It’s official. Shopify Inc. (TSX:SHOP) is now Canada’s biggest and most valuable publicly traded company.
The e-commerce platform provider’s market capitalization surpassed $120 billion Wednesday to displace Royal Bank of Canada (TSX:RY) as the largest public concern. Shopify’s lead held past the closing bell on Wednesday and the company ended the session with a market cap of $121.3 billion, compared to RBC’s $120.5 billion.
It’s been a meteoric rise for the Ottawa-based technology company with shares up 98% year-to-date amid forecasts that the company will capture more business as consumers stay at home during the COVID-19 pandemic. Shopify said Wednesday its first-quarter revenue jumped 47% year-over-year to $470 million U.S.
The company’s surging stock price has helped vault co-founder and chief executive officer Tobi Lutke up the ranks of the nation’s wealthiest people. Lutke is now worth $5.9 billion — more than media and publishing scion David Thomson, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Lutke co-founded the company in 2004 after helping to develop the e-commerce platform to sell snowboarding gear and has grown the company to include 5,000 employees and post $1.5 billion U.S. in annual revenue. It is worth noting that Shopify has yet to report sustained profitability.
RBC, which lost its Crown as Canada’s largest public company, reported $12 billion in profit on $46 billion of revenue for fiscal 2019. The bank currently employs more than 80,000 people.