Stock market crash in 2026 - pensions?

[sunshine244]

For some reason Facebook has been showing me videos warning of a 'once in a generation' stock market crash overdue for 2026. I have a small pension in a SIPP and due to being a single mum of disabled kids it's not likely to have much paid in for the near future. So it's important to me to try and make sure it does as well as possible.

I usually pretty much ignore it, but I'm wondering if I should be paying a bit more attention (to proper financial advice - not Facebook obviously) or if its best to just forget about it entirely.

How old are you and how is your money invested?

Don’t make investment decisions based on Facebook memes.

Once you’ve watched one of those reels, you just keep getting more. I’m not getting them. Mine are mostly pot-holes and jokes about Trump.

It probably depends what you are invested in and your age. I moved my pension entirely out of the US market a year ago and it's done a lot better since then (it went down £100k when Trump introduced his tariffs last year!!) It's now gone back up. If you have an IFA, it's worth speaking to them.

I am not getting those - wonder why your algorithm is showing you that.

If you are far off retirement a crash doesn't have to be disastrous, the market tends to recover and it can even benefit you in the sense you can carry on investing when stocks are cheaper.

I'm only mid 40s so a long way off retirement. SIPP is well spread across a few funds.

No idea why I'm getting those videos. I haven't interacted with them but I did pause briefly on a photo at one point 🙄

To the person who said not to make investments based on Facebook. I already made it clear I wasn't. I was asking if its something I should be researching properly or if it's best to entirely ignore given I'm diversified.

There was an article that went viral last week after it suggested a hypothetical Doomsday scenario of major job losses due to AI. Since then this has been doing the rounds on social media.

Have a look here: https://fortune.com/2026/02/24/viral-essay-ghost-gdp-ai-white-collar-recession-fake-news-on-phones-perception-reality/

The stock market is more volatile than it has been historically, thanks to a number of factors, and there does seem to be caution about an AI-bubble similar to the dot-com crash of the early 2000s.

There could be a big stock market crash any time really (for example if Trump goes nuts and starts invading other countries), but I don't think we're at a particularly high risk right now than compared to the previous 12 months.

If you're concerned about how your SIPP is invested you could always take formal advice in real life?

Probably no point me taking formal advice - value of my SIPP is too low to make it worthwhile. It's a small amount but its important to me (and I tend to worry about money due to previous DV relationship).

In your mid 40's I would say don't worry about it. You are very unlikely to time the markets correctly if you try and at your age, it's better to be invested and ride it out. There will undoubtedly be a points when the stock markets fall; don't sell, invest more if you can at that stage. If you can't, just do nothing and wait.

Many tech stocks have already crashed. Some of them are down 30-50% from ath. I don’t think they can fall much further tbh

I think a once in a generation crash has been predicted every year for the last 10 years.

I've been seeing this shite for years.

Time in the market, not timing the market. Over the longer term stocks and shares have historically outperformed other asset classes, so for pensions especially that you can’t touch for 20 years, it can make sense to remain invested. Also, people have been predicting market crashes for ever. If you are well diversified, then markets generally bounce back quite quickly even after a big shock. If you’re really worried though, then you can go safer, but ultimately you’ll probably (a word doing a fair bit of work here) have a smaller pension in retirement.

The Elliott Wave system has predicted 7 of the last 3 economic downturns.
Hold on, buy quality companies, use quality managers, take the long view. For instance Killik who deal with retail customers take a 20-30 year view.
It may not be the better than hot-shot fast traders but it is reliable and safe to take this view.

It is expected that USA will continue to do well and other parts of the world are more stable and prospering.

You have long enough to go before retirement age that you almost certainly have time to ride out any crashes.

At your age, you are probably invested in growth assets, and should aim to de-risk as you get closer to your suggested retirement age.

Facebook is just random people talking shit and dodgy algorithms.

There is no point taking advice as financial advisors don’t know when a crash is coming (if they did they would be relaxing their yachts not selling financial advice).

If you have 20 years to go until retirement, it’s all just noise. You can’t time the market so just accept there will be ups and downs. It’s only when you are 5y or so from retirement that you need to be thinking about all this and even then you’ll probably want to stay invested to a large extent depending on circs.

In your 40’s please don’t worry, they go up and down but long term will rise. In your late 50’s/early 60’s moving into less volatile areas of investment makes sense

Leave it to the experts and let the pension company invest for you - they know what they are doing.

I honestly wouldn't worry, you have a good 20 years til you retire. Google 2008 stock market crash vs 2025 chart. Remember, if it does crash you benefit from your regular contributions having more buying power.

What did you do during the Covid crash?
2022 dip?
Last year’s mini crash?
If the answer is nothing then congratulations, it’s exactly the thing to do now, unless you are going to be drawing down / taking a TFLS in the next 3-5
years.

Covid crash I hadn't even considered it. Last years crash I panicked 🫣

I appreciate all the advice - I'll try to work up courage to delete my app so I don't keep checking values.

Look up Rebel finance community on Facebook or videos on you tube. Free investment education.

markets are always volatile but so long as you are investing 5+ years it will give you above inflation growth.