AAPL Topples XOM Again As Dow Reverses Course

As the Dow Jones Industrial average gave up gains, XOM continued to sink Tuesday afternoon, again yielding the top market cap distinction to Apple.

Folks, for one brief moment, around a quarter of 1 pm, Eastern, Apple (AAPL) was the richest stock in the world, toppling Exxon Mobile (XOM) as the latter began to break down.

Apple rose to a high of $369.89, giving it a market cap of $342.8 billion based on 927 million shares outstanding.

Exxon fell as low as $68.78, reducing it to a market cap as low as $334.41 billion. Somewhere around $340 billion, the two crossed over.

Exxon is now back at $341.82 billion in market cap, Apple is now at $338.59 billion.

It’s quite an accomplishment to be within a billion dollars in market cap of the world’s biggest oil company. And rather remarkable considering that when CEO Steve Jobs returned to Apple in August of 1997, and soon after was named “interim CEO,” the company had about 126 million shares of common stock outstanding, which were trading then in the neighborhood of $19 per share, or around $2.4 billion in market capitalization.

Considering that Apple is down 10% from a recent 52-week high of $404.50, it’s certainly quite conceivable that the two could trade places again in short order.

With another two hours in the session, it could even happen today.

Update: With the sudden reversal of the Dow — now down 155 points — Apple’s on top again, with Apple shares up $3.13, or 0.9%, at $356.34. The stock currently has a market cap of $330.4 billion, while XOM has broken down further, falling $2.89, or 4%, at $67.29, bringing its market cap below $330 billion.

Correction: An earlier version of this post listed the adjusted share price for 1997, when in fact the actual price at the time was around $20.