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“I buy on the assumption that they could close the market the next day and not reopen it for five years.”

— Warren Buffett

The Warren Buffett investment philosophy calls for a long-term investment horizon, where a five year holding period, or even longer, would fit right into the strategy. How would such a strategy have worked out for an investment into Henry Schein Inc (NASD: HSIC)? Today, we examine the outcome of a five year investment into the stock back in 2015.

Start date: 05/01/2015
$10,000

05/01/2015
$10,020

04/30/2020
End date: 04/30/2020
Start price/share: $54.45
End price/share: $54.56
Starting shares: 183.65
Ending shares: 183.65
Dividends reinvested/share: $0.00
Total return: 0.20%
Average annual return: 0.04%
Starting investment: $10,000.00
Ending investment: $10,020.03

As we can see, the five year investment result worked out as follows, with an annualized rate of return of 0.04%. This would have turned a $10K investment made 5 years ago into $10,020.03 today (as of 04/30/2020). On a total return basis, that’s a result of 0.20% (something to think about: how might HSIC shares perform over the next 5 years?). [These numbers were computed with the Dividend Channel DRIP Returns Calculator.]

More investment wisdom to ponder:
“Confronted with a challenge to distill the secret of sound investment into three words, we venture the motto, Margin of Safety.” — Benjamin Graham