While Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) has been one of the most talked-about stocks of the AI boom, a dollar-cost averaging (DCA) strategy over the last 3-year period wouldn’t have captured the explosive gains headline numbers might suggest.
Using monthly closing prices from June 2022 through June 2025, an investor who consistently invested $100 across 36 months into Nvidia would have accumulated roughly 30.42 shares.
Starting when the stock was trading around $15.14 and ending at $143.94, the total investment of $3,600 would have reached approximately $4,426 by June 2025, representing a gain of roughly $826 or a 23% total return.
DCA vs lump sum investing
While that might sound appealing at first glance, it’s considerably lower than Nvidia’s eye-catching spot returns. The reason? DCA smooths out volatility, and in this case, it diluted gains from NVDA’s major price surge between late 2023 and early 2025. Investors who bought in early captured great value, but regular purchases throughout higher-priced months pulled down the average return.
Indeed, a lump-sum investment in Nvidia around the same time would have performed far more lucratively. For example, had you invested $10,000 at the June 2022 price of around $15.60, holding until mid‑June 2025, that stake would be worth roughly $91,663 today, yielding an extraordinary 816% return.
Dividends made a negligible difference in the final outcome. Nvidia didn’t pay any meaningful dividend during the first two years of this period and only began distributing a modest quarterly payout of $0.01 per share in mid-2024. Over the final 12 months, those who had built up roughly 20 shares would have received less than $1 in total dividend payments.
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