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← Back to List2026.06.30#Evolution of Investment#Philosophy

[Prologue] Rebuilding My Survival Principles After 11 Years of 0% Returns ​

Evolution of Investment: Weapons to Defend Against Human Nature

2010–2021: The Painful Years of a Clueless "All-In" Investor ​

I will confess honestly. From 2010 when I first set foot in the stock market until 2021, for 11 long years, I was just an ordinary office worker and a completely ignorant investor. I didn't even know what an ETF was, nor did I have any concept of diversification or long-term investing. I simply relied on luck, constantly going "all-in" on single stocks. I firmly, mistakenly believed that by chasing corporate news, I could miraculously discover hidden ten-baggers (stocks that go up 10x) and beat the market.

The result was disastrous. For a long time, when the market went up, my portfolio went up less than others, and when it went down, it plunged much deeper. I had simply wasted over a decade of time and energy.

After wandering in that swamp of painful failures, it wasn't until the post-COVID bull market in 2021 that I miraculously broke even—after 11 long years. At that moment, it hit me hard: "I can't keep investing like this anymore."

I immediately stopped all my investments and began to study the stock market from scratch. While relentlessly self-studying through numerous books and YouTube videos, I naturally became interested in the US stock market. Feeling the limitations of Korean communities, I started crazily reading posts on Reddit, the massive US community.

And it was right there on Reddit that I serendipitously discovered the ray of light that changed my life: the 'Bogleheads' community. That is how I became deeply absorbed into John Bogle's index fund philosophy.

"Don't look for the needle in the haystack. Just buy the haystack (the entire market, S&P 500)!"

Following this revelation, starting in 2022, I completely transformed my approach and began walking the path of 'steadfast long-term investing without selling a single share'. This simple yet great truth brought peace to my account, and I became blindly convinced that VOO (S&P 500 ETF) was the ultimate answer and the only holy grail of investing.

The 2023 Magnificent 7 (M7) Boom: Where Robot Theory Clashes with Human Reality ​

However, my seemingly steadfast faith was soon put to a massive test.

Particularly from 2023 onwards, when 'Magnificent 7 (M7)' Big Tech companies like Apple and Nvidia surged, sucking up the market's capital like black holes, an inexplicable 'madness' dominated the market that reason could not explain. Conversely, if even a minor piece of bad news broke, panic selling poured out regardless of fundamentals, and the 'fear' of the market collapsing in an instant became a daily occurrence.

Mainstream economists always say politely: "The market is rational (Efficient Market Hypothesis), so just hold the whole market and sit still."

Of course, mathematically, that might be 100% correct. But we investors are not emotionless robots. In the face of the terrible sense of deprivation (FOMO) of being left out in a raging bull market where everyone else is making hundreds of percent, or the terrifying crashes where accounts get halved in days, the advice to "rationally sit still" was far too harsh and unrealistic given our hot-blooded human nature.

Rereading Investment History Through the 'Anatomy of Psychology' ​

To overcome these terrible psychological limits, I began searching for answers by scouring 60 years of Wall Street history. And I realized a very surprising fact.

Markowitz, Sharpe, Fama, French, Carhart... What is the real reason why these great, intimidating Nobel Prize-winning geniuses created such complex factors and formulas over the past decades?

It wasn't simply out of noble academic curiosity. It was a fierce 'history of weapon forging' to protect ourselves and survive in the market against 'humanity's irrational nature'—a nature that is foolishly greedy and pathetically prone to terror.

By digging into the past 60 years of struggle, the three weapons I have equipped in my portfolio today are:

  1. VOO, the basecamp created to acknowledge and defend my 'Ignorance (Unpredictability)'.
  2. SCHD, the titanium shield designed to exploit the masses' 'Fear (Overselling)' and extract solid cash flow.
  3. SPMO, the spear of attack that mechanically rides the masses' 'Greed (FOMO)' to explode returns.

This series is the fierce survival record of an ordinary individual investor who rolled and broke in the market since 2010, obtained by unearthing 60 years of investment history. Let's explore how financial science discovered the 'Factor Core' weapons to defend against human nature, and how I ultimately fused these weapons to evolve into my own 3-Core Survival Portfolio that grows stronger precisely when crises strike.

Why must we not remain traditional Bogleheads, but take a step further and 'evolve'?. From here, the magnificent evolution of investment series begins.

📚 [Evolution of Investment Series]

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