Don't Celebrate TWSE 40,000! 90% of Retail Investors Fall into the "Don't Sell" Trap
Taiwan stocks have broken 40,000 points, but your account has not gained a single extra dollar. That is the brutal fact. Taiwanese retail investors are actually the losers in a bull market—the reason is not poor stock-picking, but behavioral bias on entry and exit timing: buying when they shouldn't, selling when they shouldn't, and stubbornly holding when they most need to sell. According to the Taiwan Academy of Banking and Finance, Taiwan retail investors' actual returns in bull markets have significantly lagged the broader market index over the long term. This article breaks down 4 exit discipline iron rules (loss tolerance, time-bound money exclusion, target-return trigger, and the age-plus-stock-ratio 120 rule), 4 practical action steps including age-based target allocations, and 2 Taiwan-specific traps (the high-dividend ETF ex-dividend fill trap, and the TSMC concentration risk making up 30% of the weighted index). It closes with a 30%+ crash emergency plan and the 3-question buy framework. Core line: paper numbers are an illusion handed to you; money in the pocket is your real wealth.
