Are you saying you can expect 10%/year with your money in the stock market? No stockbroker will tell you that, it is more like 6%-8% over a 10 year time frame. And you have to have the courage to watch your balance drop 50% over a 1-2 year time span and still stay in.

My own accounts have earned over 11.5%/year, for the past 10 years. This was through the financial crisis, where I did see huge drops like you describe, held, and continued to invest.

Longer term 6 to 8% feels about right though.

S&P 500 ETF Trust gained 63.42%, last 10 years.

Vanguard 500 Index Fund, 130.56% since 2010.

And neither look like hockey sticks.

If you put some time into it and learn how to properly invest, yes.

If you made a million today, you probably want to just keep it in an account and wait until a 20%+ correction happens before buying in, though -- it's been quite while since the last significant drop.

Trying to time the market? Good luck with that.

All active investment, unless you're a market maker, is market timing.

> it is more like 6%-8% over a 10 year time frame

Uh, it's 6-8% compounded over what ever time frame. Which is actually still quite good and probably handily beats most angel investment returns.

Yeah, exactly. Profitable VC investment is often described as a numbers game, where you need to make maybe hundreds of investments to smooth out the inevitable numerous failures. 4x $250k angel investments is basically a long shot gamble. On the flip side, if you do spread your investments and invest in lots of companies, you as an individual aren't going to be able to have enough time to help or advise any one startup in a meaningful way.

How often do angels get screwed when VC's come in? Genuinly asking, not trying to make some point.

Sorry, I'm talking about VCs/angels as the same thing, and not trying to say anything about the investment time/stage/size/whatever.