Apple on Tuesday became the second company in history to be valued at US$5 trillion, joining Nvidia as the iPhone maker’s shares have surged in recent weeks and becoming the world’s largest firm by market capitalisation.
The iPhone maker recently regained its ranking as the world’s most valuable company.
Shares of Apple rose as much as 1.8 per cent to US$342.89 shortly after trading opened, pushing the company’s market capitalisation just above US$5 trillion for the first time, before paring back gains to be largely unchanged.
Apple ranks ahead of Nvidia (US$4.7 trillion) as the world’s largest company by market value after surpassing the AI giant on Monday, and ahead of Alphabet (US$3.9 trillion) and Microsoft (US$2.9 trillion).
Nvidia and Apple have climbed at varying rates so far this year: Apple’s stock has jumped nearly 25 per cent, while shares of Nvidia—down 1.4 per cent on Tuesday—have risen just 2.6 per cent.
Surprising fact
The pace at which companies have grown has accelerated in recent years: Apple became the first US$1 trillion company in 2018, the first US$2 trillion company in 2020 and the first US$3 trillion firm in 2022. Nvidia then became the first to reach both US$4 trillion and US$5 trillion, as booming demand for AI products quickly swelled the valuation of many tech firms.
Tangent
Apple on Tuesday announced US customers would soon be able to lease an iPhone for up to two years starting at US$17.99 per month. The program, named Upgrade, is in partnership with the buy-now, pay-later firm Klarna and will be offered at Apple’s physical and online stores. That comes after the firm raised starting iPad and Mac prices by at least US$100, including some models with price tags bumped by more than US$1,000, citing a global memory crunch.
Key background
Apple long held the title as the world’s most valuable company before being unseated by Nvidia in 2024, and later falling behind Microsoft. The iPhone maker held the top spot for market capitalisation for most of the previous decade after first surpassing Exxon in 2011, and then the firm periodically traded spots with Microsoft. Apple, like its mega-cap competitors, has accelerated its spending on AI products over the last year, though its spending projections are just a fraction of others. Apple’s capital expenditures totalled US$12.7 billion in fiscal 2025, whereas Alphabet plans to spend US$205 billion this year, and Microsoft and Amazon bumped their annual spending plans to as much as US$190 billion and US$145 billion, respectively.
This story was originally published on forbes.com
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