“I buy on the assumption that they could close the market the next day and not reopen it for five 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 five year period?
Today, let’s look backwards in time to 2017, and take a look at what happened to investors who asked that very question about T-Mobile US Inc (NASD: TMUS), by taking a look at the investment outcome over a five year holding period.
Start date: | 01/20/2017 |
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End date: | 01/19/2022 | ||||
Start price/share: | $59.62 | ||||
End price/share: | $105.38 | ||||
Starting shares: | 167.73 | ||||
Ending shares: | 167.73 | ||||
Dividends reinvested/share: | $0.00 | ||||
Total return: | 76.75% | ||||
Average annual return: | 12.07% | ||||
Starting investment: | $10,000.00 | ||||
Ending investment: | $17,678.56 |
As we can see, the five year investment result worked out quite well, with an annualized rate of return of 12.07%. This would have turned a $10K investment made 5 years ago into $17,678.56 today (as of 01/19/2022). On a total return basis, that’s a result of 76.75% (something to think about: how might TMUS shares perform over the next 5 years?). [These numbers were computed with the Dividend Channel DRIP Returns Calculator.]
More investment wisdom to ponder:
“People who invest make money for themselves; people who speculate make money for their brokers.” — Benjamin Graham