First on AI: Apple's stock soared to new heights on Thursday, pushing the company's market capitalization to $456 billion, a number that is greater than the values of rivals Google and Microsoft combined.



From AppleInsider:

As of Thursday morning, Microsoft's market cap was around $256.7 billion, while Google was valued at around $198.9 billion. With Apple's stock up more than 3 percent in morning trading, the company surpassed the combined totals of both Google and Microsoft.

The milestone comes soon after Apple reported its best quarter ever, earning $13.06 billion on sales of 37 million iPhones, 15 million iPads and 5.2 million Macs. Total revenue for Apple's holiday quarter was $46.33 billion.

But Google's shares fell more than 9 percent last month after the company missed expectations on Wall Street for both earnings and revenue. And while Microsoft met Wall Street expectations, revenue from its Windows operating system fell 6 percent to $4.74 billion.

  Apple now worth more than Google and Microsoft combined