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“Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.”

— Warren Buffett

The Warren Buffett investment philosophy calls for a long-term investment horizon, where a two-decade holding period, or even longer, would fit right into the strategy. How would such a strategy have worked out for an investment into Akamai Technologies Inc (NASD: AKAM)? Today, we examine the outcome of a two-decade investment into the stock back in 1999.

Start date: 11/01/1999
$10,000

11/01/1999
$5,174

10/07/2019
End date: 10/07/2019
Start price/share: $174.31
End price/share: $90.23
Starting shares: 57.37
Ending shares: 57.37
Dividends reinvested/share: $0.00
Total return: -48.24%
Average annual return: -3.25%
Starting investment: $10,000.00
Ending investment: $5,174.22

As we can see, the two-decade investment result worked out poorly, with an annualized rate of return of -3.25%. This would have turned a $10K investment made 20 years ago into $5,174.22 today (as of 10/07/2019). On a total return basis, that’s a result of -48.24% (something to think about: how might AKAM shares perform over the next 20 years?). [These numbers were computed with the Dividend Channel DRIP Returns Calculator.]

One more piece of investment wisdom to leave you with:
“Be fearful when others are greedy; be greedy when others are fearful.” — Warren Buffett