Apple retakes most valuable company title as Nvidia slips
Apple’s market value rose above Nvidia’s as investors weighed AI spending, iPhone data and pressure in the chip sector.
By Sofia Marchetti · World Affairs Correspondent
3 min read
Apple has moved back ahead of Nvidia as the world’s most valuable company, Al Jazeera and Reuters reported, reclaiming a ranking it had not held for more than a year. The shift matters because it shows investors reassessing which companies may turn artificial intelligence into revenue, beyond the chipmakers that powered the recent AI rally.
Apple was valued at $4.88 trillion, compared with Nvidia’s $4.86 trillion, after Nvidia’s market value fell 3.5 percent, according to Al Jazeera and Reuters. Nvidia had previously held the top spot after its valuation moved past $5 trillion in October.
The change came as Apple prepared to report third-quarter earnings on July 30, Al Jazeera and Reuters reported. In the prior quarter, Apple executives projected sales growth of 14 percent to 17 percent.
Apple’s rise also followed the company’s unveiling last month of an upgraded Siri AI assistant, according to Al Jazeera and Reuters. The new version is designed to understand more of the personal context behind user requests, pull current information from the web and carry out more complicated tasks for users.
Michael Monaghan, founder of Founder ETFs, told Al Jazeera that investor attention has moved from AI model developers to semiconductor companies and now toward businesses that can convert computing power into products and services customers will pay for. He said investors had once questioned Apple’s lower AI spending, but some now see its smaller capital demands as a strength if the company can benefit from consumer AI without building cloud infrastructure at the scale of other firms.
Al Jazeera and Reuters reported that Apple has trailed some rivals in AI and publicly introduced the enhanced Siri only last week. Analysts cited in the report said the personal data stored on iPhones could become a major advantage for Apple’s AI plans.
Monaghan told Al Jazeera that Apple’s approach fits the product philosophy associated with co-founder Steve Jobs: begin with the customer experience, then build the technology needed to support it.
The leadership transition at Apple is also approaching, according to Al Jazeera and Reuters. Chief Executive Tim Cook is set to hand over control of the company to John Ternus in September. Ternus has been Apple’s head of hardware engineering since 2021.
Nvidia’s decline came as competition increased in the semiconductor industry, Al Jazeera and Reuters reported. Micron crossed a $1 trillion market value in May, and South Korea’s SK Hynix joined the Nasdaq in the same month, according to the report.
Benjamin Hall, vice president of alpha research at Segal Marco Advisors, told Reuters that the arrival of more companies could draw investor attention away from the so-called Magnificent Seven and toward a broader group of stocks.
The wider market was lower despite Apple’s gain, according to Al Jazeera and Reuters. In midday trading, the Nasdaq was down 1.6 percent, the S&P 500 had fallen 0.9 percent and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was off 0.25 percent from Friday’s open.
This story draws on original reporting from Al Jazeera.