According to the “Mega Caps” predefined screener, Bill Gates (Trades, Portfolio)’ Microsoft Corp. MSFT leapfrogged Jeff Bezos’ Amazon.com Inc. AMZN as the second-largest U.S. company in terms of market cap on Friday.
With a market cap of $1.0347 trillion, Apple Inc. AAPL remains the largest U.S. company. Microsoft comes in second with a market cap of $780.354 billion.
Microsoft rises to number two as Amazon falls on weak fourth-quarter earnings guidance
Online retail behemoth Amazon’s market cap tumbled to $757.108 billion, down approximately $23,246.05 million from Microsoft’s market cap following the release of fourth-quarter earnings guidance that disappointed investors.
The Seattle-based company expects net revenues of $66.5 billion to $72.5 billion for the fourth quarter, which reflects an unfavorable impact of approximately 80 basis points from foreign exchange rates. Although the revenue guidance represents a 10% to 20% increase compared to revenues from the prior-year quarter, the guidance fell short of the consensus estimate of $73.79 billion according to CNBC columnist Eugene Kim, who further said the guidance might show “a slight deceleration of growth” in the company’s business ahead of the all-important holiday season.
Dow ends volatile week with 300-point nosedive
The Dow Jones industrial average traded approximately 300 points lower, finishing the week with the fourth three-digit loss over the past five days. Table 1 illustrates the index price trend since Oct. 19.
| Date | Dow Close | Dow Change |
| 10/19/2018 | 25444.34 | Â |
| 10/22/2018 | 25317.41 | -126.93 |
| 10/23/2018 | 25191.43 | -125.98 |
| 10/24/2018 | 24583.42 | -608.01 |
| 10/25/2018 | 24984.55 | 401.13 |
| 10/26/2018 | 24688.31 | -296.24 |
Table 1
The top five companies in terms of market cap all closed lower for the day. As Table 2 illustrates, Amazon led losses with a 7.82% nosedive, followed by Google parent Alphabet Inc. GOOGL, which tumbled 2.06%. Warren Buffett (Trades, Portfolio)’s conglomerate, Berkshire Hathaway Inc. BRK.ABRK.B, declined 1.97% while his top holding, Apple, declined 1.59%.
| Symbol | Company Name | Current Price | Change (%) |
| MSFT | Microsoft Corp. | 106.96 | -1.34 (-1.24%) |
| AAPL | Apple Inc. | 216.3 | -3.50 (-1.59%) |
| BRK.B | Berkshire Hathaway Inc. | 198 | -3.98 (-1.97%) |
| GOOGL | Alphabet Inc. | 1,080.88 | -22.71 (-2.06%) |
| AMZN | Amazon.com Inc. | 1,642.81 | -139.36 (-7.82%) |
Table 2
Disclosure: No positions.
Read more here:
