Google is on top of the search market while shareholders bask in an $800 record high

Google is gaining and they are laying the blame on tablets and smartphones. The volume of online searches has increased exponentially with the widespread use of mobile devices and now, we all know for sure what their default search engine is. Google shareholders have no reason to complain. They are probably thanking their guardian angels for urging them on and buy Google shares when the company went public in August 2004. We can only expect more investors wanting a share of the good fortune.

Record high

Here’s what the excitement is all about. The 0.3% gain in Google shares in 2012 which got everyone excited has just culminated to a record $806.85 closing price at the New York Stock Exchange. Google shares are up, and there is no more doubt which company sits at the very top of the search market hierarchy.

Mobile platforms already boosted Google rankings at the start of this year when reports came out that 67% of the US search market in January used the search engine over its main competitors. There’s no question about it. Google operates the biggest search engine on Earth. Google Doodle may have something to do with Google’s stellar rise, but we don’t know for sure. What we do know is that more advertisers are choosing to sell their wares on Google sites, and that ought to keep shareholders confident of their finances for the time being.

Search engine dominance

To better understand how firmly established Google is, let’s do the Math. An estimated 175 billion searches were done online in December 2012 and Google handled 65%  of that volume. The rest of the pie was shared by a handful of other companies (we’ll find out who they are later). That’s 115 billion searches, at 65,000 searches/sec. We might have to come up with a new unit of measurement just to accurately describe that level of performance.

The Others

The top five search engines in the United States today are ranked thus: Google sites, Microsoft sites, Yahoo sites, Ask Network, and AOL. Google’s dominance is clear when in January 2013 alone, Google searches reached 19.5 billion. And as we’ve already mentioned, in both November and December 2012, Google’s name was written on the biggest piece of the search pie (65.2%).

On the decline

When something comes up, others must come down. That’s how we keep the balance and the unfortunate ones on the decline are Microsoft and Yahoo. Last year, both saw a decrease in their share of searches. Their shares either declined or remained stagnant as a consequence. Even the major search engines in China (Baidu) and Russia (Yandex) are proving to be no match to the definitive number one search engine in the world.

Apple shares has also declined an alarming 8.4% in the past year, and Google has something to do with it as well. Apple is a tech company while Google is mostly into the search market. But Apple is trading at a discount to Google at 56% for quite some time now.

Photo Credit: Google Woodmark