Wal-Mart Stores remained at the top of the list of the biggest global companies, despite strong gains among the major oil firms, Fortune magazine reports.
The US retail behemoth claimed the top spot of the Fortune Global 500 list for the fourth straight year, as revenues rose to 287.9 billion dollars in 2004, the magazine said in its edition dated July 25.
But British-based oil giant BP, remaining at number two on the list, closed the gap, as revenues rose 23 percent to 285.1 billion dollars, faster than Wal-Mart's 9.5 percent increase.
The Fortune ranking is based on revenues. Using profitability, US-based Exxon Mobil (number three on the Fortune Global list) would be at the top, with a 2004 profit of 25.3 billion dollars.
The largest stock market capitalisation would be a close contest between Exxon Mobil and US conglomerate General Electric (number nine on the Fortune list).
The top 10 on the Fortune list included four oil companies - BP, Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch/Shell (number four) and France's Total (number 10).
THE OTHERS IN THE TOP 10 INCLUDED FOUR AUTOMAKERS: General Motors (number five), DaimlerChrysler (number six), Toyota (number seven) and Ford (number eight).
For the Fortune Global 500 as a whole, 2004 was an excellent year, with revenues up 13 percent and profits up 27 percent, the magazine reported.
"It got a lot harder to join the ranks of the world's largest corporations this year," Fortune writer Janet Guyon said.
"The cutoff for the list - the revenue needed to be ranked number 500 - rose by a record 15 percent, to 12.4 billion dollars. That's more than the GDP (gross domestic product) of Jordan or Jamaica." "It was an especially good year for oil companies, with prices over 50 dollars a barrel for much of 2004," says Guyon.
The number of Chinese companies on the list increased to 16 this year, up from 15 last year and just three in 1995.
"So keen was one Chinese company to make the list that it sent a representative from Beijing to Fortune's offices in New York to hand-deliver its annual report," says Guyon. "Unfortunately the company, which had enough revenue in 2004 to have made the list last year, was too small to qualify." The US had the largest number of companies on the list, 176. But that was 14 fewer than last year, mainly due to the weak dollar.
Tokyo is home to more of the top 500 companies than any other city, with 56, twice as many as Paris with 27 firms, London (24) and New York (22).