Apple joined an exclusive club when its market capitalisation hit the US$4 trillion (A$6.1 trillion) mark on Tuesday (Wednesday AEDT).
The technology giant became the third company to reach this valuation when its share price passed $269.70, joining NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA), which passed the mark on 9 July, and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), which reached that level on 31 July.
The share price of Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), whose products include the iPhone, Mac, iPad, Apple Watch and AirPods, closed up 19 cents (0.071%) at $269.00, capitalising it at $3.99 trillion (A$6.06 trillion), after peaking at $269.89.
The price has risen 13% since the 9 September launch of the iPhone 17, whose sales have helped to address worries that the company was falling behind in the artificial intelligence (AI) race and concerns about United States tariffs.
"The iPhone accounts for over half of Apple's profit and revenue and the more phones they can get into the hands of people, the more they can drive people into their ecosystem," Northlight Asset Management Chief Investment Officer Chris Zaccarelli was quoted as saying in a Reuters story.
While it took Apple 38 years from its 1980 initial public offering to be valued at $1 trillion on 2 August 2018, the company reached the $2 billion mark two years later on 19 August 2020, $3 trillion after 17 months on 3 January 2022 and $4 trillion after 45 months.
The company, which is due to report its fourth-quarter earnings on Thursday, is valued at more than the gross domestic product of all countries except the United States, China, Japan and Germany.
Microsoft moved back above the $4 trillion mark after its shares were boosted by a deal allowing ChatGPT maker OpenAI to restructure itself into a public benefit corporation, while Nvidia remains the world’s largest company with a market value of more than $4.8 trillion.
