Alphabet becomes fourth US company to hit $1 trillion valuation

[Cal Jeffrey]

What just happened? While stock analysts give very little weight to market cap valuations, companies like to tout the numbers as a measure of growth. Only a handful of companies have reached $1 trillion and Alphabet is the latest.

On Thursday, Google’s parent company Alphabet closed trading at $1,450.16 per share and breaking a $1 trillion market cap. The company will be reporting its fourth-quarter earnings next month, and Motley Fool analysts predict around 20-percent growth year-over-year with revenue of $46.9 billion.

Alphabet it the fourth US company to break the trillion-dollar barrier — $1.01 trillion as of this writing. Apple was the first in 2018, followed by Amazon. However, the online retail giant quickly dipped back under the mark (now at $924B). Microsoft hit the threshold last year and has maintained its cap along with Apple valued at $1.27T and $1.38T, respectively.

PetroChina was the first to reach the valuation in 2007, if only briefly. CNN Business notes, Saudi Aramco hit $2 trillion last December but has taken a deep dive down to $119 billion. Both companies have struggled to maintain valuation after their IPO due largely to a shaky and unstable oil market, showing that market caps are not necessarily a good gauge of a company's financial health.

Facebook is another company poised to break into the trillion-dollar club. Its current market cap sits at $632 billion, although it is hard to predict how long it will take to reach $1T.

While its growth has been steady, trading in Facebook stock has been volatile in the short term. Shares plummeted more than 40 percent in the last half of 2018 in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, and it is just now reaching its previous levels.

With only a small margin over the trillion-dollar cap, it’s hard to say whether Alphabet can hold on to its valuation. However, with Google making headway with its Stadia platform, including a partnership with BT to bundle the service with broadband packages, further growth seems all but guaranteed.

Image credit: Alphabet site under magnifying glass by dennizn

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https://www.techspot.com/news/83603-alphabet-becomes-fourth-us-company-hit-1-trillion.html

 

[Uncle Al]

The only thing that surprises me about the "Big T Club" is that they have had very few stock splits to bring the price per share down so more investors will take the plunge. Of course Berkshire-Hathaway doesn't either and their share price dwarfs the other four ..... LOL

 

[ypsylon]

In a way best thing in current economy model is inflation.

For corporations inflation is life. They can boast 'hey we are trillion $ company..." but only as long as speculation of Wall Street allows it. How criminal activity known as Cambridge Analytica vel Google vel Alphabet over-inflated valuation is legal.

Oh and trillion only applies to few countries relying on long scale. 99% of the World sees that as only 1 billion so nothing to shout about. Still plenty of 000s to that trillion. LOL

Magic word. Read my lips: Inflation.

 

[Evernessince]

In a way best thing in current economy model is inflation.

For corporations inflation is life. They can boast 'hey we are trillion $ company..." but only as long as speculation of Wall Street allows it. How criminal activity known as Cambridge Analytica vel Google vel Alphabet over-inflated valuation is legal.

Oh and trillion only applies to few countries relying on long scale. 99% of the World sees that as only 1 billion so nothing to shout about. Still plenty of 000s to that trillion. LOL

Magic word. Read my lips: Inflation.

The large corporate tax cuts allowed companies to make large stock buybacks, artificially inflating value. That money, for the vast majority of companies, was not invested into the economy and eventually that inflated value is going to come back down to earth. The inflated stock values + a looming recession + high federal debt are not a good combination.

 

[onestepforward]

Alphabet/Google made most of that trillion dollars by simply stealing the privacy of their users.

 

[kira setsu]

Alphabet/Google made most of that trillion dollars by simply stealing the privacy of their users.

they don't have to steal what their users are willingly giving away.

we all know what google takes but they're simple, easy and everywhere, we traded privacy for convenience and I dont see that trade stopping anytime soon.

 

[Markoni35]

What about players like Goldman Sachs? They have more money than all the tech companies combined. Except that dirty banksters don't pay taxes, so they list their value low. They don't wanna attract too much attention.

After all, Goldman Sachs and a few friends sold derivatives worth 30,000 billion (30 trillion) to German banks alone. Not counting other EU or Asian countries. Where are those trillions? Nobody knows. Especially not the IRS.

So, nope, Alphabet is not the 4th. Goldman Sachs and friends are way above any IT company.