Apple has reclaimed the title of the world's most valuable public company from Nvidia.
Apple's stock closed at a record high on Monday, pushing its market capitalization to roughly $4.94 trillion, according to Yahoo Finance data. Nvidia's market cap stood at $4.75 trillion.
Apple shares have climbed more than 22% year to date.
Investors increasingly view Apple's restrained AI spending as a strength rather than a weakness. Jay Woods, chief market strategist at Freedom Capital Markets, said: "They have successfully avoided some of those capex pitfalls."
Apple's capital expenditure has declined over the past three quarters, according to Yahoo Finance's AlphaSpace data. In contrast, Alphabet raised its capital spending outlook to support its AI infrastructure build-out, while Tesla increased spending to fund its robotaxi and robotics ambitions.
Shares of Alphabet and Tesla fell following their earnings reports. Alphabet stock is up about 4% year-to-date, while Tesla stock has tumbled roughly 30% year-to-date.
Investors are now awaiting earnings from Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta, all of which are expected to announce further increases in AI-related spending. Apple will report earnings on Thursday after the closing bell.
Thursday's report will be closely watched for signs that Apple can scale its 'Apple Intelligence' features without a bump in capital expenditures or an impact on operating margins. It will also mark the final earnings call for Tim Cook as CEO before he steps down on Sept. 1 to become executive chairman, officially passing the reins to John Ternus, a hardware engineering veteran at Apple.