Exxon replaces Apple as world's most valuable company

Oil giant ExxonMobi's sharesl rose 0.36% to US$91.68 giving it a market cap of $418bn to edge back into first place.

Apple first overtook ExxonMobil in August 2011 as the most valuable company in the world based on the value of its stock.

A year later, Apple dethroned longtime rival Microsoft as the most valuable company in history based on the value of its stock at US$622bn.

But the company took a bruising last week after a gloomy forecast accompanied its record quarterly profit announcement prompted pessimism over the technology giant's slowing growth trajectory.

Apple's profit was US$13.1bn on revenue of US$54.5bn for the quarter that ended in December. However, sales of iPhones and iPads set quarterly records.

Despite those figures, investors soured on Apple after it forecast that revenue for the current quarter would range between US$41bn and US$43bn, while gross margins would be between 37.5% to 39.5%, lower than analysts' expectations.

Analysts remained cautious about Apple, which had seen a meteoric rise last September to over US$700 a share but slid 37% since then.

Analysts expressed concern that Apple has lost its edge in innovation since the death of co-founder Steve Jobs and is losing ground to rivals such as Samsung, which leads the mobile phone market in other parts of the world and and to smartphones and tablets based on Google's Android operating system.

Jinho Cho at Mirae Asset Securities said Apple will likely increase carrier subsidies in 2013 and launch an "entry-level" iPhone to compete in emerging markets.

"These moves by Apple should lead to stiffer competition for carrier subsidies among smartphone manufacturers, thus driving down operating margins on handset industry-wide," the analyst said.

Getting into smartphone price wars would break from Apple's long tradition of premium products aimed at the high-end of the market and bite into profits made from each device sold.

"While we are incrementally more positive on the stock, we believe that competition is increasing for the company," Colin Gillis at BGC Financial said in a research note.

"We see competitors are using price as a lever to get traction in the market. Apple may also run into difficulty posting both the volumes and maintaining its prices over the next several quarters," Gillis added.

Since the death of Jobs, Apple has fallen short of high expectations with its smartphone mapping software so flawed that the company was forced to apologise for releasing it.

In a separate development Apple released the results of its audit of working conditions at facilities in China.

"We're fixing problems and tackling issues that our entire industry faces, such as excessive working hours and under-age labour," the report said.

"We're going deeper into the supply chain than any other company we know of and we're reporting at a level of detail that is unparalleled in our industry," it claimed.

Apple tracks work hours for more than a million workers across its supply chain and publishes results monthly on its website.

The company reported a 92% compliance rate in keeping working weeks to 60 hours or less. The average number of hours worked per employee in a week is now less than 50.

Eight facilities were found to have bonded labour. Suppliers had to pay back US$6.4m in foreign contract worker fees and implement procedures to make sure the practice was stopped.

Eleven facilities were found to be employing under-age workers.

"One supplier used dozens of under-age workers with forged documents, prompting Apple to cut its business relationship with the supplier and make the company send the children back to school and finance their education," the report said.

Source: AFP via I-Net Bridge