Just came across something pretty interesting about market timing that's been floating around for ages. There's this old economic theory from Samuel Benner back in 1875 where he tried to map out financial cycles – basically arguing that markets follow predictable patterns of panics, booms, and recessions. Worth digging into if you're thinking about periods when to make money.

So the theory breaks down into three phases. First, there are panic years – roughly every 18-20 years – where financial crises hit and markets collapse. Think 1927, 1945, 1965, 1981, 1999, 2019, and if the pattern holds, around 2035 and 2053. The advice here is pretty straightforward: don't panic sell during these windows. Just hold and wait it out.

Then you've got boom years when prices are surging and recovery is in full swing. These are supposedly the periods when to make money by selling – years like 1928, 1943, 1953, 1960, 1968, 1980, 1989, 2000, 2007, 2016, 2020. The idea is you take profits when the market's hot and everyone's buying. Looking at the cycle, 2026 is flagged as one of those boom years, which is interesting timing.

The third phase is recession and decline years – when prices are crushed and the economy's struggling. This is when you're supposed to be buying, not selling. Years like 1924, 1931, 1942, 1951, 1958, 1978, 1985, 1996, 2005, 2012, 2023 fall into this category. Hold through these periods and wait for the boom to come back around.

The whole framework is basically: buy cheap during recessions, hold through panics, sell high during booms. Rinse and repeat every couple decades.

That said, I'd take this with a grain of salt. It's a historical pattern, not gospel. Markets get shaped by so many variables – geopolitics, tech disruptions, policy shifts, wars, you name it – that this cycle can definitely get thrown off track. But as a long-term lens on market behavior? It's a pretty compelling way to think about timing and market cycles over decades. Worth keeping in your mental model even if it's not a perfect predictor.