On Wednesday, Apple overtook Microsoft as the most valuable company in the world, overtaking it once more as the manufacturer of the iPhone advanced in the competition to dominate artificial intelligence technology, according to Reuters.
Its market valuation increased to $3.25 trillion when its shares increased by more than 2% to $211.75. With a market valuation of $3.24 trillion,Microsoft surpassed Apple for the first time in the previous five months.
A day after the company introduced several AI-enabled features and software upgrades for its devices, Apple shares jumped to an all-time high in the previous session, a move that multiple analysts predicted would boost iPhone sales.
Executives, including CEO Tim Cook, highlighted how speech assistant Siri would be able to interact with messages, emails, calendars, and third-party apps during Apple's annual developer conference on Monday.
The IT giant's stock underperformed this year compared to peers because it has lagged behind competitors like Microsoft and Alphabet, the owner of Google, in the hottest sector of artificial intelligence.
Apple's stock has increased by roughly 10% so far in 2024, compared to gains of roughly 16% for Microsoft and over 28% for Alphabet. After Apple surprised investors with its quarterly results and outlook in May and revealed a record $110 billion buyback plan, some of the concerns about its poor share performance subsided.
Leader in AI chips Nvidia is up a staggering 144% this year and last week briefly passed Apple in market value. The market value of Nvidia was $3.06 trillion at the time. With a more than 30% decline, Tesla is the only other member of the "Magnificent Seven" that has performed worse than Apple this year.
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