<prompt> Human: Potentially a stupid question. I am 26 and have a form sponsored 401K plan and am about to start a Roth as well.If there was to be a market downturn crash what is the strategy for your holdings in that situation? Do you transfer your holdings into Bond index funds or do you just do nothing and hope that you recover your unrecognized losses over time once the market recovers?Its one of the concepts I could never get my head around that in the last collapse people watched their holdings diminish as they did nothing. Maybe this results from something like not being able to sell off your holdings while the market is in free fall. Any help would be appreciated!  <response>: If there was to be a market downturn crash what is the strategy for your holdings in that situation? Do you transfer your holdings into Bond index fundsIt sounds to me like you are proposing to sell your stocks after the market drops. What? Isnt that the opposite of what you should do? If anything, when the market drops, your current stock holdings will be underallocated compared to your bonds, and you should re-balance, shifting some money from bonds to stocks, effectively buying lowBut in reality, the most important thing to do during a market downturn is keep contributing. Every dollar you put into the market during a down turn is effectively purchasing stocks on sale.And dont fool yourself and think that you can identify the beginning of a market down turn and sell before it gets bad. Youre just as likely or more likely to sell at the bottom of a little dip, the worst thing to do. 