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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 ten year period?

Today, let’s look backwards in time to 2014, and take a look at what happened to investors who asked that very question about Autodesk Inc (NASD: ADSK), by taking a look at the investment outcome over a ten year holding period.

Start date: 07/31/2014
$10,000

07/31/2014
  $45,618

07/30/2024
End date: 07/30/2024
Start price/share: $53.35
End price/share: $243.34
Starting shares: 187.44
Ending shares: 187.44
Dividends reinvested/share: $0.00
Total return: 356.12%
Average annual return: 16.38%
Starting investment: $10,000.00
Ending investment: $45,618.87

As we can see, the ten year investment result worked out exceptionally well, with an annualized rate of return of 16.38%. This would have turned a $10K investment made 10 years ago into $45,618.87 today (as of 07/30/2024). On a total return basis, that’s a result of 356.12% (something to think about: how might ADSK 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:
“Be fearful when others are greedy; be greedy when others are fearful.” — Warren Buffett