(Bloomberg) — Apple Inc. reclaimed the title of world’s most valuable company on Friday, taking the mantle from Nvidia Corp. as investors seek the perceived safety of the iPhone maker amid concerns about artificial intelligence spending.
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Shares of Apple fell 1.2% on Friday, resulting in a market capitalization of $5.03 trillion, while Nvidia sank 4.2% to close with a valuation of $4.93 trillion. This is the first time Apple has overtaken Nvidia since briefly doing so in late July.
Friday’s selloff came as a number of major technology companies disappointed with their results, including Intel Corp. and Amazon.com Inc., which followed similarly disappointing reports from Alphabet Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc., among others. The reports renewed concerns about the outlook for AI spending, something Apple has largely foregone.
Fears that heavy spending on AI computing infrastructure won’t pay off have helped make Apple, which has kept a lid on capital expenditures, by far the best performing of the Magnificent Seven tech giants this year. Its shares are up 27% in 2026, more than twice the gain of second place Nvidia, which is a key beneficiary of AI spending.
The outlays have gotten so large that companies like Alphabet Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. have seen their free cash flow turn negative, forcing them to increasingly turn to debt markets for funding. Meanwhile, rising interest rates are raising the cost of borrowing.
Apple, by contrast, is projected to see its free cash flow climb 38% to $142 billion in fiscal 2026, which ended on Sept. 30.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 Index fell 6.7% in October, its worst month since March 2025. CoreWeave Inc. and Nebius Group, data center owners that offer AI computing services, have dropped more than 30% this month. With Friday’s collapse, Intel lost more than 45% in October, its biggest ever one-month drop in data compiled by Bloomberg going back more than 40 years.
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