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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 Warren Buffett investment philosophy calls for a long-term investment horizon, where a ten year holding period, or even longer, would fit right into the strategy. How would such a strategy have worked out for an investment into United Airlines Holdings Inc (NASD: UAL)? Today, we examine the outcome of a ten year investment into the stock back in 2014.

Start date: 10/01/2014
$10,000

10/01/2014
  $12,554

09/30/2024
End date: 09/30/2024
Start price/share: $45.47
End price/share: $57.06
Starting shares: 219.93
Ending shares: 219.93
Dividends reinvested/share: $0.00
Total return: 25.49%
Average annual return: 2.30%
Starting investment: $10,000.00
Ending investment: $12,554.82

As we can see, the ten year investment result worked out as follows, with an annualized rate of return of 2.30%. This would have turned a $10K investment made 10 years ago into $12,554.82 today (as of 09/30/2024). On a total return basis, that’s a result of 25.49% (something to think about: how might UAL shares perform over the next 10 years?). [These numbers were computed with the Dividend Channel DRIP Returns Calculator.]

Another great investment quote to think about:
“All you need for a lifetime of successful investing is a few big winners, and the pluses from those will overwhelm the minuses from the stocks that don’t work out.” — Peter Lynch