If You'd Invested $3,000 in Nvidia (NVDA) Stock 20 Years Ago, Here's How Much You'd Have Today
The answer may make you want to kick yourself.
Hindsight is 20-20, and few back then expected Nvidia to grow so quickly.
You still may do well investing in the company now.
10 stocks we like better than Nvidia ›
Here's a question and answer that might make you kick yourself: If you'd invested $3,000 in shares of Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) 20 years ago, what would it be worth today?
The answer: $2.3 million. (It would be even better if you had reinvested your dividends in more shares of Nvidia along the way. Your stake would be worth around $2.5 million.)
That's an average annual gain of 39.5%! The S&P 500 averaged a solid 9.22% in the same period.
Don't be too hard on yourself if you missed the monster growth, though. Ask 100 people, and you may not find one who invested in Nvidia back in 2005 and held on.
Holding on to great companies for many years, if not decades, is one of the best ways to build wealth, but it's easier said than done. For one thing, it's not always clear which companies will become long-term winners, and even some extremely promising companies fall on hard times occasionally, with their stock sinking. It can be hard psychologically to not sell shares `at those times.
For a long time, Nvidia was a semiconductor company specializing in chips for gaming. It was very successful at that, but its explosive growth in recent years is largely due to its dominance in chips for data centers, which are in high demand due to artificial intelligence (AI) computing activities.
Too late to buy?
While it's too late to buy shares of Nvidia in 2005, it's not too late to buy shares in 2025, and they don't look terribly overvalued at recent levels, either -- despite the stock hitting an all-time high. Nvidia's recent forward price-to-earnings ratio (P/E) of 38 is roughly on par with its five-year average of 39.
In its last quarter, Nvidia's revenue popped by 69%, with double-digit gains expected in the quarters to come. If you expect the use of AI to increase in the near future along with more demand for data centers and the chips on which they run, take a closer look at Nvidia.
Do the experts think Nvidia is a buy right now?
The Motley Fool's expert analyst team, drawing on years of investing experience and deep analysis of thousands of stocks, leverages our proprietary Moneyball AI investing database to uncover top opportunities. They've just revealed their to buy now — did Nvidia make the list?
When our Stock Advisor analyst team has a stock recommendation, it can pay to listen. After all, Stock Advisor's total average return is up 1,036% vs. just 181% for the S&P — that is beating the market by 855.09%!*
Imagine if you were a Stock Advisor member when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $625,254!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $1,090,257!*
The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join Stock Advisor.
See the 10 stocks »
*Stock Advisor returns as of July 29, 2025
Selena Maranjian has positions in Nvidia. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Nvidia. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
If You'd Invested $3,000 in Nvidia (NVDA) Stock 20 Years Ago, Here's How Much You'd Have Today was originally published by The Motley Fool

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