Korean giant Samsung has become the latest company to join the trillion-dollar club, which raises the question: whatever happened to the so-called law of large numbers?
It was long received wisdom that as companies grow ever larger, it becomes progressively harder for them to maintain high growth rates, so the biggest businesses tend to underperform smaller, faster-growing rivals over time.
Not Samsung. Pulled higher by surging demand for memory chips tied to artificial intelligence (AI), shares have more than doubled in 2026 alone, and are up fivefold over the last year.
That sounds freakish, but Samsung is not alone. The world’s second-most valuable company, Google parent Alphabet, is up 160 per cent over the last year. After crossing the $3 trillion threshold in September, it is now closing in on $5 trillion.
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Shares in Broadcom, which recently crossed the $2 trillion threshold, have doubled over the last year. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) is approaching $2 trillion, up roughly 150 per cent over 12 months.
AMD is worth almost $700 billion after more than quadrupling over the last year and rising 90 per cent year-to-date. Chip rival Intel, once the archetypal mature incumbent, has nearly tripled in 2026 to around $570 billion. Micron Technology, at about $670 billion, has risen over 700 per cent in a year.
Even Nvidia – the world’s first $5 trillion company, and long the poster child of the AI trade – looks almost restrained by comparison, up “only” 13 per cent this year and by 80 per cent over the last year.
The law of large numbers hasn’t been repealed, but it has certainly been pushed out of sight for now.
