Apple valued at $3 trillion, first company to ever reach milestone
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SAN FRANCISCO — When markets closed Friday, Apple’s market capitalization was more than $3 trillion, making it the most valuable company — ever. It’s a massive milestone for the tech giant, which warned investors in May that its current-quarter revenue was expected to decline. But Friday’s stock price increasing by just over 2 percent to close at $193.97 per share suggests that investors are still confident in the company, a bright spot in an industry that has otherwise been rocked by layoffs and uncertainty over the past year.
Daniel Ives, a senior equity research analyst at Wedbush Securities, said in a note Friday that it was a “historic day for the tech sector with Cupertino leading the way.”
The Cupertino, Calif.-based company stands in sharp contrast to other major tech giants — such as Meta, Google and Amazon — that have shed costs and laid off tens of thousands of employees over the past year. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post. The Post’s interim chief executive, Patty Stonesifer, sits on Amazon’s board.) In May, Apple chief executive Tim Cook said the company was slowing down its pace of hiring, but layoffs were “a last resort.”
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Apple’s record valuation comes several weeks after it unveiled its $3,499 Vision Pro headset, a major bet on a device that has yet to be embraced by the wider public. Several other companies, including Meta and Snap, are also working on face computers.
“The Apple bears and skeptics continue to scratch their heads as many have called for Apple’s ‘broken growth story’ this year in a tougher backdrop to which we firmly believe the exact opposite has happened with Cupertino heading into a massive renaissance of growth over the next 12 to 18 months,” Ives said.
Apple set a similar record in January 2022 when it hit a $3 trillion market cap during intraday trading, but it did not close the trading day at that level.
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Source: The Washington Post
