New Hope Corp Ltd (ASX: NHC) shares have handed out some very tidy gains over the past three years.
How tidy?
I'm glad you asked!
Here's what an $8,000 investment in New Hope shares three years ago would be worth today.
How have New Hope shares been tracking?
Three years (and two days ago) ago, on 7 May 2021, you could have bought New Hope shares for $1.18 apiece.
Meaning you could have bought 6,779 shares with your $8,000 investment.
Not coincidentally, May 2021 was also when we saw coal prices begin to really lift off.
At the time thermal coal, primarily used for generating electricity, was trading for approximately US$98 per tonne. But fuelled by strong demand amid limited new supplies, and following Russia's February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, thermal coal prices hit all-time highs of some US$440 per tonne by September 2022.
This also saw New Hope shares trading at all-time highs in October of that year.
Although the ASX 200 coal stock has retreated from those record highs, investors who bought three years ago will still be sitting very pretty.
New Hope shares closed yesterday trading for $4.70 apiece.
That gives the S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) coal miner a market cap of right around $4.0 billion.
And it means that the 6,779 shares you bought three years ago for $8,000 would now be worth a cool $31,861.30.
But that's not the extent of the gains you would have booked.
New Hope shares also have been paying out some very juicy dividends.
Don't forget the dividends
New Hope shares gained a lot of attention among passive income investors in recent years amid the coal miner's soaring dividend payments.
Since May 2021 the ASX 200 coal stock has made a total of six fully franked dividend payments.
All told these come out to $1.80 a share in dividends that you would have received if you'd bought the stock three years ago.
Now we'll assume here that you decided to spend those dividends rather than reinvest them, which could have netted you even more gains.
OK.
If we add the $1.80 a share in total dividend payouts to yesterday's closing price of $4.70, then the total accumulated value of New Hope shares since May 2021 works out to $6.50 a share.
Which means – drum roll please – that the 6,779 shares you bought three years ago for $8,000 would be worth $44,063.50 today.
Or a gain of 451%!
