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If You Invested $1000 in Corning a Decade Ago, This is How Much It'd Be Worth Now

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For most investors, how much a stock's price changes over time is important. This factor can impact your investment portfolio as well as help you compare investment results across sectors and industries.

FOMO, or the fear of missing out, also plays a role in investing, particularly with tech giants and popular consumer-facing stocks.

What if you'd invested in Corning (GLW - Free Report) ten years ago? It may not have been easy to hold on to GLW for all that time, but if you did, how much would your investment be worth today?

Corning's Business In-Depth

With that in mind, let's take a look at Corning's main business drivers.

New York-based Corning Incorporated started out as a glass business that was reincorporated in 1936. The company has since developed its glass technologies to produce advanced glass substrates that are used in a large number of applications across multiple markets. Corning reports results under six operating segments.

The Display Technologies segment (25% of total core sales in 2024) includes glass substrates that are commonly found in liquid crystal display (LCD) TVs, notebooks and flat-panel desktop personal computer (PC) monitors. The company’s specialty, active-matrix substrates improve the brightness and sharpness of images.

The company’s Optical Communications products (35.4%) may be categorized into two. The first category comprises cables. Products are typically sold to its own subsidiaries, which then distribute to end users. The second category is hardware and equipment, which comprises optical and copper connectivity products.

Automotive Business segment (12.7%) is created by separating the Automotive Glass Solutions business from the Hemlock and Emerging Growth Business and converging it with the Environmental Technologies segment in the first quarter of 2025. The segment also makes ceramic substrates required for mobile and stationary pollution and emission control systems. The primary users of Corning’s products are automotive and diesel engine manufacturers.

Specialty Materials (13.3%) include different formulations for glass, glass ceramics and fluoride crystals that render special properties to each separate substrate, making it suitable for specific industrial and commercial use.

Life Sciences segment (6.5%) products are sold under the Corning, Costar and Pyrex brands primarily for laboratory equipment, such as microplate products, coated slides, filter plates for genomics sample preparation, plastic cell culture dishes, flasks, cryogenic vials, roller bottles, mass cell culture products, liquid handling instruments, Pyrex glass beakers, serological pipettes, centrifuge tubes and laboratory filtration products. Hemlock and Emerging Growth Businesses, which include solar and semiconductor products and all other businesses that are not part of any other segments, accounted for 7.5% of total sales.

Bottom Line

Putting together a successful investment portfolio takes a combination of research, patience, and a little bit of risk. For Corning, if you bought shares a decade ago, you're likely feeling really good about your investment today.

According to our calculations, a $1000 investment made in August 2015 would be worth $3,643.65, or a gain of 264.37%, as of August 18, 2025, and this return excludes dividends but includes price increases.

Compare this to the S&P 500's rally of 208.38% and gold's return of 187.02% over the same time frame.

Analysts are forecasting more upside for GLW too.

Corning reported impressive second-quarter 2025 results, wherein adjusted earnings and revenues surpassed the respective Zacks Consensus Estimate. It is benefiting from solid traction in the optical connectivity segment, driven by surging demand for advanced generative AI-powered products in data centers. Its fiber optic business is a direct beneficiary of the government mandated bridging of the digital divide across the United States. Corning Gorilla Armor 2, which is the most scratch-resistant and optically advanced Gorilla Glass, is gaining solid market traction. The solution brings an enhanced visual experience with unparalleled durability in smartphones. However, growing interest in other technologies such as sapphire substrates could hinder growth prospects. The company is exposed to significant customer concentration risk.

The stock is up 21.16% over the past four weeks, and no earnings estimate has gone lower in the past two months, compared to 4 higher, for fiscal 2025. The consensus estimate has moved up as well.


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