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Apple’s market cap surpassed $3 trillion for the first time ever. The tech-heavy Nasdaq had its best first half in 40 years.
On the 30th of last month (local time), Apple closed at $193.97 on the New York Stock Exchange, up $4.38 (2.31%) from the previous day, continuing the march for four consecutive days. As a result, Apple’s market capitalization totaled $ 3.51 trillion (about 4024 trillion won), surpassing 3 trillion dollars (about 4000 trillion won) for the first time ever. This is a level that exceeds France (approximately 2.93 trillion dollars, as of 2021), which ranks 7th in the world in terms of gross domestic product (GDP).
Apple has surpassed $3 trillion intraday on January 3 last year, but this is the first time it has exceeded $3 trillion based on closing price. Accordingly, Apple surpassed $1 trillion in market capitalization in August 2018, followed by $2 trillion in August 2020, and then exceeded $3 trillion in 2 years and 10 months.
Apple’s strength on this day was largely due to the slowdown in the US price index. According to the US Bureau of Economic Analysis, the core personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index, a major indicator of interest for the Federal Reserve, rose 4.6% in May from the same month last year, below expectations and 4.7% the previous month. The PCE price index also rose 3.8% compared to the same month last year, showing the lowest level in over two years since April 2021.
As the inflation rate that the Fed is watching has slowed, the possibility of future interest rate hikes has weakened, and technology stocks, which are greatly affected by interest rate hikes, have generally been on the rise. Nvidia, the representative stock of artificial intelligence (AI) semiconductors, rose nearly 4%, and other major technology stocks such as Meta, Tesla, and Microsoft also rose significantly.
Art Hogan, chief market strategist at asset manager B. Reilly Wells, said of Apple’s strength, “It’s proof that it’s one of the great publicly traded companies that has ever existed,” adding, “Apple continues to grow, diversify its revenue structure, and shareholder-friendly “We have a management team that sells our stock and pays dividends. We also have strong, defensible cash flow along with a strong financial structure.”
Apple ended the first half of the year with a 49% increase so far this year.
Nasdaq, best first half in 40 years
On the other hand, the New York Stock Exchange also rose sharply on that day. Nike fell on sluggish earnings, but strong tech stocks offset this. The Dow and Standard & Poor’s (S&P) 500 rose 0.84% and 1.23%, respectively, and the Nasdaq ended the first half with a 1.45% rise.
As a result, the Dow and S&P 500 rose 3.8% and 15.9% in the first half, respectively, and the Nasdaq soared 31.7%, sending the best first half in 40 years since 1983.
The biggest contributors to this are, by far, technology stocks. Last year, they were hit the hardest by the Fed’s wide interest rate hike, but this year, they benefited the most from the AI-driven craze caused by ‘ChatGPT’ along with the prospect of ending the tightening cycle. .
Among them, a small number of big tech companies, such as Apple, Nvidia, Tesla, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet, which are referred to as the ‘7 princesses’, rose en masse, leading the stock market to rise.
Concerns are constantly being raised that the rise of the stock market has been concentrated on a small number of big tech companies, but it is clear that these companies played a large part in the stock market’s performance despite concerns about a global economic slowdown and tightening.
The chief investment officer (CIO) in charge of stocks at BlackRock, a global asset management company, recently expressed an optimistic outlook for related technology stocks, saying that interest in AI is greater than interest in other new technologies.
In terms of interest, he said, “You can compare the current situation with AI to the metaverse and virtual reality a year or two ago.” .
Reporter Information Jang Seong-won sotg813@ajunews.com
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