Saudi Aramco became the first non-American company to surpass a $2 trillion market capitalization.
Saudi Aramco reached the milestone in December 2019, shortly after its shares began trading on the Saudi Exchange in the company’s initial public offering. The listing made Aramco one of the world’s most valuable publicly traded companies and highlighted the financial importance of Saudi Arabia’s petroleum industry.
The company is officially Saudi Arabian Oil Company and is majority-owned by the Saudi government. It developed from the former Arabian American Oil Company, whose assets were progressively taken over by Saudi Arabia. Aramco’s valuation has been especially sensitive to oil prices, production expectations, dividends, and geopolitical developments. Its market capitalization is not the same as the value of all Saudi oil reserves; it represents the equity value assigned by investors to the publicly traded company.