Facebook now 5th most valuable company

NEW YORK (AA) – Facebook became one of the top-5 most valuable companies in the world Thursday, topping $360 billion in value.

After beating expectations with strong second quarter earnings the day before, the stock value of the social media giant climbed to its all-time level reaching as high as $128.33.

That placed the company’s market capitalization at $362.5 billion during trading hours.

Meanwhile, multinational conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway saw its shares rise as high as $144.54 Thursday, placing its market capitalization at $355.6 billion.

Facebook shares jumped a little more than 4 percent, thanks to strong earnings, higher average users and bigger ad revenues.

In the second quarter the company's revenue rose by 59 percent to $6.44 billion, compared to a year ago, while net income jumped by 186 percent to $2.05 billion.

Meanwhile, revenue from advertisement soared by 63 percent year-over-year to reach $6.24 billion.

Monthly average users increased by 15 percent to 1.71 billion, while daily active users rose by 17 percent to 1.13 billion, during the same quarter.

The market and investors now wonder if Facebook may challenge for fourth place on the list of most valuable companies where ExxonMobil has a market capitalization of $377 billion as of Thursday.

While Apple is the world's most valuable firm, Google's parent company Alphabet comes second. Microsoft is in third place.