Eight of the top 10 companies remained unchanged
Top 25 global tech companies by market cap in Q1 2019. Source: shutterstock.com
Eight of the top 10 companies remained unchanged in the GlobalData’s list of Top 25 publicly traded global technology companies by market capitalization (M Cap), with the exception of Facebook and Tencent swapping their places at fourth and fifth positions, during the first quarter (Q1) ended 31 March 2019.
Facebook’s M Cap increased by 26.3% quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) as its share price increased from US$131.09 in Q4 2018 to US$193.4 in Q1 2019.
The quarter witnessed M Cap growth for all the top 25 technology companies, except for Qualcomm and Sony.
The overall list witnessed a 16.7% increase in the aggregate M Cap as on 31 March 2019, which stood at US$6.2 trillion, as compared to US$5.3 trillion as on 31 December 2018 (Q4 2018).
Major gainers were NVIDIA, VMware and Intuit, which recorded more than 30% QoQ increase in M Cap. Facebook, Accenture, Samsung, Automatic Data Processing, ASML Holding, Cisco Systems and IBM reported more than 20% increase in M Cap.
NVIDIA’s share prices received a fillip reaching US$181 by the end of Q1 2019 from US$133.5 in Q4 2018 because of growth in its gaming business, with shipments of about 100 new GeForce Max-Q laptops, and introduction of NVIDIA RTX, a computer graphics technology, which has gained broad industry acceptance.
Intuit Inc, which replaced KDDI Corporation at 24th position, is the new entrant in the top 25 list. Its share price grew from US$196.85 to US$251.06, following surge in revenue and profits, fueled by growth in the online ecosystem and lower effective tax rate in Q1 2019.
Sony suffered a 12.8% decline in M Cap on the back of sluggish growth in profit owing to earnings risk in its PlayStation gaming business, which impacted investors’ confidence.
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