The title of Big Apple has been hijacked to California where Apple’s fortunes have seen the IT company grow in leaps and bounds. Apple’s shares late last week were hovering at a new record, just under US$500 a share making it more valuable than Google and Microsoft combined.
Apple shares closed at $ 493.42 on Friday, up 25c. They had started the week at $459.68. One year ago they were going for $356.
The tech giant’s stock is worth more than the market capitalisations of rivals Google ($196.8bn) and Microsoft ($256.1bn) combined.
Apple’s profits recently passed $1 billion a week and the company now sells a million iPhones a day.
Apple’s market capitalisation only overtook Microsoft’s in May 2010. Fortune magazine also pointed out the worthy statistics that Apple’s stock is worth more than the gross domestic product of Sweden – $458 billion.
Apple is worth more than all the gold in the American Federal Reserve – $350 billion, by Fortune’s reckoning – and all the illegal drugs in the world, $321 billion.
Several analysts were urging their client to buy Apple shares, suggesting the shares could go as high as $665. Needham and Co’s Charlie Wolf raised his price target to $620, after predicting iPad sales of 62 million units this year, and 94 million next year, largely driven by the Apple tablet’s appeal to business.
Mizuho Securities analyst Abhey Lamba, gives Apple a “buy” rating and a $635 price target, arguing that the company will remain tops in tablets despite the threat of Microsoft’s Windows 8 coming to the tablet market.
Canaccord Genuity’s Mike Walkley put his price target at $665.
