There's no doubt 2008 will be remembered among investors and market watchers as one of the worst on record. After enjoying double-digit returns for some years, it was downhill all the way this year.

Australia's benchmark stock index — the ASX200 — began 2008 coming off the back of 11 percent of gains in 2007. At the time of writing (early December) the market had lost 42 percent in 2008 and $491 billion had been wiped from the value of Australian listed companies.

The catalyst for this year's mammoth losses has been the financial crisis. What began as a simmering issue in the US mortgage market in 2007 morphed into the worst financial crisis the world has seen since the Great Depression of the 1930s. As the year progressed, it became apparent that no market around the world would remain unaffected and Australia was no exception.

The best performing sector of the year was the healthcare sector, which lost just 12 percent. The worst performer was the consumer discretionary sector, which lost a massive 58 percent of its value through the year.

From September this year, seasoned market watchers were left gaping open-mouthed as the market crash began in earnest. There had been a big warning shot fired on January 22 when the market lost 7.5 percent, earning that day the nickname "Black Thursday". There would be many more bad days to come.

The nightmare really kicked off in earnest in the early weeks of September as a seemingly never-ending stream of bad news from the US turned into a deluge.

The first jitters came with news the US Government was set to bail out mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. This was swiftly followed by the collapse of Lehman Brothers as authorities decided to let the 158-year-old investment bank fail on September 15.

That kicked off a massive crisis of confidence globally and led some analysts to announce the US banking system had collapsed. The crisis lasted until mid-November and took in some huge drops on the sharemarket.

There was some earlier relief though, as the market rose after the Australian Securities and Investments Commission banned the practice of short selling and the market staged a mini-recovery on September 19. However, that relief was short-lived.

Political wrangling over a proposed US$700 billion bailout of the US financial system sent the Australian market into freefall at the end of September. By the time the US bailout bill was passed on October 4, more ground had already been lost.

October 10 had the headline writers searching for superlatives to describe what was happening as the ASX lost more than $73 billion in one day of trade. "Black Friday," as some newspapers imaginatively called it, saw the ASX close 8.3 percent lower as traders described the atmosphere as pure panic.

A week later, the market lost another 7 percent in one day after Wall Street stocks had their worst day since the 1987 market crash.

While that day was the last day of massive losses, the ASX continued to lose ground through November and December with little light at the end of the tunnel for bruised and battered investors.