Market Cap
A company's total stock market value — share price multiplied by total shares outstanding — and the standard way companies get grouped by size.
What it means
Market capitalization (market cap) is a company's total stock market value: its current share price multiplied by the total number of shares outstanding. It's the standard way to compare company size across the market, since share price alone says nothing about size — a $50 stock with 10 billion shares outstanding is a much bigger company than a $500 stock with 10 million shares. Market cap is commonly grouped into rough bands (large-cap, mid-cap, small-cap, and so on), and where a company falls matters for how it's typically covered, traded, and analyzed — large-caps tend to be more heavily covered by analysts and less volatile day to day than small-caps, for instance.
How MarketWall calculates it
MarketWall computes market cap from each symbol's latest share price and shares outstanding, refreshed as part of the regular symbol data sync. See the Data Sources & Methodology page for the full sync schedule.
How it's typically used
Market cap is a size measure, not a valuation measure — a company can have a huge market cap and still be reasonably priced relative to its earnings, or a small market cap and be significantly overvalued; the two questions (how big is this company, and is its price reasonable for that size) are answered by different numbers, market cap for the first and ratios like P/E for the second. Rough conventional bands: large-cap is typically $10 billion and up, mid-cap roughly $2-10 billion, small-cap roughly $300 million-$2 billion, with micro-cap below that — the exact cutoffs vary by source, so treat them as rough guides rather than fixed rules. Company size correlates with several practical things worth knowing: larger companies tend to have more analyst coverage (more independent estimates feeding things like Forward P/E and Analyst Price Target), tend to trade with tighter bid-ask spreads and more liquidity, and tend to be less volatile day-to-day than small- or micro-caps, which can swing sharply on comparatively little news or trading volume. None of that makes large-cap inherently "better" as an investment — it's a different risk and opportunity profile, not a quality judgment. Market cap changes constantly as the share price moves, distinct from a company's actual share count, which only changes through specific corporate actions (buybacks, new share issuance, splits).
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FAQ
What's the difference between market cap and enterprise value?
Market cap only reflects the equity (stock) portion of a company's value. Enterprise value adds debt and subtracts cash, giving a fuller picture of what it would cost to acquire the whole company — MarketWall doesn't currently report enterprise value.
Why do market cap bands (large-cap, small-cap) vary between sources?
There's no single official standard — different data providers and index makers draw the cutoffs slightly differently. MarketWall's own bands follow common industry convention rather than a fixed rule.
Does a falling share price always mean a falling market cap?
Usually, but not always — market cap is price times shares outstanding, so a falling price combined with a rising share count (from new stock issuance) can leave market cap roughly flat even as the price drops.
How current is MarketWall's market cap figure?
It's recalculated from the latest synced share price and share count as part of the regular symbol data pipeline — see the Data Sources & Methodology page.
See more signals in the interactive walkthrough, read the full Data Sources & Methodology page, or explore it live on a real chart — AAPL or BTC.