2. Earlier as per the policies of govt and income tax related laws long term investment period was considered to be 3 years but with changing dynamism of stock market and prevalent uncertainity in global mkt, this time has been reduced to a period of 1 year.
3. Real stk mkt gurus like Warren Buffet have made money from long term investment by holding the stocks for a period ranging between 10 -12 years and in some cases stock has been held for atleast 25 years also.
4. Thus as a thumb rule one can say that one should be able to hold a stock for minimum 5 years to fall in the bracket of long term investor.