Russell 2000 Downtrend Replay (2002-04-16 to 2002-07-23)
Relive a brutal 2002 small-cap slide as the Russell 2000 fell 15.8% across 138 daily bars with a 30.4% drawdown. In this FinFable market-replay, you step through each trading day, face 11 decision points, and receive an AI coach review of your choices using simulated capital.
138 daily bars · 11 decision points · 2002-02 to 2002-09 · Stocks
Key facts
This window spans 197 days with a peak-to-trough drawdown of 30.4% and a 12.5% run-up.
- Max drawdown
- −30.4%
- Max run-up
- +12.5%
- Duration
- 197 days
- Largest single-day move
- +4.9%
- Bars
- 138 Daily bars
- Decision points
- 11
Every figure above is computed programmatically from this replay’s own candle series — no editorial input, no LLM. Methodology: Methodology
The market advances day by day. You only see candles up to the current day — as if you were really there.
At key decision points choose Buy / Trim / Exit / Hold. Each decision advances the timeline by one day.
After settlement you get a six-dimension score and an AI coach review. Your result enters the scenario leaderboard.
Event Replay
What happened — and what it teaches
The Russell 2000 in spring 2002 presented small-cap investors with one of the decade's most challenging environments. As the dot-com wreckage continued to reshape equity markets, the index of smaller companies faced prolonged uncertainty across 138 daily bars of authentic historical data. This market-replay scenario places participants at the center of that turbulence, challenging them to navigate 11 decision points—including 4 deemed critical—while the era's economic backdrop unfolded around them. The stakes were clear: survival required discipline, risk awareness, and psychological resilience.
The price trajectory was punishing. The index closed the period at 394.16, down from an opening of 468.19—a cumulative decline of 15.8%. Yet the headline figure understates the ordeal. Maximum drawdown reached 30.4%, meaning any position entered near the high would have been carved down to a fraction of its value. Volatility was relentless, with the largest single day moving 4.9%—a magnitude that could devastate leveraged accounts or shatter lesser-prepared traders in a single session.
This replay teaches three enduring lessons for decision training. First, process discipline matters more than prediction; navigating a downtrend demands following rules, not chasing certainty. Second, risk management is survival—the 30.4% drawdown exposes how position sizing and stop discipline separate lasting traders from those wiped out by a single extended move. Third, psychology is the ultimate battlefield; the emotional weight of watching paper losses compound tests every bias in the book. By confronting this historical crash, participants build the habits needed when markets turn hostile.