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Holding Period Return Calculator

Measure the total return over a holding period from the beginning and ending value plus any income, with the annualised equivalent.

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Investment Return CalculatorProject a lump sum plus regular contributions, with the compounding frequency, the start-versus-end-of-period timing, inflation and tax.Real Rate of Return CalculatorStrip inflation out of a nominal return with the exact Fisher equation, and see how far the simple subtraction is off.Inflation-adjusted return calculatorCompute the real (inflation-adjusted) return from a nominal return and inflation rate.Capital Gains Yield CalculatorCompute the capital gains yield from the purchase and current price, with dividend yield, total return and the annualised equivalent.Dividend Payout Ratio CalculatorTwo ways in — total dividends over net income, or DPS over EPS — with the retention ratio as its complement and what each level implies.Dividend Reinvestment (DRIP) CalculatorMonth-by-month DRIP with price appreciation, dividend growth, tax and contributions — and the DRIP advantage.Effective Yield CalculatorConvert a nominal rate into the effective annual yield for any compounding frequency, with APR and APY side by side.EPS Calculator (Earnings Per Share)Basic and diluted earnings per share from net income, preferred dividends and share counts.

Holding Period Return Calculator works straight from this page — free, instant, nothing to install. It sits under Investing & markets in our catalogue, alongside Investment Return Calculator and Real Rate of Return Calculator.

How to use it

  1. Open the tool — no signup or install needed.
  2. Enter your input or adjust the available options.
  3. Get your result instantly, then copy or download it.

Frequently asked questions

What does Holding Period Return Calculator do?

Measure the total return over a holding period from the beginning and ending value plus any income, with the annualised equivalent.

When would I actually use this?

Comparing two investments that pay at different times, deciding whether a project clears its cost of capital, and sanity-checking a valuation someone else produced.

What is the most common mistake?

Trusting a valuation without asking what share of it comes from the terminal value. Past 70%, the answer is an assumption about the distant future dressed up as a calculation.

How is Holding Period Return Calculator different from Investment Return Calculator?

They sit next to each other but answer different questions: Investment Return Calculator is the one to open when you need it to project a lump sum plus regular contributions, with the compounding frequency, the start-versus-end-of-period timing, inflation and tax. Pick whichever matches what you're starting from — both are free.

Is there a tool for the next step?

Real Rate of Return Calculator is the closest one after this: Strip inflation out of a nominal return with the exact Fisher equation, and see how far the simple subtraction is off.

What else is worth having open alongside it?

Inflation-adjusted return calculator and Capital Gains Yield Calculator — they come up in the same task often enough to be worth a second tab.

Where do the figures come from?

Discounting, IRR and payback are defined identically everywhere, so the arithmetic is not in dispute — the assumptions you feed it are. Change the discount rate by a point and re-read the answer.

Further reading

All guides →
ExplainerHow Wrong Is Nominal Minus Inflation? Exactly One Year's Inflation WrongThe subtraction is not an approximation of the Fisher relation — it is the exact answer multiplied by (1 + i). At 8 percent nominal and 3 percent inflation the real return is 4.8544 percent, the shortcut says 5, and the error is exactly 3 percent of the answer. Always.ComparisonReal vs Nominal Return: Why Subtracting Inflation Is the Wrong AnswerAt 7 percent nominal and 3 percent inflation the real return is 3.883 percent, not 4. The Fisher equation divides, it does not subtract — and over 30 years the shortcut overstates a $10,000 pot by $1,072.ExplainerPrice Return, Total Return and Yield Are Three Different NumbersThe index quoted in the news is almost always a price index. At 5 percent price growth and a 2.5 percent reinvested yield, 30 years turn $10,000 into $43,219 on price and $90,656 on total return — the price measure misses 58.8 percent of the gain.ExplainerDividend Reinvestment: What Actually Drives the DifferenceReinvesting a 3 percent yield for 30 years turns 100 shares into 242.7 and multiplies the final position by exactly that factor: $32,434 becomes $78,726. Tax at 30 percent on each dividend costs $18,223 of it — nearly two and a half times the tax actually paid.ExplainerTax-Equivalent Yield: Comparing a Tax-Free Bond With a Taxable OneTaxable-equivalent yield = tax-free yield ÷ (1 − marginal rate). A 3.00 percent tax-free yield is worth 3.85 percent at a 22 percent marginal rate and 5.07 percent at 40.8 percent. The trap is that it is the marginal rate, surtaxes and social levies included — leaving them out costs 0.85 points of yield.ExplainerWhat an Investment Return Number Is Not Telling YouA fund can return 9.49 percent a year while its investor earns −1.77 percent. Time-weighted versus money-weighted, nominal versus real, gross versus net — four questions inside one number, separated with arithmetic.