Apple Becomes The World’s Most Valuable Company

It’s not shocking news anymore when you read headliners on a clash of techno’s two giants: Samsung and Apple. The latter filed a lawsuit against the Korean-based company of copying Apple’s iPhone and iPad features and even the design. Oh yes! So I guess the rectangular and rounded-edge phone design is now exclusively an Apple trademark (perhaps).

The court battle between the two doesn’t stop the latter to hit a new milestone. According to a recent report from Wall Street Journal Apple Inc. becomes the world’s most valuable company ever, surpassing the software giant Microsoft based on stock-market value on Monday. Apple’s share rose to 2.6% to reach $ 665.15 which gives the Cupertino a market cap of $623 billion beating Microsoft’s record of $613.3 billion record in December 1999.

With these numbers, Apple is leading with more than $200 billion to that of its nearest and long time U.S. stock market rival Exxon Mobil which is at $405.97 billion. These two have traded places a number of times as the world’s largest listed company according to CBSNews. Apple has first surpassed Exxon Mobil back in August but it didn’t finish ahead of Exxon last year due to Steve Job’s death- Apple founder and creative guru.

As to whether they can sustain longer on the same spot, NYU’s Mr. Sylla says, “Apple will sell a lot of products, but I suspect that their reign as the most valuable company in the world won’t last for more than another few years.”

Photo Credit: IBNLive

The reason behind this new success though is the strong demand of iPhones and iPads. According to TG Daily, “the iPhone alone generates more revenues for the company than Microsoft brings in overall”. Plus, with recent rumors of upcoming iPhone 5 and iPadmini , it helped the company’s share price to grow.  Consumers have put off purchasing new devices according to Wall Street Journal even if competitors have launched products to steal Apple’s greater market share. Devices like Samsung’s S3, Google’sNexus 7, Amazon’sKindle Fire 2 and even Microsoft’s Surface tablet are all putting pressure on Apple to ramp up their products rollout in the market.

“Technology is one sector you have to watch very carefully. But they have more than enough going for them at Apple that you don’t want to get off the train just yet,” says St. Denis Villere III, a partner at Villere & Co., which has about $1.7 billion in assets. “We still like it and think there’s a good probability that this will become the U.S.’s first trillion-dollar company.” It’s a challenge indeed for Apple to keep the same spot. It all depends then on how their new line of products will fair in the market.