[NewsPoster]

Apple has jumped from 55th to 19th place in this year's edition of the Fortune Global 500. The chart ranks the biggest corporations in the world, and in its new position Apple sits above companies like GM, Daimler, GE, and Ford. "The introductions of the iPhone 5 and a the 7-inch iPad Mini helped propel the tech giant's revenues up from $108 billion in 2011 to $157 billion last year," Fortune writes, also remarking that the company has over 76,100 workers.

Elsewhere though the publication points out that Apple's ranking is based on the results of its 2012 fiscal year, which ended in September. Around that time Apple stock began a precipitous slide, falling from $700 to under $400, although it has since rebounded over the $400 mark. The drop has been blamed on investor worries about everything from lower-than-expected iPhone 5 sales to Apple's own decision to switch to more realistic guidance.

The top five companies in Global 500 are Shell, Walmart, Exxon, Sinopec, and China National Petroleum, each of which pulled in over $400 billion in revenues. The only high-technology company above Apple is Samsung, which is also more diversified.

[Geoduck]

IMO anything over $500/share was speculation.

[pairof9s]

I'd say if you've ever followed Apple's stock price, the fact that most top analysts had projected Apple to be #17 or better probably best explains the drop in price, at least today.

[Charles Martin]

I do find it amusing that the same analysts that have been dragging down the stock also are the ones who expected Apple to leap even higher than it did.

[shawnde]

I also find ALL the Fortune 500 lists to be misleading and frankly bogus, since their ultimate metric is revenue and not profit. You can have all the revenue in the world, and not turn a dime in profit, and you still get a ranking on Fortune 500 (I'm sure AMZN is on there). Therefore, if actually use PROFIT as the metric, AAPL will probably shoot up to top 5 in there.