Apple could become world’s first trillion-dollar company as shares hit record high

The release of the iPhone X has propelled Apple close to the point of becoming the world’s first ever trillion-dollar company.

Apple’s share price hit an all-time high on Wednesday after a 19 per cent surge on news of record pre-orders for the iPhone X. The news came as a bit of a surprise for some, who expected the $1,000 handset to struggle to gain traction thanks to its high price.

While the share price has since slipped a little, at its peak Apple was worth $868bn, reclaiming the crown of ‘world’s most profitable company’ from Samsung.

Apple this week reported that it sold 46.7m iPhones in its last quarter. In addition, its range of services such as the App Store, iTunes, iCloud and Apple Pay generated $8.5bn in the period, making it the company’s fastest growing segment. To top it off, quarterly Chinese sales were up 12 per cent, stemming previous drops in what is Apple’s second largest market.

Macs are flying, too, with sales climbing 25 per cent thanks to the new Macbook Pro, helping the computer line to its best ever year. Apple Watch sales were apparently also up over 50 per cent.

Apple is currently sitting on a cash pile worth some $269bn and is on track to record the biggest ever profit from a US company in its next quarter.

CEO Tim Cook, who described 2017 as a “sensational year” for Apple, said: “I have to say I couldn’t be more excited by Apple’s future. This was our biggest year ever in most parts of the world.

“The ramp for iPhone X is going well. We are really happy that we are able to increase week by week what we are outputting and we are going to be getting as many as we can to people as soon as possible.”