As 2010 draws to a close, there has been – as one could expect – a change in the top five companies traded here in terms of their market capitalizations. Three of the top five from 2009 stayed in the top five for 2010 – Exxon Mobil continues to be first with a market cap of $369.92 billion (up from $327 billion a year ago). Amazing what high oil prices will do.
The new number two is Apple, riding the success of its iPad tablet, launched in the middle of this year. Apple’s market cap at the end of this year was $296 billion, up from $188 billion a year ago. That’s a whopping 57% gain.
The other carryover was Microsoft, which came in 3rd this year at $238.27 billion. It held the number 2 spot last year with a $278 billion market cap. That means this year it declined 14%. The new kids in the top five class?
Berkshire Hathaway came in at number 4 with a market cap of $196 billion, up from $152 billion a year ago when it ranked number 13. And General Electric bounced back to number 5 with a market cap of $193 billion, up from $164 billion the year before. GE had been hurt over the past two years by bad commercial real estate loans owned by its GE Capital unit.
Dropping out of the top 20 this year were Cisco Systems and Hewlett-Packard. Joining this year were Intel (at 19) and Merck (at 20).
Here’s the full list:
As of close on December 30, 2010
Company Market Cap ($in billions)
Exxon Mobil 369.92
Apple Inc. 296.90
Microsoft 238.27
Berkshire 196.69
General Electric 193.65
Wal-Mart Stores 192.60
Google Inc. 191.50
Chevron 184.34
Procter & Gamble 182.39
IBM 182.22
AT&T Inc. 173.34
Johnson & Johnson 170.10
JPMorgan Chase 165.08
Wells Fargo 161.77
Oracle Corp. 158.09
Coca-Cola 152.09
Pfizer Inc. 140.09
Bank of America 133.93
Intel Corp. 117.25
Merck & Co. 112.13
Source: The Online Investor (http://www.investhelp.com)
