PetroChina overtakes ExxonMobil in the 2010 Financial Times 'Global 500 list'

Chinese state owned petroleum major PetroChina has become the world's most valuable company, after overtaking US oil major ExxonMobil in the Financial Times 'Global 500 List' 2010 of largest companies by market value.

With a market capitalisation of $329.3 billion, the Beijing-based PetroChina secured the top spot overtaking ExxonMobil's, market capitalisation of $316.230 billion-$13 billion less than PetroChina.

This marks the first time that a Chinese company has moved to the top of the Financial Times 14-year old ranking. Last year PetroChina ranked second.

The list had 162 companies from the US, 42 from Japan, 27 from the UK, 22 from China and 16 from India.

Among the top 10, six were from the US, and included Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway. Three were were from China and one from Australia

Microsoft moved by 3 ranks but Apple gained the most by moving up 28 ranks, while China Mobile slipped 5 paces.

$ millions
Global rank 2010	Global rank 2009	Company	Sector	Market value
1	2	PetroChina	Oil & gas	329259.7
2	1	Exxon Mobil	Oil & gas	316230.8
3	6	Microsoft	Computer software	256864.7
4	4	Industrial & Commercial Bank of China	Banks	246419.8
5	33	Apple	Technology hardware	213096.7
6	19	BHP Billiton	Mining	209935.1
7	3	Wal-Mart	Retail chain	209000.7
8	12	Berkshire Hathaway	Nonlife insurance	200620.5
9	23	General Electric	General industrials	194246.2
10	5	China Mobile	Mobile telecom	192998.6

A total of 16 Indian companies made to the FT list with the highest ranking taken by Reliance Industries at No 68 with a market value of $78 billion, followed by state-owned ONGC at 124th spot with a market value of $52 billion.

LN Mittal-owned ArcelorMittal moved up by 55 spots to be ranked at 81 with a market value of $68 billion

$ millions
Global rank 2010	Global rank 2009	Company	Sector	Market value
68	75	Reliance Industries	Oil & Gas	78,670.8
124	120	ONGC	Oil & Gas	52,334.3
184	138	NTPC	Electricity	38,017.8
218	483	Tata Consultancy	Computer software	34,039.3
225	330	Infosys	Computer software	33,394.9
256	372	State Bank	Banks	29,405.4
290	188	Bharti Airtel	Telecom	26,382.6
297	345	BHEL	Industrial engineering	26,010.1
330	-	ICICI Bank	Banks	23,656.7
338	-	SAIL	Steel & mining	23,165.9
340	-	Wipro	Computer software	23,110.3
352	362	ITC	Tobacco	22,380.0
363	-	Larsen & Toubro	Construction	21,765.7
400	-	HDFC Bank	Banks	19,703.5
463	-	Housing Development Finance	Financial services	17,349.0
499	-	Indian Oil	India Oil & gas	16,048.4

The total capitalisation of the top 500 companies increased from $15.6 trillion to $23.5 trillion, up by 50.6 per cent, which is the greatest increase since the past 10 years said the Financial Tines, showing that the global economy is well on its way to recovery after the 2008-09 recession.