>And the investors money isn't just disappearing nor any such investor just deciding to spend everything in some beach vacation somewhere.

I'm not sure I buy this argument. The money for investing didn't disappear in 2000 either but the market went sideways and down for over a decade.

Famously, the US started year 2000 with a sharp, surprising, and short-lived reduction of the money supply. It took way into 2001 to get to the level it was before the shock.

The one in 2008 was less clear. The data was worse, and the crisis was more confusing. But 2000 is a textbook case of deflationary shock.