Savings: a great way to mitigate your stupid moves

For many years, at the end of each month, I update a spreadsheet on which my stocks are written.

It's a historical document that helps me to see my performance over time and also serves to see what were my preferences at different moments in time.

I sometimes use it to congratulate myself for not buying crappy stocks like Yellow Media anymore or to remind me how crazy I've been to sell my MasterCard shares.

Taking a look at that spreadsheet, I came to realize that, from 2012 to 2017, my portfolio more than tripled (3,54 times to be exact). It's amazing considering the fact that 2015 and 2016 have been bad years for me, with a performance hardly positive.

Before, I've had a couple of years of great performance, but the other reason of that increase in value is my savings. Year after year, I've managed to save a good amount of money. Plus, I don't have a lot of expenses, and they're all reasonable. I don't snort coke. I don't use whores. I minimize my material possessions to what I think necessary for a minimal comfort.

So, with discipline, my bad moves (which are plenty) have been mitigated by my capacity to save money.

We tend to forget that simple truth. Continue to save money is very important, at least in the first years of your investing life. When your portfolio's worth will be around 1 million dollars, probably that your savings won't have a lot of impact. But while it's between 0 and 200 000$, your savings can raise your portfolio by 10% in a single year even if the stock market is shitty and the returns are flat.

When you'll be 40 or 50 and you'll have done plenty of mistakes, you'll finally be a good investor. Then, you'll can snort coke with whores because supplementary savings won't have a lot of impact on your portfolio. So, you'll be able to live your mid-life crisis like everyone who is 55 should: buy a Camaro, and try to fuck 21 years old girls.

That's probably the only reason to be excited about getting old.