{"id":46825,"date":"2026-05-23T19:08:06","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T19:08:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/46825\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T19:08:06","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T19:08:06","slug":"invested-10000-in-rio-tinto-fortescue-or-bhp-shares-5-years-ago-guess-which-one-has-gained-the-most","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/46825\/","title":{"rendered":"Invested $10,000 in Rio Tinto, Fortescue or BHP shares 5 years ago? Guess which one has gained the most"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you’d bought $10,000 worth of Rio Tinto Ltd (ASX: RIO<\/a>), Fortescue Ltd (ASX: FMG<\/a>) and BHP Group Ltd (ASX: BHP<\/a>) shares five years ago, which investment would have delivered the best returns?<\/p>\n

It’s a question I was asked this past week.<\/p>\n

And one I didn’t have a ready answer for.<\/p>\n

So, I did a little digging into how the S&P\/ASX 200 Index\u00a0(ASX: XJO) mining<\/a> giants have performed since mid-May 2021.<\/p>\n

Here’s what I found, bearing in mind that the S&P\/ASX 200 Gross Total Return Index (ASX: XJT) \u2013 which includes all cash dividends reinvested on the ex-dividend date \u2013 is up 49.2% over the past five years.<\/p>\n

(*Note, all price figures are as at late morning trade on Friday, 22 May. Calculations are made assuming a full $10,000 invested in each ASX 200 mining stock.)<\/p>\n

\"An<\/p>\n

Image source: Getty Images<\/p>\n

Rio Tinto, Fortescue, or BHP shares?<\/p>\n

In no particular order, we’ll kick off with Rio Tinto.<\/p>\n

Five years ago, on 21 May 2021, you could have picked up Rio Tinto shares for $122.12 apiece. On Friday, those same shares were changing hands for $184.48.<\/p>\n

That represents a gain of 51.1%.<\/p>\n

But let’s not forget those all-important dividends<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you bought and held onto those Rio Tinto shares for the past five years, you’d have received the last 10 fully-franked dividend payouts.<\/p>\n

According to my trusty calculator, that equates to a total dividend payout of $40.09 a share.<\/p>\n

If we add that back into Friday’s share price, then the accumulated value of the Rio Tinto shares you bought five years ago comes out to $224.57 a share, or a gain of 83.9%.<\/p>\n

That would have seen your $10,000 investment grow to $18,389 today, with potential tax benefits from those franking credits.<\/p>\n

Turning to BHP, five years ago, the Aussie mining giant was trading for $42.52 a share. On Friday, BHP shares were swapping hands for $59.82 each, for a five-year gain of 40.1%.<\/p>\n

As for those fully-franked BHP dividends, since 21 May 2021, you have seen 10 of those passive income payouts land in your bank account, totalling $14.92 a share.<\/p>\n

Adding that back into BHP’s recent share price, the accumulated value of those BHP shares is now worth $74.74 each. That’s a gain of 75.8%. And it would have grown your $10,000 investment into $17,578 today.<\/p>\n

Finally, five years ago, Fortescue shares were trading for $22.30. On Friday, shares were trading for $21.63. That’s a loss of 3%, without counting the dividends.<\/p>\n

Now, if we add in the last 10 fully-franked dividend payouts, totalling $9.62 a share, then the accumulated value of Fortescue shares bought on 21 May 2021 is now worth $31.25 each.<\/p>\n

Demonstrating the importance of those dividend payments, that equates to a gain of 40.1%, or enough to turn your $10,000 investment into $14,013 today.<\/p>\n

And the winner is\u2026<\/p>\n

Rio Tinto shares narrowly edge out BHP shares as the better investment over the past five years, with Fortescue coming in a distant third.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you’d bought $10,000 worth of Rio Tinto Ltd (ASX: RIO), Fortescue Ltd (ASX: FMG) and BHP Group…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":46826,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[20718],"tags":[12991,23473],"class_list":["post-46825","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rio-tinto","tag-rio-tinto","tag-trending"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116625467121456180","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46825\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}