World’s biggest companies from 1980 to 2000 and today…who are the winners and losers?

Apple recently made history as the world’s first $3 trillion company, making it the biggest company in the world by market cap, thanks to expansion into new markets and signs of improving inflation.

With this in mind, City Index has revealed the biggest companies in 1980, 2000 and today by market cap, to establish how the stock markets have changed in the last 40 years. Traders can take a position on the biggest stocks and global indices using spread bets or CFDs with City Index.

Highlights from the research:

• Apple is the world’s biggest company in 2023 – worth $3.03 trillion, followed by Microsoft ($2.51 trillion)
• Microsoft was the world’s biggest company in 2000, worth $586 billion (equating to $1.03 trillion in 2023)
• IBM was the biggest company in 1980, with a market cap of $34.6 billion (equating to $128.12 billion in 2023)
• The Oil and Gas sector dominated the market throughout the 1980s, however from 2000 onwards, the Technology industry produced the most valuable companies.

The top 10 biggest companies of today:

In an era rife with smartphones and AI, it’s no shock that technology dominates the stock market in 2023, with seven technology companies including Apple, Amazon and Tesla occupying the top 10.

City Index can reveal that Apple is the most valuable company in history, having a market cap of $3.03 trillion. Apple was founded in 1976 and went public in 1980. Only in 2011 did it become the world’s most valuable company for the first time, with a value of $350 billion. It replaced ExxonMobil at the top. It was the biggest company in the world for most of the 2010s, and in 2018 became the first US company to surpass $1 trillion in value. It then surpassed $2 trillion two years later.

Microsoft is the second-biggest company in 2023, with a market cap of $2.51 trillion, thanks to its market-leading Microsoft Azure cloud computing services and its stake in OpenAI. However, the products that saw it dominate in 2000 – including Windows and Office – are still a big part of its revenues. Microsoft was also the world’s most valuable company in 2000, adjusted for inflation, it is worth over 3 times that today ($2.51 trillion).

The biggest companies in 2000:

Much like today, Technology companies had prominence on the stock market in 2000. Companies like Microsoft, Cisco and Intel occupied half of the top 10, compared to only one (IBM) 20 years earlier. Only two Oil & Gas companies were in the top 10 in 2000, ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell.

In 2000, Microsoft was top of the stock market, worth $586 billion ($1.03 trillion today) however, it was badly affected by the dot-com crash. By March 2001, its value had dropped to $258 billion, less than half of its peak. This was partly due to the ruling of the United States vs. Microsoft case, in which MSFT was found guilty of monopolisation.1

However, in 2003, it became the biggest company in the world again, and the biggest tech company in the world up until Apple’s rise in the early 2010s.

The biggest companies in 1980:

The top companies 40 years ago look vastly different from those of 2000 and today, despite being full of recognisable names. In 1980, Technology companies hadn’t yet dominated the stock market, instead, the Oil and Gas sector was a key force, with six Oil and Gas companies occupying the top 10.

Despite this, IBM was the world’s biggest company in 1980, with a market cap of $34.6 billion ($128.12 billion today). However, IBM was facing serious competition in the personal and business computing sector at the time. New entrants to the market challenged its crown, and by 1981 it was no longer at the top of the stock markets.

By the mid-1980s, ‘Big Blue’ was dominant once more. It has underperformed the wider market, though, with a value of $130 billion today roughly matching its cap in 1980 when adjusted for inflation.