“Only buy something that you’d be perfectly happy to hold if the market shut down for 10 years.”
— Warren Buffett
Investors can learn a lot from Warren Buffett, whose above quote teaches the importance of thinking about investment time horizon, and asking ourselves before buying any given stock: can we envision holding onto it for years — even a decade-long holding period possibly?
Suppose a “buy-and-hold” investor was considering an investment into Akamai Technologies Inc (NASD: AKAM) back in 2013: back then, such an investor may have been pondering this very same question. Had they answered “yes” to a full decade-long investment time horizon and then actually held for these past 10 years, here’s how that investment would have turned out.
| Start date: | 04/26/2013 |
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| End date: | 04/25/2023 | ||||
| Start price/share: | $42.61 | ||||
| End price/share: | $79.47 | ||||
| Starting shares: | 234.69 | ||||
| Ending shares: | 234.69 | ||||
| Dividends reinvested/share: | $0.00 | ||||
| Total return: | 86.51% | ||||
| Average annual return: | 6.43% | ||||
| Starting investment: | $10,000.00 | ||||
| Ending investment: | $18,651.54 | ||||
As shown above, the decade-long investment result worked out well, with an annualized rate of return of 6.43%. This would have turned a $10K investment made 10 years ago into $18,651.54 today (as of 04/25/2023). On a total return basis, that’s a result of 86.51% (something to think about: how might AKAM shares perform over the next 10 years?). [These numbers were computed with the Dividend Channel DRIP Returns Calculator.]
One more investment quote to leave you with:
“In trading you have to be defensive and aggressive at the same time. If you are not aggressive, you are not going to make money, and if you are not defensive, you are not going to keep money.” — Ray Dalio
