President Trump’s “Liberation Day” announcement of imposing significant tariffs on the rest of the world triggered a steep and scary sell-off in the stock market. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 indices reached bear market (more than 20% down) from their mid-February record highs.

The fast and furious market crash had investors—both individuals and professionals—selling stocks and heading for the sidelines. Stock prices went down because there were more buyers than sellers.

The financial news networks were full of professional money managers stating they were staying in cash and out of stocks until there was more certainty about the economy and government policies. The fear and belief were that share prices would continue to fall until there was the time for companies to understand the effects on their businesses.

Those investors, individuals, and professionals were wrong. The market “crash” lasted less than a week.

You can see that the markets recovered those early April losses in just a few weeks. A tremendous buying opportunity had come and gone.

The rapid drop and recovery show the strength of using an income-focused strategy, which I recommend to my Dividend Hunter subscribers. We focus on building an income stream from higher-yield investments. When share prices drop, yields go up. Market corrections like the one shown above are opportunities to buy dividend-paying shares with any cash you can get your hands on.

A student of the markets knows that prices always recover from a downturn. Each recovery goes on to set new highs—every time. If you have an income-focused strategy, buying shares in a downturn becomes easier, and even exciting, because you know your wealth and income will be much greater after the recovery.