Two S&P 500 corporate behemoths created a lot of noise when they stormed past the $1-trillion market value border. But Wall Street bigwigs may likely ask for a third one, any time soon. This is a very interesting story to watch.
If their estimates are accurate, Amazon will be next in line and worth $1.1 trillion, just a few months from now. This is based on S&P Global Market Intelligence's projected 12-month stock price gauge. And it is an indication of courage.
When this breach happens, it would put Amazon at the leaderboard of the $1 trillion clubs that Apple Inc thinks will be valued in that span of time. Amazon will land behind the expected $1.2 trillion value of Microsoft.
It's a milestone in the making if the price targets were right. Amazon would be the first S&P 500 outside the information technology industry to penetrate the elite trillion-dollar grouping.
Amazon is part of the SPDR Fund (XLY) for the Consumer Discretionary Select Market, which at current market valuations, is worth around $857 billion.
It also means there is still plenty of money to be made: $262 billion to be precise. Measuring the size of the company's stock prices is not merely a source of pride.
Depending on how much they are actually worth in the business, their investments are weighted by the world's most influential mutual and hedge funds.
S&P Dow Jones Indices reported that Apple and Microsoft now control about 8 percent of the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust, which surpassed the 6.5-percent record maintained by International Business Machines in 1958.
At present, Amazon is the third most valuable company in the SPY trading, with a weighting of 2.94 percent. Analysts said Amazon's online retail businesses are valued at more than $450 billion on a collective basis.
Amazon's growth also shows how powerful the retailer within the S&P 500 has become. Just ten years ago, Exxon Mobil at $324 billion, Microsoft at $271 billion and Amazon's competitor Walmart at $203 million were the three most profitable S&P 500 shares.
If the price targets of analysts are right, in 12 months, Walmart will be worth $343 billion. That would be in the S&P 500's 10th position.
Apple soared to a new high of 236.21 last week. That puts the stock of information technology at the pole position of the market. Apple is worth $1.067 trillion, narrowly exceeding the price of $1.066 trillion for Microsoft.
Yet Apple stock has already raced the average price target of 227.17 for past analysts. If the expectations of investors don't hit their targets, in 12 months, Wall Street looks for Apple to be worth less than $1.03 trillion.
