Skip to navigationSkip to main contentSkip to right columnADVERTISEMENTDaniel Sparks, The Motley FoolFri, July 3, 2026 at 11:43 PM GMT+2 5 min readNvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) currently holds the title of the world's most valuable company, and Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) is close again. As of this writing, Nvidia carries a market capitalization of about $4.7 trillion, some $190 billion -- or about 4% -- ahead of Apple at about $4.5 trillion. Apple closed much of the gap on Thursday, jumping nearly 5% on reports of an expanded iPhone lineup, while Nvidia slipped alongside a broader sell-off in chip stocks.So, could Apple retake the crown this month? Here's how the two sides stack up.Missed Nvidia in 2009? This Rare Signal Is Flashing Again. In 2009, a "Double Down" signal flashed for a little-known chipmaker called Nvidia. For the first time in years, that same "Total Conviction" signal is flashing for a company 1/100th the size of Nvidia. Continue »Image source: Apple.Nvidia: faster growth, cheaper stockAs far as its business momentum goes, Nvidia is in a class of its own. In its fiscal first quarter of 2027 (the period ended April 26, 2026), revenue rose 85% year over year to $81.6 billion, with data center revenue setting a record at $75.2 billion. The chipmaker trades at about 30 times earnings.The catch for the crown race is timing. Nvidia doesn't report again until late August, so it has no company catalyst this month -- its share price is at the mercy of artificial intelligence (AI) sentiment, which has turned jumpy on worries about how much the AI build-out will cost. That souring mood is exactly what let Apple close the gap.It's worth stressing that the chip-stock sell-off is about sentiment, not Nvidia's results. Demand still looks ferocious; data center revenue nearly doubled from a year earlier, and gross margin held around 75%. The worry weighing on the group is whether the big cloud companies can keep funding an AI build-out this expensive, not whether Nvidia is selling fewer chips.Apple: a catalyst is on the calendarApple's edge is a less cyclical business with a durable growth opportunity, as the company is seen as a bigger AI beneficiary deeper into the AI boom's maturity, when on-device AI features become more important. Then there's the potential catalyst of a rumored foldable iPhone that may be debuted this fall.The tech giant notably reports its fiscal third-quarter results on July 30, with guidance for 14% to 17% revenue growth, and it enters that print with momentum: fiscal second-quarter revenue grew 17% to $111.2 billion, led by a 22% jump in iPhone sales.Pair a strong report with the buzz around a rumored release of five new iPhones, and Apple has a concrete near-term reason for the gap to keep narrowing.Terms and Privacy PolicyEU DSA contactPrivacy & Cookie SettingsMore Info