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Microsoft's Market Value Hits a Dot-Com Era Milestone: $600 Billion (wsj.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft's value is returning to tech-bubble peaks. The software giant closed with a market value of $600 billion Thursday for the first time since January 2000, according to the Journal's Market Data Group. Shares rose 0.4 percent to $77.91, setting a fresh all-time high. For the year, Microsoft shares are up 25% and on track for their best year since 2013, as the firm continues its rebirth as a force in cloud-computing. The firm is the third-largest S&P 500 company in market value, trailing Apple (about $800 billion) and Google's parent company, Alphabet, (about $690 billion). In July, fellow technology and internet stalwarts Facebook and Amazon.com joined the trio as the only U.S.-listed companies valued at more than in the $500 billion. The last time Microsoft was over $600 billion back in 2000, it didn't stay there for long. The tech bubble would peak in March of that year, and the Nasdaq Composite Index wouldn't climb back to the level it reach that year until 2015.
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You're messin' with my Zen Thing, man.....
Finally, after all these years, Microsoft is on its way to being a $1T company.
Adjusted for inflation MS would have to reach a value of 877 billion to match the 2000 value of 600 billion.
Desktop OS market - on life support.
Laptop OS market - moribund at best
Server OS market - MS's one bright spot is a bubble fighting a better free alternative
Tablet OS market - does MS even have an offering?
Phone OS market - Yep, that went well for MS Office Suite - on life support as on line and free alternatives eat their lunch - anybody write documents?
Outlook - Please somebody put this out of its (and my) misery
$600B?? Time to short and profit!
What is the market value of those companies that exist to fix Microsoft's mistakes and poor security choices?
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
Okay Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Google. But I still shake my head and wonder how the hell did Facebook become a $500 billion entity. Really?
Although I am a committed Linux user I think it is important to have choices in cloud providers. Amazon appeared to be on the way to dominating that space the way Microsoft dominated the desktop. Good to see Microsoft transform itself for current technology trends.
How valuable Facebook really is ,is proven from the fact that Facebook ads can influence an election and give us Trump as President. None of the other 4 (with maybe the exception of Google) have that kind of impact on the real world. An instrument of mind control which users sign up for themselves and is powered by user generated content which is also profitable . If the soviets had managed to come up with something like Facebook , the west would have lost the cold war.
**Life is too short to be serious**
I came here to listen to the trolls explain how this valuation spells the death of Microsoft, and I wasnâ(TM)t disappointed. Keep plugging away at the delusion.
How the hell is Microsoft continuing to make money? I don't get it. They are hurting in every area as people bail on their garbage, proprietary software left and right. From the complete failure of Windows Mobile, to people's complete hatred of Windows 10, to people abandoning Windows entirely for Mac and Chrome OS/Linux. How is this even possible? Is it still just the same, old monopoly problem with them bullying manufacturers into pre-installing their operating system on all of their machines? Or is it the mega-corporations with incompetent IT staff that continue to insist on using their software on thousands of PCs? This is just incredibly sad news...
Title of the parent comment: "The heady days of the dot com bust..."
Recently I asked someone who works for an investment company if the U.S. stock market is in a bubble again. The answer was, "Yes, that's why we are buying stocks of foreign companies."
If, as in the years before 2008, stock brokers can convince a huge number of people that the stock market will continue to rise rapidly, the brokers can sell what they have for a huge profit, and there will be another crash, as in 2008.
Its not just the US. Govts have been overthrown in Ukraine, Georgia and across the Arab world through the power of Facebook and Social Media. Social Media and Cell Phones are a very powerful and proven tool. America has been using it to cause mischief all over the world. Now the Russians beat America at its own game.
Facebook is powerfull in the same way as Hollywood was at one time - the Soviet Union fell because common Russians believed everyone in the US led the lifestyle they saw in Hollywood movies even though on average the Soviet system was more fair. Social Media is even more powerful because it is tougher to ban Facebook than to ban Hollywood movies. After all the people you are talking to on Facebook are your friends and family and you trust them more than the strangers acting in Hollywood movies.
**Life is too short to be serious**
I don't know the answer to your question, but it's interesting that the companies /.ers love to hate (myself included to some degree) are incredible financial successes.
With power and money, does abuse inevitably follow? We rail at all three of these tech giants, often with very good reason, but they do whatever they want, because they can, and what customers have to say doesn't generally matter very much.
Yes, of course there are small companies that draw /. hate, but my point was to emphasize the hate for very successful companies. I could have been more precise about that.