That may be true if you have capital to invest.
I'm not saying any of them will go to zero. I'm saying that you can make efficient use of your capital by going to cash when a stock starts to trend down.
If you are an investor where do you get your cash to buy these bargains?
I'd like to see the data on those statistics.
It's not that you can't make money investing. Probably the majority would be better off with a buy and hold strategy of an index ETF.
I trade because I believe I can make superior returns over buy and hold. What I'm saying is that without a strategy to get you out of the market when it's falling you are at the mercy of the market to manage your portfolio. I'd rather be in control.
Buy and hold is no more than a trend following strategy with no risk control. We haven't had a depression in decades but then we haven't had a pandemic for decades. I can only control what I do.
Why not do both? Personally, I do both then its good to compare whether you can beat buy and hold.
This is the article which shows the longer you invest the higher probability of positive expectancy, In fact you can just randomly pick a sample of stocks and see how it does 4-5 years ago and now and more often than not you will be in the green.
https://www.nutmeg.com/nutmegonomic...-returns-the-facts-about-long-term-investing/
The reason I feel that trading is riskier in a sense is that odds are not exact. In trading, you want to strive to be a casino, but then in casino games the odds are exact. In double zero roulette the house edge is 5.26% and this is an undeniable fact because there are 38 numbers and two are green numbers. In trading, you can backtest a result showing the edge is so and so but then again it is curve-fitted to give you the best results, the best you can do is to estimate the odds and then bet accordingly but you never know the exact edge so there is always an element of uncertainty.
The advice I would not give a beginner is to "always use a stop loss". If you do so, statistics show that you would join in the losing trader's club 90% of the time. A beginner more often than not is not going to understand the game straight off. Obviously, everyone starting out will have overinflated ego and be overzealous thinking they are somehow the top 1% only to find out they are not.
A better advice would be pick maybe 2-3 top stocks/cryptos and DCA monthly maybe add in 1-2 another smaller cap stocks/cryptos that are unpolished gems (smaller caps, but good use cases, fundaments, team etc). Trade a smaller amount until you get more competent in it.