Apple overtakes Saudi Aramco as most valuable company

Apple Inc is now the most valuable company in the world with a valuation of $1.84 trillion, while Saudi Aramco’s is $1.76 trillion as at the end of trading on Friday.

On Thursday, Apple announced a revenue of $59.7 billion for its fiscal third quarter, blasting expectations and showing growth across all product categories including the iPhone. The company also said it plans to initiate a 4-for-1 stock split next month to make the stock “more accessible to a broader base of investors.”

This made the share price up about 6% after hours, pushing the company’s stock price above $400 for the first time ever. It even reached $412 during Friday’s intraday trade.

This is the first time the Apple’s valuation has surpassed that of Saudi Arabia’s national oil company, which made its market debut in Riyadh in December 2019.

Bloomberg reports that the dethroning of Aramco comes after a tumultuous period for the Saudi company. Its initial public offering fell short of Crown Price Mohammed bin Salman’s expectations. The kingdom’s de facto ruler initially wanted a valuation of $2 trillion and to raise $100 billion. But after foreign investors balked at the pricing, the government settled on a smaller domestic offering and raised about $30 billion, still the largest IPO ever.

The plunge in crude oil prices during the pandemic did not also help the company. According to Bloomberg estimates, Aramco’s second-quarter revenue probably dropped to about $37 billion from $76 billion a year earlier

While oil companies suffered from the pandemic, tech companies benefitted from it as most people accelerated the shift to the use of digital services.