Apple reached a market capitalization of $1 trillion in August 2018, becoming the first publicly traded company to do so.
The milestone was calculated by multiplying Apple’s share price by its shares outstanding. Apple crossed the threshold on August 2, 2018, when its stock traded above the level needed to value the company at one trillion US dollars.
The achievement reflected the enormous scale of the iPhone business, along with growing revenue from services such as the App Store, Apple Music, and iCloud. Apple was founded in 1976 by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne, and went public in 1980.
Market capitalization is not the same as annual revenue, profit, or cash holdings. It changes whenever the share price changes, so Apple’s valuation moved above and below the milestone after reaching it. Apple later became the first company to pass several higher valuation thresholds.