AlgovestIQLoss and recovery
Enter an investment's peak value, the low it fell to and its value today. You get the peak-to-trough loss, the gain needed to get back to the peak, how far today's value sits below it, and how much of the loss has been recovered.
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The dashed line is the high-water mark the value has to regain.
Maximum Drawdown
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ContinueDrawdown measures the loss from a peak to a later trough, and recovery is the gain needed from the trough to get back to that peak. Because the recovery is measured from a smaller base, it is always larger than the loss. The figures describe the one peak and trough you enter; if that is the worst peak-to-trough fall in a period, it is that period's maximum drawdown.
Drawdown = (trough value - peak value) / peak value
Recovery needed = (peak value - trough value) / trough value
Recovery needed for a loss L = 1 / (1 - L) - 1
Current drawdown = (current value - peak value) / peak value
A portfolio peaks at $100,000 and falls to $72,000: a drawdown of -28%. Recovering to $100,000 from $72,000 takes a 38.9% gain, more than the 28% lost.
At $85,000 today, the portfolio is 15% below its peak, needs a 17.6% gain to reach a new high, and has recovered 46% of the loss.
The recovery burden grows faster than the loss: a 10% loss needs an 11.11% gain, 20% needs 25%, 30% needs 42.86%, and 50% needs 100%.
Move from peak-to-trough math into portfolio risk analysis.
View portfolio drawdownCompare growth-heavy and broad-market downside paths.
Compare benchmarksLearn why drawdown captures investor pain that volatility can miss.
Review methodologyRelated tools are selected for the drawdown calculator workflow.
Walk through the values in date order, keep the highest value seen so far (the running peak), and measure each value's fall below it. The deepest of those falls is the maximum drawdown, usually shown as a negative percentage. A peak and trough entered here give the maximum drawdown only if they are the worst such episode; the global high cannot be paired with a low that came earlier.
Losses and gains are asymmetric. A 50% drawdown requires a 100% gain from the trough to return to the original peak.
No. Volatility measures return variability, while drawdown measures the worst peak-to-trough loss path.
No. The result is a scenario calculation from the peak, trough, and current values you enter.