Google dethrones Apple as world’s most valuable company

The parent company of search giant Google, riding a six-month surge in its stock price, on Monday leapfrogged over Apple to become the most valuable company on Earth.

Apple had held the title since 2013.

Google parent Alphabet popped more than 5 percent in after-hours trading on Monday, putting its market capitalization at roughly $565 billion.

That put the value of the Mountain View, Calif., company about $26 billion over that of Apple, which closed Monday with a market cap of about $539 billion.

In the last six months, Alphabet has gained 21 percent while Apple has declined 20 percent.

Apple’s fall from the top marks the end of an era for the Cupertino, Calif., company, which first overtook ExxonMobil as the most valuable corporation in August 2011.

Apple and the oil giant tangoed back and forth between the No. 1 and No. 2 spots for a couple of years before Apple took it in 2013 and held it until now.

Monday also marks a turnabout in Apple’s duel with Google, which had been the more valuable tech giant as recently as February 2010, before the iPhone began its legendary growth tear.

At the time, Steve Jobs was still Apple’s CEO, the latest iPhone model was the 3GS, and the iPad hadn’t yet been unveiled. Apple’s Mac computer line was still the company’s biggest business.

Meanwhile, Google was still under the “parental guidance” of then-Chief Executive Eric Schmidt, who a year later would hand back the title to co-founder Larry Page.

Since then, Page has engineered stunning growth in Google’s core business, even as he has lavished funds on a range of “moonshot” projects to tackle everything from human aging to space exploration.
On Monday, Alphabet shares, which had surged more than 45 percent since last July, rose after the Silicon Valley behemoth disclosed surprisingly strong revenue at its Google division.

By contrast, Apple shares have sunk 16 percent since last summer, and tanked even more last week after the tech giant co-founded by Steve Jobs reported only slight growth in iPhone sales, stoking worries about the company’s ability to maintain its historic momentum.

At Alphabet, sales from Google’s search engine, YouTube, and the Android mobile operating system rose 18 percent, to $21.33 billion, in the quarter ended in Dec. 31 — ahead of Wall Street’s estimate of $20.8 billion, according to Thomson Reuters.

Alphabet’s fourth-quarter profit surged to $4.92 billion, or $7.06 a share, up from $4.68 billion, or $6.79 a share, a year earlier.

Alphabet’s “Other Bets” segment — which houses a slew of risky, ambitious startups that make robots, drones and artificial intelligence — had revenue of $448 million last year, up 37 percent from 2014.

The Other Bets segment, however, also expanded its losses to $3.57 billion last year, compared with a loss of $1.94 billion in 2014.