> After 2008 I became interested with crashes throughout history. There are so many fascinating little details that added up to one giant mess.
I would recommend looking into Jeremy Grantham. Not saying he's right about everything, but he really views himself as a "bubble historian" and he's got some great commentary on bubbles and crashes.
Interestingly, his experience during the dot com bubble and crash is pretty fascinating. He saw the bubble pretty clearly, but he got out early which caused his investors to withdraw something like half of his assets under management. He was eventually proven right of course, and his strategies did very well during the crash.
Which also points out why diversifying can be emotionally difficult. If you're well diversified you should expect to do worse than the market when it's booming, and better than the market when it's crashing (i.e less volatility). The problem with that for money managers is that it's very easy for clients to feel "Hey, the market is exploding, and I'm paying this person who is underperforming the market!", and then, when the market falls, even if the manager overperforms the market (but still has negative returns) "I'm paying this person but he's doing worse than if I just kept my assets in cash!"
I kinda loved some near ending scene of Big Short. The investor is talking with the fun manager and saying "Market is at all times low and you are buying". Kinda hammering home that they don't really know and are just following the general sentiment...
I would recommend looking into Jeremy Grantham. Not saying he's right about everything, but he really views himself as a "bubble historian" and he's got some great commentary on bubbles and crashes.
Interestingly, his experience during the dot com bubble and crash is pretty fascinating. He saw the bubble pretty clearly, but he got out early which caused his investors to withdraw something like half of his assets under management. He was eventually proven right of course, and his strategies did very well during the crash.
Which also points out why diversifying can be emotionally difficult. If you're well diversified you should expect to do worse than the market when it's booming, and better than the market when it's crashing (i.e less volatility). The problem with that for money managers is that it's very easy for clients to feel "Hey, the market is exploding, and I'm paying this person who is underperforming the market!", and then, when the market falls, even if the manager overperforms the market (but still has negative returns) "I'm paying this person but he's doing worse than if I just kept my assets in cash!"