By Esther Fung

All hail the new king of packages.

For the first time in history, FedEx eclipsed United Parcel Service this week in market capitalization, a sign of how much Wall Street is rewarding the delivery giant that can shrink the fastest to boost profits.

FedEx shares have climbed nearly 40% in the past two years, while UPS shares have dropped by about the same amount. On Monday, FedEx was valued at $84.9 billion, about $44 million more than its rival, the first time that FedEx was worth more since UPS went public in 1999. UPS retook the top spot Tuesday, but FedEx was on top again by Friday's closing bell.

The longtime rivals have been slashing thousands of jobs and shrinking their operations after adding capacity to their networks during the pandemic. UPS shares have tumbled since the company signed a new contract with the Teamsters union in 2023 that locked in pay raises.

Here is a look at how the two companies stack up now compared with a decade ago:

For decades, Wall Street judged the companies on how big they could grow, focusing on metrics including parcel volume and revenue. During the pandemic, they expanded at a breakneck speed to keep up with demand. But when demand for e-commerce shipments eased as consumers returned to normal life, investors started paying attention to their cost-cutting efforts.

FedEx had $88 billion in revenue in its last fiscal year, just behind the $88.7 billion in revenue that UPS reported in the 2025 calendar year. But FedEx delivered fewer packages: Its average daily domestic parcel volume was 14 million compared with 20 million for UPS.

FedEx Chief Executive Raj Subramaniam, who has held the top job since 2022, has moved to combine the company's express and ground-delivery units and spin off the freight cargo division. Those two efforts are continuing, and the company has said they will make its operations more efficient.

In a recent meeting with investors, Subramaniam said FedEx has become more resilient and is focused on business-to-business deliveries, especially in the healthcare, automotive, data-center and aerospace industries.

UPS said in January it planned to cut an additional 30,000 roles this year, after cutting 48,000 in 2025. Early last year, CEO Carol Tomé announced plans to wind down UPS's partnership with Amazon to focus on higher-margin business.

Write to Esther Fung at esther.fung@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 13, 2026 16:24 ET (20:24 GMT)

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