The seven most valuable technology companies in the United States — Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, Facebook, Tesla and Invedia — have ended a huge year by adding $3.4 trillion in market value in 2020, amid the global spread of the pandemic and the broader economic crisis.
Between continued optimism about iPhone sales, Microsoft Teams' growing collaborative product, Amazon's continued control over e-commerce, and the monopoly power of Facebook and Google for online advertising, technology companies have not slowed down because of the Corona virus or the growing number of investigations into their dominance.
Tesla was the biggest surprise, with its shares nearly nine-fold this year, raising the electric car maker's market value from $76 billion at the beginning of the year to $669 billion.
Despite the closure of factories due to the epidemic, Tesla was able to deliver a record number of vehicles in the third quarter, and in December 2020 became the biggest ever addition to the S&P 500.
At the same time, invidia chip maker's value more than doubled in 2020, with a market value of $323 billion, making it the seventh technology company in value.
Invidia's graphics processors for gaming devices were sold so quickly that the company had difficulty keeping up with demand.
Invidia chips have also gained considerable strength due to data centers, with improved workloads requiring higher speeds, and the company agreed in September to buy Arm for SoftBank's mobile chip maker for $40 billion.
Apple's biggest increase in market value, which exceeded $1 trillion in market value, was driven by an 81 percent rise in its shares.
Amazon, which benefited from growth in consumer business and cloud computing, rose by $710 billion.
Microsoft raised $480 billion, Alphabet earned $268 billion and Facebook $193 billion.
The gains are clearly reflected among the wealthy, with Amazon's Jeff Bezos being the richest person in the world, followed by Tesla's Elon Musk and Microsoft's Bill Gates, while Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg is in fifth place.
Google's founders Larry Page, Sergey Brin and former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer are also among the top 10.
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