Microsoft, not Apple, is now the world's most valuable company

It will probably come as a surprise to many, but Microsoft has just overtaken Apple as the world's most valuable company.

It's not so long since Apple became the first company to pass that ridiculous milestone in market capitalization, $1 trillion, a figure larger than the GDPs of all but the richest 15 nations on earth. Just a few short months later, though, after a tech sell-off and some disappointing results and forecasts (particularly in the iPhone business), Apple's value has shrunk to about $812 billion. Microsoft has also taken a bit of a hit, but it's stocks have stood up better than Apple's, especially as it moves away from its traditional Windows business and towards enterprise software and cloud services. Microsoft's valuation fell to $819 billion, putting it just above Apple, at least for a while.

You can call it schadenfreude, but I had a little chuckle at that. I have always disliked Apple as a company, a dislike I think dates back to those supercilious anti-Microsoft ads it used to air some years ago. Well, who's smirking now?