Credit: Shutterstock photo(RTTNews.com) - Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) surpassed Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) as the world's most valuable public company based on market capitalization.
On Monday, Amazon's shares rose $54.12 or 3.4 percent to close at $1,629.51, giving the company a market capitalization of $796.78 billion. Shares of Microsoft edged higher by 0.1 percent to close at $102.06, for a market capitalization of $783.57 billion.
Microsoft had unseated Apple in early December 2018 to rank as the world's most valuable company.
However, all these tech giants now remain well below the $1 trillion milestone that Apple and Amazon hit in 2018 due to the late-2018 sell off on Wall Street.
Google parent Alphabet Inc. (GOOG, GOOGL) is now in the third position with a market capitalization of $745.22 billion, while Apple ( AAPL ) stood in fourth place with a market capitalization of $701.99 billion.
Apple's shares have fallen since October 2018 amid concerns about slowing smartphone demand and the possibility of additional U.S. tariffs on Chinese-made goods. In 2010, Apple overtook Microsoft as the most valuable technology firm.
Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 as an online bookstore, Amazon has expanded into various businesses such as cloud computing and artificial intelligence or AI, but its core business continues to be e-commerce.
In November 2018, Amazon selected New York City and Arlington, Virginia, as the locations for its new headquarters.
The tech giant also said it will invest $5 billion and create more than 50,000 jobs across the two new headquarters locations, with more than 25,000 employees each in New York City and Arlington. The new locations will join Seattle as the company's three headquarters in North America.
Read the original article on RTTNews (http://www.rttnews.com/2967941/amazon-surpasses-microsoft-as-world-s-most-valuable-company.aspx)
For comments and feedback: contact editorial@rttnews.com
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
