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The Daily Insight

What is required rate return?

Author

Henry Morales

Published Feb 16, 2026

The required rate of return (RRR) is the minimum return an investor will accept for owning a company’s stock, as compensation for a given level of risk associated with holding the stock. The RRR is also used in corporate finance to analyze the profitability of potential investment projects.

How is required rate of return determined?

The required rate of return for equity of a dividend-paying stock is equal to ((next year’s estimated dividends per share/current share price) + dividend growth rate). For example, suppose a company is expected to pay an annual dividend of $2 next year and its stock is currently trading at $100 a share.

What affects required rate of return?

The required rate of return is influenced by the following factors: Risk of the investment. A company or investor may insist on a higher required rate of return for what is perceived to be a risky investment, or a lower return on a correspondingly lower-risk investment. Liquidity of the investment.

What is meant by rate of return?

A rate of return (RoR) is the net gain or loss of an investment over a specified time period, expressed as a percentage of the investment’s initial cost. When calculating the rate of return, you are determining the percentage change from the beginning of the period until the end.

Is required rate of return the same as YTM?

With bonds, the terms “yield to maturity” and “required return” both refer to the money that investors make from owning a bond. With yield to maturity, you’re using the price of a bond to determine the investor’s return; with required return, on the other hand, you use the return to set the price of the bond.

What is a rate of return example?

The return, or rate of return, depends on the currency of measurement. For example, suppose a 10,000 USD (US dollar) cash deposit earns 2% interest over a year, so its value at the end of the year is 10,200 USD including interest. The return over the year is 2%, measured in USD.

Why is YTM a poor measure of expected return?

Yield to maturity is often a poor measure of what a bond’s giving you because it assumes one can reinvest coupons at the yield. A better way to price bonds is to discount all their cash flows to the present using the appropriate zero-coupon rate for the cash flow’s maturity.

What is the difference between rate of return and expected return?

The expected rate of return is the amount you expect to lose or gain on an investment over a time period, and this lacks certainty due to market changes, interest rates and other factors. In contrast, the rate of return is how much you actually end up gaining or losing on that investment.

What is rate of return in simple terms?

How do you explain return?

A return, also known as a financial return, in its simplest terms, is the money made or lost on an investment over some period of time. A return can be expressed nominally as the change in dollar value of an investment over time.

What are the factors that determine returns?

There are five key factors that determine the general rate of return you can expect on your investments

  • Your investment objective.
  • Your age and financial responsibilities.
  • Your liquidity (availability of funds)
  • Your risk-bearing capacity.
  • Your investment timeline.

What are the two basic parts of a return?

The two primary components of return are capital gains (or increase in value) and current income (for a stock, this would be represented by dividends).

What do you need to know about required rate of return?

The required rate of return (RRR) is the minimum amount of profit (return) an investor will receive for assuming the risk of investing in a stock or another type of security. RRR also can be used to calculate how profitable a project might be relative to the cost of funding the project.

What happens if the required rate of return is not met?

If the expected return of an investment does not meet or exceed the required rate of return, the investor will not invest. The required rate of return is also called the hurdle rate of return.

How is cost of capital related to required rate of return?

The cost of capital can be the cost of debt, the cost of equity, or a combination of both. If the investor is a company considering the required rate of return on a corporate project, then calculating the cost of debt is simple. It is the interest rates on the company’s debt obligations.

How to calculate required rate of return using CAPM?

Calculating RRR using CAPM 1 Add the current risk-free rate of return to the beta of the security. 2 Take the market rate of return and subtract the risk-free rate of return. 3 Add the results to achieve the required rate of return.