Because the headline return is only what you earn if you survive the waiting. Across 18 years of three iconic Indian investments, the paper results are spectacular and the lived experience is brutal. Measuring the share of the holding period spent below a previous peak (an "anxiety index"):
The Nifty Midcap 100 returned roughly 9X - and spent 73% of the time in drawdown. L&T grew about 7X, at the price of 75% time underwater, including a single drawdown that lasted 2,377 days - about 6.5 years watching the investment be worth less than it once was. Even the "safer" Nifty 50 sat in drawdown 63% of the time.
So the useful questions before chasing the next 10X are behavioural, not arithmetic: do you have the temperament to go nowhere for 5+ years? Is your financial life structured to survive needing the money at the worst possible moment? Is your asset allocation built for your psychology, not just for a model? Your biggest risk is rarely the spreadsheet - it is your own conviction in the depths of a bear market. (Past performance guarantees nothing, but it teaches the price of returns.)
Measure it on your own holdings - any stock, index, metal or crypto, over a window you choose: https://www.tigzig.com/qrep (free, open source). The analysis: https://www.tigzig.com/post/that-9x-return-from-nifty-midcap-is-irrelevant-if-you-couldn-t-survive-the-73-of-time-it-was-in-dra. Related: rolling returns vs CAGR https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq/what-are-rolling-returns-vs-cagr.
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