“Only buy something that you’d be perfectly happy to hold if the market shut down for 10 years.”
— Warren Buffett
The above quote from Warren Buffett is timeless, and brings into focus the choice about time horizon that any investor should think about before buying a stock they are considering. Behind every stock is an actual business; what will that business look like over a ten year period?
Today, let’s look backwards in time to 2009, and take a look at what happened to investors who asked that very question about Berkshire Hathaway Inc New (NYSE: BRK.B), by taking a look at the investment outcome over a ten year holding period.
| Start date: | 05/26/2009 |
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| End date: | 05/22/2019 | ||||
| Start price/share: | $59.78 | ||||
| End price/share: | $202.60 | ||||
| Starting shares: | 167.28 | ||||
| Ending shares: | 167.28 | ||||
| Dividends reinvested/share: | $0.00 | ||||
| Total return: | 238.91% | ||||
| Average annual return: | 12.99% | ||||
| Starting investment: | $10,000.00 | ||||
| Ending investment: | $33,892.96 | ||||
As we can see, the ten year investment result worked out quite well, with an annualized rate of return of 12.99%. This would have turned a $10K investment made 10 years ago into $33,892.96 today (as of 05/22/2019). On a total return basis, that’s a result of 238.91% (something to think about: how might BRK.B shares perform over the next 10 years?). [These numbers were computed with the Dividend Channel DRIP Returns Calculator.]
Here’s one more great investment quote before you go:
“I think you have to learn that there’s a company behind every stock, and that there’s only one real reason why stocks go up. Companies go from doing poorly to doing well or small companies grow to large companies.” — Peter Lynch
