US Markets

Investing legend Jack Bogle: 'Stay the course'

Individual investors should stay the course: Bogle
VIDEO3:2603:26
Individual investors should stay the course: Bogle

Investors thinking of selling amid the current market turmoil should resist the urge, Vanguard Group founder Jack Bogle said Wednesday.

"Just stay the course. Don't do something, just stand there. This is speculation that we're seeing out there, and you can't respond to it," the investing legend told CNBC's "Power Lunch."

Bogle made his remarks in the midst of yet another sell-off in global equities.

Jamie Dimon at the 2016 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
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The Japanese Nikkei 225 tumbled nearly 4 percent and closed in bear market territory. In Europe, the pan-European STOXX 600 index fell more than 3 percent.

U.S. equities inched closer toward bear market territory, with the Dow Jones industrial average falling more than 450 points Wednesday, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq composite fell about 3 percent.

At the center of the sell-off was U.S. oil, which plunged nearly 8 percent Wednesday, hitting a fresh 2003 low.

"Each bubble, for lack of a better word, is different from the previous bubble. The dotcom bubble back in 1999 into the beginning of 2000 was a whole lot of ridiculously overpriced new companies, only probably 15 percent of which made it," Bogle said. "The mortgage bubble was because a lot of people had mortgages, and weren't able to pay for them."

The recent fall in stocks and commodities, particularly oil, has raised questions as to whether or not the economy is at risk of entering a recession. Bogle said the long-term relation between the economy and the stock market is very tight.

In the short term, however, Bogle said: "Nothing has changed."

"In the short run, listen to the economy; don't listen to the stock market," he said. "These moves in the market are like a tale told by an idiot: full of sound and fury, signalling nothing."