Survive the Crash
Four thousand dollars, twenty years of real market history, and a clock that does not wait for you. Every instrument opens in its turn, with a card that explains it. The history runs from 1971 to 2026.
20 years · real prices · the dates stay hidden
$4,000, twenty years, one running clock.
Beat the computer that only ever buys the index.
Why the Index Usually Wins
The game is built on one uncomfortable finding: almost nobody times the market twice.
The gauges warn, they do not time
A stretched Buffett Indicator or an inverted yield curve tells you the ground is soft. Neither tells you the month. The market can stay expensive for years, and a player who sells on the first red light usually watches the index climb without them.
Money you move is money out
Cash in your pocket earns nothing, and a bond cannot be cashed in before its term ends. Every month spent between decisions is a month the index was invested. This is why the flat index line is so hard to beat: it pays nothing to do nothing.
The numbers are real
Stocks are the S&P 500 with dividends, bonds are 10-year Treasuries, gold is the London benchmark and cash is 3-month Treasury bills. Every year is measured from the last trading day of December, and every figure lands within a fraction of a point of the published record.
Dollars, not purchasing power
Results are in dollars of the day. Inflation ran between 8 and 13 percent a year through the late 1970s, so a run that ends ahead in dollars can still have lost you groceries. If your window felt like a win and reads like one, check which years you drew.
How to Play Well
Five habits that separate a good run from a lucky one.
- The run is graded on two numbers, not one: your money against the computer, and the worst fall you sat through. Rank S needs both — more money than the machine, and a worst drop under 25%.
- Read the gauges before you move, not after the year goes badly.
- Decide what a red light is worth to you. Half your stocks is a decision; all of them is a bet.
- Watch the drawdown, not only the final number. A run that doubles through a 60% fall is a run most people would have quit.
- Play the same window blind and with the gauges. The difference is the only honest measure of whether they helped you.
The Gauges, Reading Today
The same gauges, reading today instead of 1974
CAPE — the gauge the game shows for every year since 1871
10Y-2Y spread — inverted before every recent recession
Market cap to GDP — the valuation gauge of the game
Which past month today most resembles
Every source series and threshold behind these numbers