than when you had started. if you had placed your money on the sidelines for that single year, you would still have your $452 590.
if you have no ability at all to measure risk and reward, you would have to accept your lumps. since you would have no ability at all to weigh the upside potential against the downside risk, you would just have to look at long-term numbers to see which is more likely. you would see that there are lots of years with 10% increases and very few with a 50% loss. you would choose to accept the risk, being that you had no ability to estimate it.
and 