Apple continues to be the largest listed company in terms of the highest market capitalization. On January 3, 2022, during intraday trading, Apple briefly became the first $3 trillion business in the world. According to a report ‘Global Top 100 companies – by market capitalization by PwC, Apple retained the top spot with a market cap of $2850 billion (March 2022) as against $2051 billion ($2.05 trillion) in March 2021. While the most valued company status remains with Apple, for some time, it was overtaken by another mega-cap company.
Over the past 10 years, Apple has continuously held the position of the world’s most valuable public company, however, in May 2022 Saudi Aramco marginally overtook Apple with a market capitalization in excess of $2.4tn. The same happened in 2020 when soon after the IPO of the Saudi oil major, its market capitalization was higher than both Apple and Microsoft.
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Technology companies have dominated the top five, with four companies being from this sector in the past 10 years. The constituents of the top five remain unchanged from the 2021 Global Top 100. Technology companies have dominated the top five, with four companies being from this sector in the past 10 years.
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As of 31 March 2022, the market capitalization of both Apple and Microsoft was higher than Saudi Aramco. Since then, the valuations have fallen for the tech giants. The market cap of Apple, Microsoft, and Saudi Aramco as of September 28, 2022, stands at around – $2.42 trillion, $1.77 trillion, and $1.99 trillion respectively. Interestingly, the gap between the largest and the smallest companies on the list has continued to widen over the past 10 years, even more so in the past three years where the market capitalization for the number one ranked company has increased by 78% from $1,602bn to $2,850bn.
