Exxon Retakes Top Spot in Fortune 500

Wal-Mart slips to second in 'worst-ever' year for the 500
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 20, 2009 6:00 AM CDT
Exxon Retakes Top Spot in Fortune 500
Exxon Mobil has unseated Wal-Mart Stores to top the 2009 Fortune 500 list after a year the magazine called the worst ever for the country's 500 largest publicly traded companies.    (AP Photo/Lisa Poole, file)

Exxon Mobil snagged a whopping $443 billion in revenue to unseat Wal-Mart from the top spot in this year's Fortune 500 list, CNN reports. The two behemoths thrived on jacked-up oil prices and the recession respectively, but the picture was a lot bleaker for most of the rest of the 500—overall earnings took a record 85% dive to $98.9 billion from $645.2 billion the year before.

Microsoft came in third place, followed by ConocoPhillips, General Electric, and General Motors. Some 128 companies on the list had losses for a total of $519.3 billion, up from 57 companies losing a total of $116.7 billion in 2007. AIG, ranked as biggest loser, plummeted from No. 13 to No. 245. "America is getting used to the sound of bubbles bursting," Fortune said. (More Fortune 500 stories.)

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