , leading to comparisons with the dotcom crash of 2000 . We are widely predicted to fall into recession later this year .
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