The 100 largest public companies in the world have been revealed, with Apple topping the list, according to data from Companiesmarketcap.
An uncomfortable macroeconomic headwind has shaped this year.
Market capitalizations of publicly traded companies lost trillions of dollars, investor confidence declined, and cost pressures hurt consumer expenditure.
Together, several of the biggest companies around the world saw their market shares drop precipitously.
Still, a few companies in vital sectors had favourable growth throughout the course of the year.
The infographic below, which draws its information from Companiesmarketcap.com and depicts the largest corporations in the world as 2022 draws to a close.
The World’s Largest Public Companies in 2022
Apple is currently the most valuable company in the world, with a $2.3 trillion valuation.
Apple kept the top place despite the 2022 tech slump brought by by higher borrowing rates and decreased sales. This was partly due to record earnings and strong iPhone demand from customers, which accounts for nearly half of the company’s overall revenue.
Apple is followed by Microsoft. In contrast to Apple, Microsoft has had slower year-over-year revenue growth as a result of a decline in personal computer demand and the negative effects of a strong currency. Globally, about 50% of the company’s sales are made outside of the country.
With a market value of $1.8 trillion, the oil behemoth Saudi Aramco ranks third among all publicly traded companies. The only non-American corporation in the top 10 is also this one.
The state-run business momentarily overtook Apple as the most valuable firm in the world in May as rising energy prices increased profits. The largest oil exporter in the world, Saudi Arabia is expected to see one of the fastest worldwide economic growth rates in 2022 (7.6%).
Overall, 62 of the top 100 companies have their headquarters in the United States, 11 are based in China, and five are in France.
Top 10 Performance in 2022
2022 was a terrible year for performance for many of the biggest companies around the world.
The vast majority of the world’s titans witnessed a fall in their market valuations, as the image above shows. Double-digit declines were experienced by half of these companies.
This year, Tesla has seen almost 70% of its market cap disappear. Falling demand, particularly in China, and CEO Elon Musk’s hazardous and erratic acquisition of Twitter are the two main causes of this decline.
However, among the top 10, UnitedHealth Group has had the best result.
The company, which derives a significant portion of its profits from employer-sponsored insurance policies, claimed that recessionary effects would not start to manifest themselves until 2022.
Biggest Companies in the World, by Sector
Tech is still dominant in 2022, despite declining market prices across the board.
Twenty of the largest companies in the world—with a combined market value of $9.2 trillion—are in the technology sector. That is around 31% of the market value of the 100 largest firms, for context.
Next in line are the consumer discretionary and healthcare sectors, which include well-known companies like Amazon and Johnson & Johnson.
Utilities are at the other end of the scale, being the overall smallest sector, at least in terms of the list of the largest corporations. One of the biggest developers of wind and solar energy in the world is NextEra Energy, the only utility business listed in the rankings. It intends to spend up to $95 billion over the following three years on greening its power operations.
Change of Fortune
It is not surprising that many of the largest corporations in the world are seasoned participants in global markets.
But among the ranks, UnitedHealth Group, which jumped from #19 in 2021 to #8 this year, and NVIDIA, which increased from #24 last year to become the 11th largest company globally, are two notable movers from 2021.
Alibaba and Meta, the parent company of Facebook, are among the biggest losers. In terms of overall rankings, Meta has dropped from #6 in 2021 to #26 in 2022. Alibaba, which was previously the ninth-largest company in the world, is now ranked #36. Due to weak results, the market caps of both companies have lost a significant amount of value—roughly 66% and 28%, respectively.
The end of the year will reveal if the top companies in the world make a recovery in 2023 or experience more difficult times.
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