The list of mistakes people make in the stock market is really long but for some reason, the bear market tends to bring out the worst in us.

Therefore, today, we are going to talk about 5 common mistakes investors make during bear markets.

Mistake #1 is Checking Portfolios Every Day

The first mistake investors make is that they keep checking their portfolios every day. See, guys, here is the thing…if your portfolio is looking ugly now, it’s not going to become beautiful tomorrow…right? 

Just remember that the bear market is hurting everybody….you are not the only one suffering so stop obsessing about your portfolio every day because it will only cause stress and frustration.

Mistake #2 is Panic selling

Some investors just can’t bear the stress of their stocks falling 10-15% or even higher so they just decide to book the loss.

But what they don’t realize is that market never moves up in a straight line. It follows a zigzag path and if you want to be a successful investor, you need the stomach to sit through such ups and downs.

Mistake #3 is Stopping SIPs

This is the most counterintuitive thing I have seen people doing. 

Isn’t investing all about buying low and selling high? If that’s true then why be afraid to buy when the market is low when you were perfectly happy buying at highs? Doesn’t make any sense, right?

So, instead of being afraid, take advantage of the bear market.

Mistake #4 is not rebalancing the portfolio

Bear markets are excellent opportunities to rebalance your portfolio by moving some of the capital from debt to equity or from fixed deposits to equity.

That is exactly what most of the dynamic asset allocation mutual funds do but we, retail investors are so scared of the market at the time, we don’t want to put any more money there and hence miss out on a great opportunity of averaging down the buying price.

Mistake #5 is Getting carried away with bad news  

One of the fascinating things about the bear market is that the level of pessimism grows very high. 

Every day there is some news of economic recession or job losses or some stock falling 20-30%.  Some of us get overwhelmed by this series of negative news and start to completely give up on the stock market in general.

What we need to realize is that in the stock market, things are never as good as they seem neither they are as bad as they seem.

So, guys, just like our bodies go through periods of sickness and health, so does the stock market goes through cycles of a bear market and bull market. 

So, instead of worrying about the bear market, start thinking about taking advantage of one.