I know the bottom-to-top return on RHG was more like 50x and not 10x, which is why i said ">10". In reality, almost nobody got the whole 50-60x on RHG though, because doing so required that you'd made 100% of your RHG investment exactly on the very lows of the stock and held 100% of that investment until the end - that sort of timing is close to impossible for a number of reasons:
1) RHG was very cheap long before it bottomed, so realistically those who bought it (traditional deep value investors like Steve Johnson) invested a significant part of their capital well above the lows (i.e. as it was falling but long before it bottomed);
2) RHG hit its bottom only very briefly before rapidly rebounding, so practically it's almost impossible to make 100% of your investment right on the lows.
3) Value investing requires that you start selling as the price rises toward fair value, so any investor lucky enough to get in right on the lows almost certainly wouldn't have held on for all the upside.
"This is an extreme case and almost certain it will never happen again."
It absolutely will. Guaranteed. In fact, there's 0% chance an RHG-like 50-bagger in 5 years type scenario won't happen again at some point during the next financial crisis. "Never" is a very long time indeed.
FIG Price at posting:
14.5¢ Sentiment: None Disclosure: Not Held