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Apple CEO Tim Cook Meets China's IT Minister During Beijing Visit

FILE PHOTO: Apple CEO Tim Cook gives a presentation as Apple holds an event at the Steve Jobs Theater on its campus in Cupertino, California, US, Sept. 9, 2024. REUTERS/Manuel Orbegozo/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: Apple CEO Tim Cook gives a presentation as Apple holds an event at the Steve Jobs Theater on its campus in Cupertino, California, US, Sept. 9, 2024. REUTERS/Manuel Orbegozo/File Photo
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Apple CEO Tim Cook Meets China's IT Minister During Beijing Visit

FILE PHOTO: Apple CEO Tim Cook gives a presentation as Apple holds an event at the Steve Jobs Theater on its campus in Cupertino, California, US, Sept. 9, 2024. REUTERS/Manuel Orbegozo/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: Apple CEO Tim Cook gives a presentation as Apple holds an event at the Steve Jobs Theater on its campus in Cupertino, California, US, Sept. 9, 2024. REUTERS/Manuel Orbegozo/File Photo

Apple CEO Tim Cook met on Wednesday with China's Minister for Industry and Information Technology Jin Zhuanglong during a visit to Beijing this week, the ministry said in a statement.
During the meeting, Jin told Cook that he hoped Apple would continue to deepen its presence in China, increase investment in innovation, grow with Chinese companies and share the dividends of high-quality development, the statement showed.
The trip is Cook's second to China this year. His posts on the X-like Weibo social media platform showed he visited an organic farm and toured ancient neighborhoods with artists including local photographer Chen Man, Reuters reported.
China is the world's biggest smartphone market where, in recent quarters, the iPhone maker has been losing market share to domestic rivals. Apple began China sales of its latest smartphones on Sept. 20, the same day local champion Huawei launched a rival handset. The new iPhones got off to a strong start with sales rising 20% in the first three weeks of launch compared with the year-earlier model, showed data from researcher Counterpoint.
However, overall iPhone sales in China fell 2% on year during the three-week period due to declining sales of older models and increased competition with Huawei's Mate and Pura series, Counterpoint said.

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Nvidia Overtakes Apple as World’s Most Valuable Company

A man walks past the Nvidia logo at the company's AI Summit in Mumbai, India, October 24, 2024. (Reuters)
A man walks past the Nvidia logo at the company's AI Summit in Mumbai, India, October 24, 2024. (Reuters)
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Nvidia Overtakes Apple as World’s Most Valuable Company

A man walks past the Nvidia logo at the company's AI Summit in Mumbai, India, October 24, 2024. (Reuters)
A man walks past the Nvidia logo at the company's AI Summit in Mumbai, India, October 24, 2024. (Reuters)

Nvidia dethroned Apple as the world's most valuable company on Friday, following a record-setting rally in the stock powered by an insatiable demand for its new supercomputing AI chips.

Nvidia's stock market value briefly touched $3.53 trillion, while that of Apple was $3.52 trillion, according to data from LSEG.

In June, Nvidia briefly became the world's most valuable company, before it was overtaken by Microsoft and Apple. The tech trio's market capitalizations have been neck-and-neck for several months. Microsoft's market value stood at $3.20 trillion.

Nvidia's stock has risen about 18% so far in October, with a string of gains coming after OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, announced a funding round of $6.6 billion. Nvidia provides chips used to train so-called foundation models such as OpenAI's GPT-4.

"More companies are now embracing artificial intelligence in their everyday tasks and demand remains strong for Nvidia chips," said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.

"It is certainly in a sweet spot and so long as we avoid a big economic downturn in the United States, there is a feeling that companies will continue to invest heavily in AI capabilities, creating a healthy tailwind for Nvidia."

Nvidia's shares hit a record high on Tuesday, building on a rally from last week when TSMC, the world's largest contract chipmaker, posted a forecast-beating 54% jump in quarterly profit driven by soaring demand for chips used in AI.

The next big test will be when Nvidia reports third-quarter results in November. Nvidia in August forecast third-quarter revenue of $32.5 billion, plus or minus 2%, compared with the current average analyst expectation of $32.90 billion, according to data compiled by LSEG.

Morgan Stanley analyst Joseph Moore said in a note dated Oct. 10 that he remains "very bullish" about the company longer term, but the recent rally "raises the bar for earnings somewhat".

After a meeting with Nvidia's CEO Jensen Huang, Moore noted the ramp up in production of its next-generation Blackwell chips appeared to be "quite strong" and are booked out for 12 months. The stock came under pressure in August after Nvidia confirmed reports that the production of Blackwell chips was delayed until the fourth quarter.

Shares of Nvidia, Apple and Microsoft have an outsized influence on the richly valued technology sector as well as the broader US stock market, with the trio accounting for about a fifth of the S&P 500 index's weightage.

Frenzy around the prospects of AI, expectations that the US Federal Reserve will considerably bring down interest rates, and most recently, an upbeat start to the earnings season, have pushed the benchmark S&P 500 to an all-time high last week.

Nvidia's massive gains have helped boost the stock's appeal for option traders and the company's options are among the most traded on any given day in recent months, according to data from options analytics provider Trade Alert.

The stock has surged nearly 190% so far this year as a boom in generative AI prompted the company to issue a series of blowout forecasts.

"The question is whether the revenue stream will last for a long time and will be driven by the emotion of investors rather than by any ability to prove or disprove the thesis that AI is overdone," said Rick Meckler, partner at Cherry Lane Investments, a family investment office in New Vernon, New Jersey.

"I think Nvidia knows that near term, their numbers are likely to be quite remarkable."