STORIES FROM THE FARM

Back to March 2020: Would You Trust the V-Shaped Recovery?

2026-10-12 · The StockPets team

2020 · V

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Remember spring 2020? The news was frightening every day, and the stock market fell and recovered faster than almost ever before. Going back knowing the ending sounds easy. Live it one month at a time in StockPets, and your hands may shake more than you expect.

The COVID crash in one paragraph

As COVID-19 spread around the world in early 2020, markets were gripped by fear that the economy would grind to a halt. The S&P 500 fell about 34% from its February 19 high to March 23, in just over a month. Then, helped by huge monetary and fiscal support, it rebounded quickly and set a new record that August.

Trap #1: Two calendar flips feel longer than they sound

In real life, the drop from peak to bottom took 33 days. Because StockPets moves on month-end prices, you see it as two calendar flips, from the end of January to the end of March. Weighting every crop equally, the farm average shrank about 29% over those two months. Each flip, you watch the whole field visibly shrink.

And the chart ahead stays hidden until that month arrives. You may remember “it bounces soon,” but at the end of February your screen only shows prices through February. Trusting your memory or the screen in front of you is exactly the dilemma time-travel heroes face.

Trap #2: The index recovered. Did your farm?

The S&P 500 hit a new high in August, but the game’s farm average didn’t get back to its January level until November. The index gives more weight to the biggest companies, while the farm average counts every crop equally. The V-shaped rebound you remember isn’t guaranteed to show up the same way in the crops you planted.

Depending on what you’ve planted, the same 2020 can be a completely different year. Because StockPets seeds follow S&P 500 membership at the time, the 2020 seed shop looks very different from 1996. The longer you play, the more the seed list itself shows how the market has changed.

Trap #3: 2020 is the longest road

January 1996 to March 2020 is 290 months. After the first 12 you can move at most three months a day, so getting there is a journey of more than three months of real time. By then you’ve already survived the dot-com bust and 2008, and your pet may have gone through several generations. The 2020 storm isn’t your first crisis. It hits a farm you’ve tended for a long time.

That’s why choices here feel much heavier than your first seed in 1996. Coins saved over decades, fields you’ve expanded, past generations of pets resting in the family garden: more than a number is on the line.

Trap #4: The first rebound month always looks suspicious

In April 2020 the crop average rose about 16%, while the news was still grim. A time traveler knows this is the real rebound, but staring at the end-of-April screen, it’s natural to think “what if it drops again?” Unlike 2008, the storms stopped at two this time, but you can’t know that in the moment you’re playing.

What you take away

The COVID crash is the most recent big crisis, so memories are vivid, which makes it the most interesting stretch to replay. The sharper the memory, the stronger the feeling that “I knew it all along,” also called hindsight bias. StockPets can be a small lab for checking that feeling without real money.

To try the same thought experiment on earlier crises, read Back to 2008 and Back to the dot-com bubble. For where the game begins, read If you went back to 1996, what would you plant?.

StockPets is a game that uses virtual coins only. Nothing on this page is investment advice, and past price changes do not predict future results.