It is true that, fundamentally, little has really changed for the carmaker over that period. It is therefore unsurprising that the share has joined the already well-stocked group of famous German-style 'bond stocks' - i.e., shares held by large institutional investors primarily for their dividends.
Over ten years, as we noted, the group's operating profit and net income have barely moved - after inflation, they have declined markedly - while profitability has gradually eroded.
It should nevertheless be noted that dividend payouts have increased by a third, and that the group has begun a timid share buyback program - at the same time as its fraternal enemy Mercedes-Benz. These developments have not weakened its solvency ratios, which have instead tended to improve.
A positive point for investors, who took care - the trap was wide open - not to extrapolate the record results seen during the pandemic, even when the Munich-based manufacturer's shares appeared to be trading at a multiple of just 3x earnings.
Those were peak-cycle earnings, therefore unsustainable, and it would have been imprudent to project their durability. As written above, MarketScreener also reminded readers at the time that for BMW as much as for Mercedes, it was relative to their dividend yield that the stock remained valued by the major shareholders capable of moving the market.
In that respect, with a current yield of 4.6% that corresponds to a modest risk premium over the Bund - which yields 2.8% - and the US 10-year - 4.2% - there is currently nothing excessive or fundamentally abnormal about today's valuation.
It even remains rather generous at a pivotal moment for the German automotive sector, which is struggling to reinvent itself and is now under pressure everywhere - on its home continent as well as in China and the US, where it once generated hefty profits.
