Every investor has one.

The stock they don't talk about.

It's buried near the bottom of the brokerage account, down 37%, 52%, or perhaps so much that the percentage has stopped being meaningful. You scroll past it a little faster than the others because it reminds you of a decision you'd rather forget. Maybe it was the biotech company that promised a breakthrough. Maybe it was the electric vehicle startup that was going to change transportation forever. Or maybe it was the stock your brother-in-law declared was "a sure thing."

Whatever it was, it's now less of an investment than a souvenir—a reminder that the future has an annoying habit of ignoring our confidence.

Spend a few minutes reading investing forums and you'll notice something curious. People almost never post screenshots of their biggest winners asking, "Should I sell?" Instead, they post the stock that's down 80% and ask a question they already know the answer to. "Do I keep holding?" They aren't really asking about the company. They're asking for permission to admit they were wrong.

Most investors treat losing stocks the same way they treat old high school photos. They don't throw them away, but they don't spend much time looking at them either. We celebrate our winners because they make us feel smart. We quietly bury our losers because they remind us we aren't. Selling doesn't just lock in a financial loss—it feels like admitting defeat. As one investor put it in a recent discussion, "I hate to admit that I was wrong." Another replied with a piece of advice that probably belongs on every brokerage statement: "Pride is a dangerous thing in investing."

One story in particular stuck with me. A young investor wrote about buying shares of an electric vehicle company during the frenzy of 2020. He was 18, convinced he'd found the next big thing. Six years later, the investment was down about 90%. The money barely mattered anymore. What bothered him was that every time he opened his brokerage account, he was reminded of the person he used to be, the inexperienced investor who confused excitement with conviction. He wasn't really asking strangers whether the stock would recover. He wanted to know when experienced investors finally decide it's okay to move on. Hundreds of replies followed. Very few argued about the company's future. Most said the same thing in different words: don't let yesterday's decision determine what you do with today's money.

Wall Street, however, doesn't care about your pride.

It looks at the same losing stock and sees something completely different. Not a mistake; A tax asset.

That may be the most counterintuitive idea in investing. The investment that caused you the most frustration may also be one of the most valuable pieces of your portfolio, not because it will recover, but because it can reduce the taxes you pay on your winners.

Researchers at George Mason University recently tried to answer a simple question: How much is that actually worth?

The answer surprised them.

Depending on an investor's tax rate, systematically harvesting investment losses added roughly 1% to 1.4% a year in after-tax returns. During volatile markets, when more stocks temporarily fell below their purchase price, the benefit was even larger.

This isn't a trick reserved for Wall Street. Many of the largest investment firms use tax-loss harvesting and direct indexing to improve after-tax returns for wealthy clients. Recent financial disclosures also suggest that President Donald Trump's investment portfolio is managed using similar automated, tax-aware direct indexing strategies. Whether you're managing millions or a modest retirement account, the principle is the same: successful investors don't just focus on making money, they focus on keeping more of it after taxes.

One percent. On Wall Street, one percent is an obsession.

Fund managers build careers trying to beat the market by one percent. Investors pay hedge funds millions in fees hoping they'll deliver one percent of extra performance. Financial television spends hours debating which manager might find that elusive edge. Yet one of the most dependable ways to keep an extra one percent may have nothing to do with finding the next Nvidia.

For many retirees and people living on a fixed income, that extra money isn't just another statistic. It can help cover rising grocery bills, a utility payment, prescription medications, or simply provide a little more financial breathing room without taking on additional investment risk.

It may simply come from knowing when to say goodbye to yesterday's mistakes.

And that's where one of the biggest myths in investing begins to fall apart. Selling a losing stock isn't always admitting defeat. Sometimes it's the first smart decision you've made about that investment.