Big Tech’s Domination of Business Reaches New Heights

American tech titans flew high before the coronavirus pandemic, making billions of dollars a year. Now, the upheaval has lifted them to new heights, putting the industry in a position to dominate American business in a way unseen since the days of railroads. A rally in technology stocks elevated the S&P 500 stock index to a record high even as the pandemic crushes the broader economy. The stocks of Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft and Facebook, the five largest publicly-traded companies in America, rose 37 percent in the first seven months of 2020, while all the other stocks in the S&P 500 fell a combined 6 percent, according to Credit Suisse. Those five companies now constitute 20 percent of the stock market’s total worth, a level not seen from a single industry in at least 70 years.