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“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 decade-long period?

Today, let’s look backwards in time to 2013, 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 decade-long holding period.

Start date: 09/30/2013
$10,000

09/30/2013
  $53,795

09/27/2023
End date: 09/27/2023
Start price/share: $25.97
End price/share: $139.70
Starting shares: 385.06
Ending shares: 385.06
Dividends reinvested/share: $0.00
Total return: 437.93%
Average annual return: 18.33%
Starting investment: $10,000.00
Ending investment: $53,795.80

As we can see, the decade-long investment result worked out exceptionally well, with an annualized rate of return of 18.33%. This would have turned a $10K investment made 10 years ago into $53,795.80 today (as of 09/27/2023). On a total return basis, that’s a result of 437.93% (something to think about: how might TMUS 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:
“The policy of being too cautious is the greatest risk of all.” — Jawaharlal Nehru