I bought a wave of brokerage stocks back in 2014. At the time, the P/E ratios were generally over 100. In just a few months, the stock prices took off, but the higher they went, the lower the P/E ratios got. Because the bull market had arrived. Retail trading volume surged, and brokerages were making crazy money. P/E ratios dropped to single digits. Some stocks had already gone up 10x by then. In other words, those brokerages made as much in a few months as they did in the past several years. Fast forward about a year, the stock market crash hit in the second half of 2015. Some of those stocks dropped 50%, others fell 80-90%. P/E ratios shot back up to dozens. That was my first impression of cyclical stocks. Luckily, I was young back then, didn’t have much money, cashed out after making a profit, and went to buy a house and a car. Those who kept believing in the "cyclical stocks always hit new highs" myth might still be stuck this year. Some industries don’t make money for ten years, then make ten years’ worth in one.