It's happened before.

"When Warren Buffett sold most of his Apple shares and hoarded cash, few knew what to make of it." "Then the stock market tumbled." "Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway nearly doubled its cash, Treasury bills and liquid assets in 2024, reaching a record $334 billion." By the end of the year, it had sold a net $134 billion in stocks, barely spending $3 billion on buybacks." ET. Market analyst Marc Faber "advised retail investors, including those in India, to exit the markets if there is a temporary rebound." "Faber suggested that holding gold, silver and platinum could be a safer alternative for Indian investors, as he expects the Indian rupee to decline against these commodities. The value of returns could be superficially increased through inflation, but the real value will continue to slip, he cautioned." FE. "As India's longest equity slump in nearly three decades wipes out roughly $1 trillion in market capitalization," "That spells more trouble for consumer spending and the broader economy, which is expected to grow at its slowest pace in four years in the current financial year due to weak urban demand." Reuters. "The Q3 (October-December) results season offered little cheer," and "The most worrying trend is that demand slowdown has spread from export oriented sectors to domestic consumption." "Consumers are downtrading to smaller packs in the premium segments. Despite it being a festive quarter, retail and fast-food chains saw muted growth," wrote Abhishek Mukherjee. Foreign investors "have taken out over $15 billion so far this year." "A country that has about 320 million households now has some 110 million unique investors. It's those investors' savings that are on the other side of the trade," wrote Mihir Sharma. Returns on savings in banks are less than inflation, real estate is too expensive, "And for the past year, regulators have banned funds that invest in markets outside the country from adding new subscribers. Indians have been locked into the stock market." Markets are undergoing regression to the mean especially in "specific sectors around which strong narratives have been built," wrote Vivek Kaul. Retail investors bought into the narrative. "This is a classic case of stock market insiders setting up retail investors for a fall, and making money in the process." "Also, stung by their losses, such investors may be put off from investing in stocks for years to come." "That's another loss waiting to play out." A Systematic Investment Plan (SIP) allows individuals to invest a fixed amount regularly in mutual funds (MFs). bajajfinserve.in. This helps to average out the fluctuations in markets. "In 2016-17, the total money invested in MFs through SIPs was Rs 439.21 billion. This jumped to Rs 671.90 billion, Rs 926.93 billion and over Rs 1 trillion in 2017-18,2018-19 and 2019-20 respectively." In January, however, "for every 100 new SIPs opened, 109 SIPs completed their tenure or were discontinued." "This implies that many investors are stopping their SIP flows into equity MFs after having bought stocks at peak prices," wrote Kaul. Proving that the fall in the markets is here to stay, "Promoters of Nifty50 firms are offloading their stakes at an unprecedented pace, with ownership sinking to a 22-year low of 41.1% in the December quarter, according to NSE data." msn.com. Insiders and foreigners are getting out. Leaving ordinary Indians holding duds. A recurring old story.