Summary
Market capitalization, sometimes referred to as market cap, is the total value of a publicly traded company's outstanding common shares owned by stockholders. Market capitalization is equal to the market price per common share multiplied by the number of common shares outstanding. Since outstanding stock is bought and sold in public markets, capitalization could be used as an indicator of public opinion of a company's net worth and is a determining factor in some forms of stock valuation. Market capitalization is sometimes used to rank the size of companies. It measures only the equity component of a company's capital structure, and does not reflect management's decision as to how much debt (or leverage) is used to finance the firm. A more comprehensive measure of a firm's size is enterprise value (EV), which gives effect to outstanding debt, preferred stock, and other factors. For insurance firms, a value called the embedded value (EV) has been used. It is also used in ranking the relative size of stock exchanges, being a measure of the sum of the market capitalizations of all companies listed on each stock exchange. The total capitalization of stock markets or economic regions may be compared with other economic indicators (e.g. the Buffett indicator). The total market capitalization of all publicly traded companies in 2020 was approximately US93trillion.Totalmarketcapitalizationofallpubliclytradedcompaniesintheworldfrom1975to2020.Marketcapisgivenbytheformula,whereMCisthemarketcapitalization,Nisthenumberofcommonsharesoutstanding,andPisthemarketpricepercommonshare.Forexample,ifacompanyhas4millioncommonsharesoutstandingandtheclosingpricepershareis93 trillion. Total market capitalization of all publicly traded companies in the world from 1975 to 2020. Market cap is given by the formula , where MC is the market capitalization, N is the number of common shares outstanding, and P is the market price per common share. For example, if a company has 4 million common shares outstanding and the closing price per share is 20, its market capitalization is then 80million.Iftheclosingpricepersharerisesto80 million. If the closing price per share rises to 21, the market cap becomes 84million.Ifitdropsto84 million. If it drops to 19 per share, the market cap falls to $76 million. This is in contrast to mercantile pricing where purchase price, average price and sale price may differ due to transaction costs.
About this result
This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.
Related concepts (18)
Stock
Stock (also capital stock, or sometimes interchangeably, shares) consist of all the shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided. A single share of the stock means fractional ownership of the corporation in proportion to the total number of shares. This typically entitles the shareholder (stockholder) to that fraction of the company's earnings, proceeds from liquidation of assets (after discharge of all senior claims such as secured and unsecured debt), or voting power, often dividing these up in proportion to the amount of money each stockholder has invested.
Market capitalization
Market capitalization, sometimes referred to as market cap, is the total value of a publicly traded company's outstanding common shares owned by stockholders. Market capitalization is equal to the market price per common share multiplied by the number of common shares outstanding. Since outstanding stock is bought and sold in public markets, capitalization could be used as an indicator of public opinion of a company's net worth and is a determining factor in some forms of stock valuation.
Share (finance)
In financial markets, a share (sometimes referred to as stock) is a unit of equity ownership in the capital stock of a corporation, and can refer to units of mutual funds, limited partnerships, and real estate investment trusts. Share capital refers to all of the shares of an enterprise. The owner of shares in a company is a shareholder (or stockholder) of the corporation. A share is an indivisible unit of capital, expressing the ownership relationship between the company and the shareholder.
Show more
Related courses (10)
FIN-405: Investments
The course covers a wide range of topics in investment analysis
MGT-482: Principles of finance
The course provides a market-oriented framework for analyzing the major financial decisions made by firms. It provides an introduction to valuation techniques, investment decisions, asset valuation, f
BIO-490: Entrepreneurship in life sciences
Based on real-world examples, hypothetical or own inventions, students are provided with a skill set for translating scientific innovation into a convincing investor pitch (including a comprehensive s
Show more