As a young punter I lost about 70% of my portfolio in the 1987 crash and it's aftermath.Most of the companies I held shares in at the time didn't survive (nor did some of the brokers who touted them). That and watching a good number of people go from being moderately or even seriously wealthy to dead broke was the best financial education I could get. I'm just glad it happened to me then when the numbers were small and I would young enough to have time to recover than much later in life.