Fortune 500

"I once saw an office like this in Fortune magazine at my dentist's."
--Sabrina Fairchild (Sabrina)

As a brief follow-on on yesterday's post, if you're studying a company's annual revenue on its income statement and wondering how it compares to other companies, then you might find the Fortune 500 to be a useful frame of reference. The Fortune 500, initiated by Fortune magazine in the late 1940s, ranks the top 500 US-based companies based on annual revenue from their most recent fiscal year.

The list comes out every spring. Here is this year's list.

Keep in mind that revenues are only one possible measure of organizational size. Size could also be measured by number of employees, market value, profitability, etc. But the Fortune 500 is the grand daddy of them all and offers a convenient and widely recognized listing of large company revenues.

Quick quiz per the most recent Fortune 500 list:

1) Currently, what is the largest US company based on revenue?

2) We were studying Intel's (INTC) revenues yesterday. Can you find Intel on the list? Where does it stand?

3) Currently, there are two companies with their world headquarters in Cincinnati in the top 50. Who are they and what are their respective rankings?

position in INTC