By Noel Randewich
(Reuters) - A day after Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) owner Meta Platforms suffered the biggest loss of stock market value in history for a U.S. company, Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) was on track to log the greatest ever one-day increase in value.
Shares of the online retail and cloud computing giant surged almost 15% on Friday following its blowout quarterly report, expanding its market capitalization by more than $200 billion as of mid-day.
If Amazon's stock were to close at that level, it would beat Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)'s record $181 billion one-day gain in stock market value on Jan. 28 following the iPhone maker's own blockbuster quarterly report, according to Refinitiv data.
Amazon is now valued at about $1.6 trillion. With Meta Platforms' stock dipping an additional 2% on Friday, its stock market value stood at about $653 billion.
Amazon's shares jumped after company reported better-than-expected profits late on Thursday and said it was hiking the price of its annual U.S. Prime subscriptions by 17%.
The surge in the value of Amazon comes a day after Meta Platforms' stock market value plunged more than $200 billion in the biggest single-day loss for a U.S. company after the social media giant issued a dismal forecast.
"After fighting the post-lockdown blues in 2021, we believe Amazon's fortunes have the potential to improve as 2022 unfolds," Monness Crespi Hardt analyst Brian White wrote in a research note. "Amazon is uniquely positioned to exit this crisis as one of the biggest beneficiaries of accelerated digital transformation."
Apple, Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Google owner Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) remain Wall Street's most valuable companies, with market capitalizations of $2.8 trillion, $2.3 trillion and $1.9 trillion, respectively, according to Refinitiv.