The 10 best stock market investments ever
It’s the stuff of every investor’s dream - a share that you buy for next to nothing and which then soars in price, making you a millionaire in the process.
For a tiny handful of investors who bought and sold the right share at the right time that dream became a reality.
Times Money takes a look at ten of the shares that made millionaires of some investors for a comparatively modest stake.
1. Poseidon
This Australian mining share created a worldwide sensation in the late 1960s. In September 1969 Poseidon, a small nickel mining company made a large find at Windarra, in Western Australia. Within a month the company’s share price had rocketed from 0.8 Australian dollars to 12.3 Australian dollars. By February 1970 Poseidon shares had reached 280 Australian dollars on the back of a massive speculative boom, but then fell away sharply because the bubble was unsustainable and the nickel price fell. Someone buying just 3,571 shares costing 2,856 Australian dollars at the 0.80 dollar price back in early September 1969 would have been an Australian dollar millionaire at the 280 dollar price in February 1970.
The investment vehicle of Warren Buffet, the celebrated US investor, may not have enjoyed the meteoric rise in share price of Poseidon but it has been an outstanding moneyspinner for those who have signed up for the long-term ride.
In 1962, just three years before Buffet took it over, Berkshire Hathaway’s share price stood at 7.56 US dollars. It now stands at about 112,000 US dollars. This means that someone who had bought just nine shares costing a total of 68 dollars back in 1962 would now be a US dollar millionaire.
3. Microsoft
If Warren Buffet is the most celebrated investor in the US Bill Gates must be its most celebrated businessman. Anyone who bought into his Microsoft company back in 1987 has been handsomely rewarded since. After adjusting for stock splits, the price of Microsoft shares in 1987 was, at one point, the equivalent of about 0.08 US dollars per share, compared to their present price of 25.4 dollars. So anyone holding the equivalent of 3,149 dollars’ worth of Microsoft shares in 1987 would now be a US dollar millionaire.
Like Microsoft this California-based information networking company rode the IT boom of the 1990s. In March 1990 its share price was the equivalent of 0.08 US dollars. Ten years later, in March 2000, at the height of the tech bubble, it was 77.3 dollars. So someone who held the equivalent of just over 1,000 dollars’ worth of Cisco stock in March 1990 would have turned that into a million dollars in a decade.
5. Sage Group
Not all the IT action was on the other side of the Atlantic. Sage Group, the UK accounting software specialist, has produced a return, including dividends, of 6,000 per cent for investors over the past 18 years. Someone with £17,000 invested in Sage Group back in 1990 and who had reinvested all dividends would now be sitting on a nest-egg of more than £1 million.
6. Next
Although this UK clothing retailer has suffered a sharp fall in the past year, those who got on board the shares in the depths of the previous recession, in December 1990, have reaped a rich reward. Ben Yearsley, of Hargreaves Lansdown, the independent financial adviser, says the shares hit £24 in the first half of 2007 - a 17,600 per cent rise on their December 1990 price of 13.5p. Someone who held £5,624 worth of Next shares in December 1990 would, in early 2007, have had a holding worth more than £1 million, though the recent market slide would have more than halved that figure.
7. Nokia
The Finnish mobile phone manufacturer was a little known company back in 1992, when its share price stood, at one point, at just a tenth of a euro. In contrast, says Mr Yearsley, the current share price is about 17.8 euros - an increase of 17,700 per cent. Someone who bought or held just over 5,600 euros worth of Nokia shares in October 1992 would now be a millionaire.
8. Gresham House investment trust
This private equity investment trust enjoyed a spectacular run in the nine years from August 1998 to August 2007, producing a total return for investors of 3,800 per cent. Anyone who held £25,600 worth of Gresham House shares in August 1998, and reinvested all dividends, would now be sitting on a million pound nest-egg.
9. BlackRock World Mining Trust
This investment trust has ridden the boom in metals and minerals with great effect. Between September 1998 and May this year, the investment trust produced a return of 1,897 per cent. This means that someone who invested just over £50,000 back in September 1998 and reinvested the dividends would now have joined the millionaire’s club.
10. Google
Launched just four years ago this classic internet play has already made millionaires out of a lot of Google staff and, judging by its stellar performance so far, it will, in due course, do the same thing for many private investors. Since its flotation at 85 US dollars in August 2004 the share price has already risen almost sixfold to 485 dollars and at its peak had gone up more than eightfold to more than 700 dollars.
Have you got any other suggestions for money-spinning shares? Has a single share made you a millionaire? Have your say below:
By Mark Atherton
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Could RBS be worth a investment at the current share price of 11p....... or will they go bust??
Posted by: Roy | 19 Jan 2009 19:21:38
how about now???????????????????????
Posted by: Drill baby drill | 7 Jan 2009 10:42:00
Corus was a corker 2002 price it was on its knees at 5.5p. Sold 2 years ago at over £1.20 !
Posted by: Steve Hall | 6 Dec 2008 09:07:11
I have a few friends who invested heavily in Corus Group at below 6p 5 years ago, held until they were bought out 2 years ago at over £1.20 !
Posted by: Steve Hall | 6 Dec 2008 08:58:53
You missed some: Amgen, Telmex.
Posted by: chris | 1 Nov 2008 22:26:57
How about Briex...Canadian Gold shares that boomed then busted after it was proved that "salting" had been the basis of the issue!
Geologists hell out of helicopters...!
Could appear in "frauds" or any of the swindle categories...but some Canadians (Albertans in St. Paul) made huge profits.
Posted by: Rugbyplayer | 13 Oct 2008 18:19:41
On 19.11.90 a company was formed in California which became Hansen Natural Resources. Shares were issued at $1 so for £2,500 you could have bought 3000 Shares. There have susequently been two bonus issues of 2for1 and 4for1 so 3000 shares became 24000 and the highest price on Nasdaq for the last twelve months was $68.40 which meant your original £2500 investment was worth $1,641,600. Not bad eh. in 8 years !!
Posted by: TED C. | 2 Oct 2008 14:07:45
AIM listed Durlacher had a market cap of £500,000 in 1995. By February 2000 Durlacher was a FTSE100 aspirant with a market cap of £2 billion. That beats them all ...
Posted by: philip | 19 Sep 2008 08:49:38
Have you all forgot about RIM - the maker of the crack/blackberry phones.
The share is truly goes against all odds of a company back in early 2000, trying to convince the world that it can beat established market leaders i.e. Nokia. Everyone laughed.
A penny share in 2000, now its about $130 !
Posted by: M. Oais Ahsan | 1 Sep 2008 22:22:50
GEO interactive, now Emblaze ticker BLZ, was 5p in 1999 and went to £32 plus, personally bough a tranche at 32p and sold for £16.50. Was darling of the internet bulletin boards and i personally know of several people on misicule incomes who bought around £1500 worth at 5p and sold at circa £30 and now living mortgage free and happy
Posted by: Hits | 30 Aug 2008 12:17:54
For the long term then an Australian company by the name of Westfield has been outstanding,A $1000 investment on flotation in 1960 was worth $109 million by 2000.
A slow down through this decade but still a good investment to hold.
They are now developing the White City complex in London as they spread their shopping centres from Australia to the US and then may use the UK as a foothold in Europe.
Posted by: Big geordie. | 24 Aug 2008 04:12:07
Saw a tip in the Week Magazine in Feb 1999 so bought £1500 worth of Infobank (a tech stock) . I more or less forgot about them until October 1999 but a chance look showed that my investment would now be worth £15000 . So I sold half of them . Then by November my residual shares were worth over £20,000 , so i sold them . Had i held on they further climbed so that I could have doubled this .
Soon after the company now named Izodia collapsed
Posted by: derejam | 20 Aug 2008 17:05:54
Another mining penny dreadfull come good is Aurelian (TSX: ADU) which is being taken over at CAD 8.20.
True capitalism, something of value created by intellectual capital realising and materialising a physical asset - gold.
Posted by: Alberto Jorge | 20 Aug 2008 15:17:37
Surely FMG (ASX) should be on this list. A penny dreadful that picked up roo pasture around the Rio and BHP tenements in the Pilbara in Western Australia and have built their own rail, port and mine to be the third major iron ore exporter. Againsts all odds, conventional wisdom and the disbelief of the local investment community.
Posted by: Alberto Jorge | 20 Aug 2008 15:13:39
Dragon Oil - in 2000 were trading about 9p a share and hit about 520p a share this year. I almost bought £30,000 for 32p a share in 2004 and am still kicking myself as I stuck the money in Premium Bonds instead which have netted my £2500 in 4 years.
Posted by: Timothy Murray | 20 Aug 2008 09:53:50
Town and City Property Warrants
.25p in December 74 - 64 p in 76 .
256 fold increase.
Posted by: Michael King | 6 Aug 2008 23:34:15
You forget Amgen whose present shares could have been purchased for around 9 cents in 1985. Or about the same time, shares of Telefonos de Mexico. Buying about $1 of that then would now give you over $600 divided between TMX, TII and AMX.
Posted by: Chris | 5 Aug 2008 12:02:30
1987 Crash -
Turned £700 into £13,0000 in one day.
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article2499.html
Posted by: Nadeem Walayat | 4 Aug 2008 04:18:51
Any one who invested £10,000.00 in a trendAccounts.com 14 years ago would be in the club....based on past performance in falling and rising markets the same could be true in the next 14 years...As it is not linked to the general economy and can make you money from falling markets too!!
Posted by: Mickey Ferrari | 3 Aug 2008 15:47:13
I was a private client broker in london throughout the 70s.In Feb1975 a client-East Anglian Banking descendant-put his childrens trust money into 3split capital shares,Danae,M&&G and Triplevest.The total investments of £15k went up to300k in 18 months. He also bought British Land at4p and Amalgated Inv&Property at 7p.The first grew to where it is today,the latter,even with the Archangel Gabriel Harrison just failed to make it.Burton 1976 warrants also made a fortune for those prepared to buy an out of the money issue. I forget the terms but the gearing was around 15x;it was an in house favourite and the market had it wrongly priced in the extreme.
Posted by: peter montgomery | 3 Aug 2008 13:06:46
All I can say about Google, as a user of their products, in "caveat emptor". Gmail is down a lot of the time, and, even when up performs like a three-legged tortoise. YouTube has gone the same way since being taken over by Google.
Posted by: Bill Peter | 1 Aug 2008 14:23:36
Thanks for doing all that research. Should have the time machine up and running any day now. However, a the quantum computer notion is worth a second look.
Posted by: Andrew Milner | 31 Jul 2008 23:35:00
Hard to beat the uranium boom from 2004-06. I was working for a broker in Australia and we had a client buy 250,000 Paladin Resources at 1c. They went over $10 and held them all the way. 18 months turned $2,500 into $2.5 million. Still above $5 today.
How many punts went to 0 in between?
Posted by: John | 31 Jul 2008 13:26:10
Polly Peck and Durlacher are two that spring to mind. From memory, PP went from 9p to £38, but then we all know what happened to Azil Nadir....
Posted by: Mark | 31 Jul 2008 11:26:24
I think Shire Pharmaceuticals shares increased from 5p to £15 at one point.
Posted by: Pete | 31 Jul 2008 10:33:37
It's amazing how easy it is to look back on those shares that have done spectacularly well, however you can bet that for every one that would make you a millionaire there are probably 10 others that would do very little or lose you the shirt of your back!
Posted by: Darren H | 31 Jul 2008 10:11:22
Esprit HK listed.
Posted by: stephen brown | 31 Jul 2008 08:16:18
Esprit HK listed.
Posted by: stephen brown | 31 Jul 2008 08:15:00
I am a past employee of 3M Company (its NZ subsidiary); I retired in 1998. 3M celebrated its centenary (1902- 2002); I quote from that period's "3M Story".
One "original" (1902) share, if held, would have accumulated to 1,536 (2002) shares. Dividends were paid every quarter (from 1916 to 2002). 3M prided itself in increasing the dividend, every quarter (to $2.40 cash, in 2002).
Posted by: Ron Durham | 31 Jul 2008 03:09:22
Gazprom's 'domestic' shares traded at $0.04 in the fall of 1998 after Russia's financial meltdown. Currently, it trades at about $12 per share or $50 per ADR (representing 4 shares). It sure feels nice to be in the club.
Posted by: Anatoly | 31 Jul 2008 02:57:34
There must be a load of tech stocks you have missed. They came down alot but before that they went up alot. Those who bought in early and sold at the right time must have made a mint.
Posted by: Gordon Broon | 30 Jul 2008 23:51:47
There was a story here in Oz about a Malaysian chap living in Sydney who bought $1 million worth of FMG shares about 5 years ago, today its worth $1.2 billion. Andrew Forrest is now Australia's richest man on the back of FMG.
Posted by: Kevin | 30 Jul 2008 23:35:22