Re:Have the record number of investors in the stock market l...
by MiroF on Sunday May 17, 2020 @12:21AM
(#23209546)
Nope. If prices of the underlying stock collapse because of index selling due to movement out of retirement funds, then other investors will buy the underlying stock, stabilizing the price - even if they are not buying the fund.
Selling doesn't automatically trigger more selling, that's just a media narrative.
This might be true for very illiquid assets, but that is not publicly traded stocks.
This is not a problem for actively managed funds, which have caveats that allow managers a lot of freedom. If there are no buyers for stock X, they do not have to sell it. Index funds do not get any such flexibility. The impact is amplified as the amounts invested in indices ballooned in recent years.
I do not think anyone knows if this scenario will happen and, if so, how bad the fallout will be, but there are systemic risks that go beyond sales uniformly depressing a price for a basket of stocks.