Fortescue Metals Group Ltd (ASX: FMG) shares have gained 23% over the past 12 months and delivered investors some outsized passive income.
One year ago today, Fortescue shares were trading for $17.59 apiece. Down 1.5% in intraday trading today, shares are currently changing hands for $21.71 apiece.
But you wouldn't have had to buy shares in the S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) iron ore stock last June to grab the full year's allotment of passive income.
In fact, you could have held off until 2 September.
How much passive income from a $7,000 investment in Fortescue shares?
Fortescue shares paid out a final fully franked dividend of $1.21 per share on 29 September.
To receive that you would have had to own shares at market close on 2 September. That's because the ASX 200 miner traded ex-dividend on 5 September, which was a Monday.
Management also declared a fully franked interim dividend of 75 cents per share. Eligible investors will have seen that passive income hit their bank accounts on 29 March.
A bit of back of the napkin maths tells us that the miner's full-year dividend payout comes to $1.96 per share.
But as mentioned, you don't need to have owned the stock for the full year to have received both dividends. If you'd bought shares on 2 September and held onto them, you would have received the full $1.96 per share payout.
Now, on 2 September Fortescue shares closed the day trading for $17.20 apiece.
Using that as the buy price, you could have snapped up 406 shares for $7,000, with enough change left over for a small pizza.
With dividends coming in at $1.96 per share, that equates to a very tidy $795.76 in passive income in less than nine months. Not to mention a 26% boost in the Fortescue share price over that time.
