The S&P 500 did something in August that hasn't occurred under any second-term president since 1950.

For more than a century, the stock market has been a stomping ground for wealth creation. Though other asset classes have generated positive nominal returns, stocks have delivered the highest average annual return over ultra-long stretches.

But building wealth on Wall Street isn't without its hiccups. Stock market corrections , bear markets, and even crashes are the price investors pay for admission to this long-term prosperity machine. We witnessed this volatility in action earlier this year, with the benchmark S&P 500 ( ^GSPC -0.32% ) registering its fifth-steepest two-day percentage decline since 1950 , along with the iconic Dow Jones Industrial Average ( ^DJI -0.48%

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