Google smashes the $1,000 barrier
As tech giant’s shares soar 1,900pc in 13 years
ShareS in the owner of Google smashed through $1,000 last night a week after amazon reached the same milestone.
On another dramatic day for investors in america’s technology giants, alphabet rose as high as $1,007.40 on the stock market in New York.
Google shares have jumped more than 1,900pc since they started trading at around $50 each in 2004 (pictured), with the company now worth £535bn.
The stock has risen nearly 40pc in the last 12 months.
although amazon shares reached $1,000 first, there are fewer in circulation, meaning it is worth £378bn, some £157bn less than alphabet.
The rise in the Google share price came as tech firms were forced to defend their handling of extremist content following the latest terror attack in London.
Theresa May called for areas of the internet to be closed because they provide a ‘safe space’ for terrorist ideology – piling pressure on YouTube owner Google, Whatsapp owner Facebook and Twitter to tackle extremist content.
But there is little sign of investor confidence in the tech giants waning with the so-called Faang stocks – Facebook, apple, amazon, Netflix and Google – among the favourites.
Technology stocks like alphabet, amazon, Microsoft and Facebook have soared this year, leaving other sectors in their wake.
But the boom has fuelled fears in some quarters that a bust could be on the way.
american tech firms dominate the list of the most valuable stock market-listed companies in the world, with apple at number one followed by alphabet, Microsoft and amazon. apple is currently worth around £630bn.
apple revealed a number of new tech initiatives at its annual developers conference yesterday.
The tech giant confirmed it had partnered with amazon to bring amazon Prime Video app to apple TV, teased one of its most expensive iMacs worth £3,900 - due to be released in December - and revealed it was updating its popular apply Pay cash transfer service so that users can send cash to friends with their fingerprints. It also revealed it would be upgrading the apple Watch so it can sync to treadmills and share workout data.
The extraordinary success of the US tech industry has made their founders billions.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates, 61, is said by Bloomberg to be worth £69bn while amazon’s Jeff Bezos, 53, has amassed a £66bn fortune and Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg, 33, is worth £50bn. Google entrepreneurs Larry Page, 44, and Sergey Brin, 43, are worth around £37bn each.
analysts at Goldman Sachs said the technology sector was their top pick at the moment.
a separate report by andy hargreaves, an analyst at Pacific Crest, said investors should sell apple shares and buy Google with the proceeds.
he said alphabet shares offered ‘an excellent risk-reward profile and more substantial upside potential’ than apple. Google’s advertising revenues jumped 19pc in the first quarter of the year to £16.6bn as companies ramped up marketing online.
alphabet has also invested heavily in areas such as cloudcomputing, artificial intelligence, voice-computing and even driverless cars as it looks for new sources of revenue.
analysts at Morgan Stanley estimate that Waymo, alphabet’s self- driving car unit, could be worth more than £50bn by 2030.
The value of Google owner alphabet is already higher than the gross domestic product of Switzerland, the 19th largest economy in the world.
apple is worth more than the GDP of the Netherlands, the world’s 18th biggest economy.
Microsoft founder Gates is worth around the same amount as the entire national output of Slovakia and more than Sri Lanka, Kenya or Luxembourg.