In a dismal year for most companies, a minority have shone: pharmaceutical groups boosted by their hunt for a Covid-19 vaccine; technology giants buoyed by the trend for working from home; and retailers offering lockdown necessities online.
Public companies had the tailwind of a surprisingly robust stock market — which many believe is a bubble. To rank companies that prospered in the pandemic, we have chosen to look at equity value added.
Read more: Prospering in the pandemic: The top 100 companies - Part 1
Here are the companies who ranked 51 - 100.
51. Nestlé
Sector: Consumer goods
HQ: Vevey, Switzerland
Market cap added: US$14.2 billion
Key stat: Nestlé's petcare division boasted 13.9 per cent organic growth in the first quarter.
When consumers rushed out to stockpile ahead of lockdowns this year, the world's largest food company reaped the benefits. Nestlé reported a boost to first-quarter growth from higher purchasing of its Purina petcare range, coffee and frozen food. Investors hope a long-term shift towards eating and drinking at home will continue to boost the Swiss group.
- Judith Evans in London
52. Danaher
Sector: Healthcare
HQ: Washington, US
Market cap added: US$14.1 billion
Key stat: Danaher's subsidiary says its GeneXpert machines can each run 2,000 tests per day.
The medical conglomerate owns Cepheid, a company in California that makes molecular diagnostic tests and equipment. In March the US Food and Drug Administration fast-tracked approval for Cepheid's Covid-19 test, which can be processed using diagnostic equipment already in place at more than 25,000 hospitals and health clinics worldwide.
- Claire Bushey in Chicago
53. Digital Realty Trust
Sector: Technology
HQ: San Francisco, US
Market cap added: US$14 billion
Key stat: The 49.6MW running through DRT's 275 data centres is enough electricity to power a city the size of Santa Barbara.
The lights went out at many office buildings and shopping centres this March but DRT's data centres were running at full power. While labour restrictions in Singapore delayed the completion of a new facility there, investors are betting that a tide of video calls and streaming media will mean more money flowing to the owners of the internet's backbone.
- Mark Vandevelde
54. Datadog
Sector: Technology
HQ: New York, US
Market cap added: US$13.6 billion
Key stat: Net retention rate has topped 130 per cent for 11 straight quarters.
One of last year's unheralded IPO success stories, Datadog has proved a popular bet in the crowded "cloud monitoring" sector. The New York-based software group, which offers monitoring and analytics tools, has been successful selling business customers on multiple products, boasting a high net retention rate — a metric watched closely by software investors.
- Miles Kruppa
55. Veeva
Sector: Technology
HQ: Pleasanton, US
Market cap added: US$13.4 billion
Key stat: The company's share price has soared 62 per cent this year.
Veeva is a Salesforce for life sciences, a cloud-based system that helps pharmaceutical companies manage data. It is helping drugmakers switch to more remote monitoring for their trials, when many participants are reluctant to go to the hospital during the pandemic. In the first quarter, it beat expectations and raised guidance for the full year.
- Hannah Kuchler
56. International Holdings Company
Sector: Financials
HQ: Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
Market cap added: US$12.5 billion
Key stat: Market value has surged 409 per cent this year in a mysterious rise that few believe is linked to fundamentals.
IHC has surprised Abu Dhabi market watchers as it bucked the coronavirus trend. Chaired by the Gulf federation's national security adviser, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al-Nahyan, the investment and management firm has made only modest acquisitions in sectors such as cinema, brokerage and ju-jitsu training since expanding out of fish farming.
- Simeon Kerr in Dubai
57. Activision Blizzard
Sector: Gaming
HQ: Santa Monica, US
Market cap added: US$12.5 billion
Key stat: Upgraded outlook in May to forecast net revenues up 5 per cent to $6.8bn this year.
Video-games developers have boomed as people turned to consoles and smartphones for distraction. Activision Blizzard scored points with investors thanks to two enduring franchises: Call of Duty, which outgunned the competition on both consoles and also on mobile, and Candy Crush Saga, which analysts at App Annie and IDC say was the fourth-highest grossing mobile game on iOS globally in the first quarter.
- Tim Bradshaw
58. Equinix
Sector: Technology
HQ: Redwood City, US
Market cap added: US$12 billion
Key stat: Peak internet exchange traffic grew 44 per cent compared with last year as millions of workers logged on from home.
Equinix recorded one of its best-ever quarters for new bookings in its global network of data centres and telecommunications hubs, as videoconferencing usage soared and cloud services rushed to add capacity.
- Mark Vandevelde
59. S&P Global
Sector: Financials
HQ: New York, US
Market cap added: US$11.8 bllion
Key stat: Investment-grade companies have issued more than $1tn of debt this year, a record.
The boom in debt issuance by corporate America has been good to S&P Global, the largest credit rating agency. Its shares have jumped a fifth in 2020, far outpacing its namesake S&P 500 index. Sales have been boosted by its work in rating all those new corporate bonds, as well as a surge in exchange-traded derivatives volumes given the broader market volatility.
- Eric Platt in New York
60. Advanced Micro Devices
Sector: Tech manufacturing
HQ: Santa Clara, US
Market cap added: US$11.6 billion
Key stat: Sales of PC chips jumped two-thirds as workers bought more home PCs and AMD took market share from Intel.
Long an also-ran against Intel, AMD is riding a powerful new product wave. If anything, the crisis has only lifted its prospects by fuelling sales of home PCs and bringing more demand for data centre capacity from big internet companies that use its chips.
- Richard Waters
61. Autodesk
Sector: Technology
HQ: San Rafael, US
Market cap added: US$11.5 billion
Key stat: Revenues in the three months to the end of April rose 20 per cent to $886m, beating analysts' expectations.
Autodesk is well placed to take advantage of any shift towards automation spurred by the pandemic, as it offers software technology for the construction, engineering and manufacturing sectors. Its shares have jumped 70 per cent since April alone.
- Hannah Murphy
62. Lonza
Sector: Pharmaceuticals
HQ: Basel, Switzerland
Market cap added: US$11.5 billion
Key stat: Lonza and Moderna hope to produce 1bn vaccine doses per year.
Swiss group Lonza has signed a deal with Moderna, the first US company to get a potential coronavirus vaccine into human trials, on the scale-up of a potential Covid-19 inoculation. The two companies have been shortlisted by President Donald Trump in the US's project to expedite a vaccine, which has been dubbed Operation Warp Speed.
- Donato Paolo Mancini
63. Crown Castle
Sector: Telecoms
HQ: Houston, US
Market cap added: US$11.5 billion
Key stat: The company is building 10,000 'small cell' mobile phone antennas on street lights and utility poles this year.
Like rival tower owner ATC, Crown Castle has been one of the best-performing stocks in real estate. Perched on hilltops or bolted to the roofs of skyscrapers, its utilitarian structures are leased to cellular networks on long-term contracts — providing a lifeline for socially distanced consumers, and a haven for investors.
- Mark Vandevelde
64. Jiangsu Hengrui Medicine
Sector: Pharmaceuticals
HQ: Jiangsu, China
Market cap added: US$11.5 billion
Key stat: Shares are up 71 per cent in 12 months.
Shanghai-listed Jiangsu Hengrui Medicine develops and produces high-quality generics and innovative drugs. It focuses on oncology, cardiovascular, surgical anaesthetics and endocrine therapeutic treatments. The company is benefiting both from mandatory biological equivalency tests that aim to eliminate inferior generics, and an accelerated drug approval process.
- Xueqiao Wang in Shanghai
65. Flutter
Sector: Gambling
HQ: Dublin, Ireland
Market cap added: US$11.5 billion
Key stat: Even with sports fixtures cancelled worldwide, Flutter increased gambling revenues 10 per cent year on year in the three months to May 17.
Flutter's £10bn merger with Canadian online gaming behemoth Stars Group, which completed in May, has given the Paddy Power owner more exposure to online gaming and allowed it to enter new markets such as Latin America. Investors are betting that it will emerge as the strongest player in the recently legalised US sports betting sector.
- Alice Hancock in London
66. Foshan Haitian Flavouring & Food
Sector: Food and beverages
HQ: Guangdong, China
Market cap added: US$11.2 billion
Key stat: Sales rose 7.2 per cent in the first quarter — but this was the slowest rate in a decade.
Shares of Foshan Haitian Flavouring & Food, the world's largest soy source maker, have surged on hopes of a rebound for consumer staples in post-virus China. While the company, known for its rapid expansion, reported only a modest increase in revenue during the first quarter because of the nationwide closure of restaurants, it still maintained a 15 per cent growth target for the year.
- Sun Yu
67. Wuliangye Yibin
Sector: Beverages
HQ: Yibin, China
Market cap added: US$11.2 bllion
Key stat: Net income rose 19 per cent in the first quarter.
Wuliangye Yibin, a Chinese liquor maker, has been a magnet for investors betting on a recovery in discretionary spending in Asia's largest economy. Shares of the distiller have gained a quarter since January as the company defied an industry-wide sales slump with revenue rising 15 per cent in the first three months of the year.
- Sun Yu
68. Daiichi Sankyo
Sector: Pharmaceuticals
HQ: Tokyo, Japan
Market cap added: US$11.1 billion
Key stat: Analysts at Daiwa estimate that breast cancer drug Enhertu will generate peak annual sales of $7.9 billion.
As Japan lifted its state of emergency in late May to reflect falling Covid-19 cases, Daiichi Sankyo launched breast cancer drug Enhertu. It is sold globally with AstraZeneca, which struck a $6.9 billion deal with the Japanese company for shared rights to the treatment. The release briefly lifted Daiichi's stock price to the highest level since 2005.
- Kana Inagaki
69. CrowdStrike
Sector: Cyber security
HQ: San Jose, US
Market cap added: US$11 billion
Key stat: 830 net new subscription customers in the three months to the end of April to 6,261 in total, marking 105 per cent growth year on year.
CrowdStrike, the Silicon Valley cyber security company known for uncovering Russian hackers inside the servers of the US Democratic National Committee, has positioned itself as a beneficiary of the shift to remote working, promising to better protect users with its "cloud first" security. It is now banking on working from home becoming permanent for many as lockdowns ease.
- Hannah Murphy
70. SF Holding
Sector: Delivery logistics
HQ: Shenzhen, China
Market cap added: US$11 billion
Key stat: SF Holding posted 39.6 per cent revenue growth in the first quarter.
SF Holding runs China's most reliable courier operation. Its huge force of delivery workers and 58 cargo jets kept ferrying goods during the worst of China's lockdown period — even as its competitors struggled with manpower issues. Sales at the Shenzhen-listed company rose during the period, though profits slipped.
- Ryan McMorrow in Beijing
71. ZTO Express
Sector: Delivery logistics
HQ: Shanghai, China
Market cap added: US$10.9 billion
Key stat: The company expects parcel volume to grow 31 to 35 per cent this year.
ZTO Express runs the profitable line-haul segment of delivery — leaving the costly business of ferrying packages the last mile to customers' doors to its partner firms. With ecommerce receiving a pandemic boost, investors are betting one of China's largest delivery companies will be taken along for the ride.
- Ryan McMorrow
72. Celltrion
Sector: Healthcare
HQ: Incheon, South Korea
Market cap added: US$10.8 billion
Key stat: 15-20 minutes, the time Celltrion says it will take its Covid-19 self-testing diagnostic kit to reveal results.
South Korean pharmaceutical group Celltrion has promoted its development of an antiviral treatment to fight Covid-19 while producing its own diagnostics kits. Shares are up 60 per cent this year. Investors are upbeat about its acquisition of a unit carved off by Japanese rival Takeda, and a touted merger of three Celltrion affiliates.
- Edward White
73. Wayfair
Sector: Ecommerce
HQ: Boston, US
Market cap added: US$10.7 billion
Key stat: First-quarter net revenue rose 20 per cent year-on-year.
The online homeware specialist's sales have surged as consumers have sought to upgrade their living spaces under lockdown but been unable to shop at bricks-and-mortar stores. The stock is near all-time highs, even after advertising and other costs meant the group lost US$286 million in the first quarter.
- Alistair Gray
74. Centene
Sector: Financials
HQ: St Louis, US
Market cap added: US$10.7 billion
Key stat: 41 per cent — year-on-year revenue jump.
US health insurer Centene has experienced a surge in profits because of the coronavirus emergency. Many non-essential procedures have been postponed until business returns to normal, meaning insurers have to disperse less in payments to healthcare providers. But premiums have remained the same, fattening margins.
- Donato Paolo Mancini
75. Hermès
Sector: Luxury
HQ: Paris, France
Market cap added: US$10.6 billion
Key stat: US$2.7 millio of sales were made in a single day at a Hermès store in Guangzhou when it reopened in mid-April after a Covid-19 lockdown.
It was a record haul for a boutique in China, according to the French group. If the all-important Chinese customer keeps shopping in the aftermath of the pandemic, this bodes well for the luxury house's ability to bounce back.
- Leila Abboud in Paris
76. Lowe's
Sector: Retail
HQ: Mooresville, US
Market cap added: US$10.6 billion
Key stat: Lowe's hired more than 100,000 workers for the spring season after a surge in demand.
Paint, piping, lumber, drills and fittings are among the many products stocked by Lowe's — and its sales have boomed. Americans under lockdown have undertaken more DIY projects and bought the necessary equipment from the home improvement retailer, whose stores have been allowed to stay open throughout the crisis.
- Alistair Gray
77. Spotify
Sector: Music streaming
HQ: Stockholm, Sweden
Market cap added: US$10.3 billion
Key stat: 130m global subscribers by the end of Q1, up 31 per cent from a year ago.
Music listening habits changed as people sheltered at home. While fewer people commuted to work, users at home flocked to meditation and wellness podcasts, instrumental music and chilled-out tunes to help manage stress, according to Spotify. The company benefited from a business based largely on subscriptions, helping shield it from the fallout in advertising.
- Anna Nicolaou
78. Hansoh Pharmaceutical Group
Sector: Pharmaceuticals
HQ: Lianyungang, China
Market cap added: US$10.3 billion
Key stat: Shares have risen more than 50 per cent this year.
Hansoh Pharmaceutical was listed in Hong Kong last year and develops innovative and first-to-market generics. It focuses on psychotropic, oncology and diabetes drugs. Hansoh's almonertinib received market approval in China for second-line treatment for patients with NSCLC (the most common type of lung cancer) in March.
- Xueqiao Wang
79. Gilead Sciences
Sector: Pharmaceuticals
HQ: Foster City, US
Market cap added: US$10.3 billion
Key stat: 1.5 millio — the number of doses of remdesivir, the antiviral being used for Covid-19, that Gilead gave away for free.
Gilead Sciences has been the only branded drug approved for treating Covid-19 patients. Remdesivir, originally developed for Ebola, is being used in hospitals in the US, UK and Japan. While trials are ongoing, Anthony Fauci, a top doctor advising the White House, praised the initial data as having a "clear-cut, significant, positive effect".
- Hannah Kuchler
80. Okta
Sector: Technology
HQ: San Francisco, US
Market cap added: US$10.2 billion
Key stat: 28 per cent year-on-year rise in customers in the first quarter.
This software upstart helps companies manage and secure user authentication into cloud services, and grew its customer base to 8,400 this year. Sales were up 46 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter, but it still made a net loss of US$57.7 million in the period.
- Miles Kruppa
81. Barrick Gold
Sector: Mining
HQ: Toronto, Canada
Market cap added: US$10.1 billion
Key stat: Gold is up 13 per cent since the start of the year, its highest level since 2012.
"When you buy physical gold you don't get a yield, but if you buy a well-run sustainably run gold mining company you should get a yield," says Barrick's fast-talking chief executive Mark Bristow, who has cranked up dividend payments over the past six months on the back of the rising gold price.
- Neil Hume in London
82. Chongqing Zhifei Biological Products
Sector: Pharmaceuticals
HQ: Jiangbei, China
Market cap added: US$10 billion
Key stat: Shares are up 134 per cent in 12 months.
Chongqing Zhifei Biological Products is listed in Shenzhen, focusing on vaccine R&D and sales. Zhifei is the local distribution partner of Merck to sell its approved vaccines in China including Gardasil 9. A subsidiary of Zhifei was reportedly co-developing with an institute under the Chinese Academy of Sciences to develop a vaccine against Covid-19.
- Xueqiao Wang
83. China Tourism Group Duty Free
Sector: Luxury
HQ: Beijing, China
Market cap added: US$9.5 billion
Key stat: 32 per cent — the proportion of luxury goods Chinese consumers purchased at home last year.
China Tourism Group Duty Free reported a loss in the first quarter for the first time in a decade. But investors still expect it to benefit from demand from rich Chinese shoppers who have been unable to buy luxury goods abroad because of coronavirus.
- Sun Yu in Beijing
84. Muyuan Foods
Sector: Farming
HQ: Neixiang, China
Market cap added: US$9.4 billion
Key stat: Pig farmer Qin Yinglin's personal wealth has grown by about US$6 billion since the start of coronavirus.
By the start of 2020, soaring pork prices due to an outbreak of African swine fever had already made Muyuan Foods founder Qin Yinglin the world's richest farmer. The onset of coronavirus in China, which started in late January, pushed food prices higher, adding another $6bn in personal wealth to Qin's pig farming fortune. Between January 2019 and March 2020, Muyuan shares rose about 340 per cent.
- Don Weinland in Beiing
85. TAL Education Group
Sector: Education
HQ: Beijing, China
Market cap added: US$9.4 billion
Key stat: 4.6 millio students were signed up in February, a 57 per cent year-on-year rise.
The Chinese online and offline tutoring company — whose name stands for Tomorrow Advancing Life — came under scrutiny for disclosing inflated sales in April. But neither that admission nor the group reporting a 60 per cent drop in operational income for the year to the end of February were enough to dent the share price, which was boosted by surging online student enrolment during the coronavirus crisis.
- Mercedes Ruehl in Singapore
86. RingCentral
Sector: Technology
HQ: Belmont, US
Market cap added: US$9.4 billion
Key stat: Annual recurring revenues from enterprise customers rose 59 per cent year on year in the first quarter.
The virtual telephone app has announced ambitions to compete with Zoom, rolling out a video offering. Investors have been encouraged by RingCentral's growing adoption at large enterprise customers, which makes up more than 30 per cent of the business.
- Miles Kruppa
87. Lululemon
Sector: Retail
HQ: Vancouver, Canada
Market cap added: US$9.3 billion
Key stat: Ecommerce sales jumped 68 per cent in the three months to May.
Working from home led to a near-70 per cent jump in online sales at Lululemon in the first quarter as its expensive yoga pants and "athleisure" gear replaced formal business attire. But overall sales tumbled heavily from the closure of its stores and it has warned that it is not expecting a return to earnings growth until the fourth quarter.
- Alistair Gray
88. LG Chem
Sector: Chemicals
HQ: Seoul, South Korea
Market cap added: US$9.3 billion
Key stat: Has more than a third of the electric vehicle battery market, up from 10 per cent last year.
LG Chem, which supplies many of the top auto groups, is poised to overtake Japanese rival Panasonic and become the top electric vehicle battery maker by market share. Its stock is back to near a 10-year high, and up more than 110 per cent since a three-year low in March.
- Edward White in Wellington
89. Reliance Industries
Sector: Industrial conglomerate
HQ: Mumbai, India
Market cap added: US$9 billion
Key stat: Reliance has raised $15bn from investors since April.
While Reliance's core energy businesses have struggled during the pandemic, foreign investors flocked to its digital arm Jio. After Facebook bought a 10 per cent stake for US$5.7 billion in April, Jio sold stakes to everyone from Silver Lake and KKR to Mubadala. Owned by Asia's richest man Mukesh Ambani, four-year-old Jio has almost 400m telecom subscribers and is branching out into ecommerce.
- Benjamin Parkin in Mumbai
90. Offcn Education Technology
Sector: Education technology
HQ: Beijing, China
Market cap added: US$9 billion
Key stat: Offcn founder Li Yongxin is China's richest edtech entrepreneur.
Offcn Education Technology, which helps train students for China's civil service examinations, moved its classes online in February and March. Analysts anticipate more consolidation as smaller competitors exit.
- Thomas Hale in Hong Kong
91. Newmont
Sector: Mining
HQ: Greenwood Village, US
Market cap added: US$8.9 billion
Key stat: For every US$100 move in the gold price, Newmont's free cash flow changes by US$400 millio.
Rising gold prices meant Newmont, the world's biggest gold producer, increased its first-quarter dividend by 79 per cent and repurchased US$300 million of shares. A huge reserve base — boosted by the purchase of rival Goldcorp — leaves Colorado-based Newmont well placed to produce 6m-7m ounces of gold a year until 2029, according to analysts.
- Neil Hume
92. Just Eat Takeaway
Sector: Ecommerce
HQ: Amsterdam, Netherlands
Market cap added: US$8.9 billion
Key stat: US$7.3 billion — the price Just Eat Takeaway will pay to buy US rival Grubhub.
Just Eat's merger with rival Takeaway.com, agreed in December, created Europe's largest food delivery group at just the right moment to capitalise on surging demand from restaurants and diners for new food delivery options during lockdowns. Now Takeaway founder Jitse Groen is looking to take a bite out of Uber in the US, with its blockbuster bid for Grubhub.
- Tim Bradshaw
93. Unilever
Sector: Consumer goods
HQ: London, UK and Rotterdam, Netherlands
Market cap added: US$8.9 billion
Key stat: €19.3 billion: annual turnover of Unilever's foods division, which some analysts believe it will spin off.
Unilever reported zero first-quarter sales growth as the pandemic began: higher demand for products such as Domestos bleach was cancelled out by a slump in areas such as food service and ice cream. But investors later took heart when Unilever said it would seek to consolidate into a single UK company, abandoning a dual British/Dutch structure. This should make acquisitions and disposals simpler.
- Judith Evans
94. AstraZeneca
Sector: Pharmaceuticals
HQ: Cambridge, UK
Market cap added: US$8.7 billion
Key stat: US$1 billion — the funding secured to develop a vaccine from the US government.
AstraZeneca, which has its headquarters in the UK, has climbed to the top of the FTSE 100 index after securing a deal to manufacture and distribute a potential coronavirus vaccine made by Oxford university.
- Donato Paolo Mancini
95. L'Oréal
Sector: Cosmetics
HQ: Paris, France
Market cap added: US$8.7 billion
Key stat: Online sales jumped 53 per cent in the first quarter.
The world's biggest cosmetics company's sales have held up well during the Covid-19 crisis, thanks to its heavy investments in online selling and marketing. It now earns 20 per cent of group sales from its own ecommerce sites or those of retailers, giving it a real competitive advantage over other cosmetics and personal care players.
- Leila Abboud
96. Snap
Sector: Social media
HQ: Los Angeles, US
Market cap added: US$8.6 billion
Key stat: Snap's first-quarter revenues jumped 44 per cent to US$462 millio.
The parent of camera and messaging app Snapchat experienced increased demand as home-bound young users spent more time on social media. But it faces challenges from tightening ad spending during the virus crisis, competing with the Facebook-Google duopoly and emergent rivals such as TikTok.
- Siddharth Venkataramakrishnan
97. Changchun High & New Technology Industry
Sector: Biopharmaceuticals
HQ: Changchun, China
Market cap added: US$8.4 bllion
Key stat: Shares in the group are up 140 per cent in 12 months.
Shenzhen-listed Changchun High & New Technology Industry is based in north-eastern China and invests in biological products, real estate and processed traditional Chinese medicine. The company mainly produces growth hormone products. Its new nasal spray influenza vaccine was approved in March, the first live attenuated flu vaccine in China.
- Xueqiao Wang
98. Chewy
Sector: Ecommerce
HQ: Dania Beach, US
Market cap added: US$8.3 billion
Key stat: Chewy added 1.6m new customers in the first quarter, bringing the total to 15 million.
Pet owners have been stocking up on food, treats and other supplies under lockdown, a boon for online specialist Chewy, which floated last year. A surge in orders pushed net sales in the three months to May up 46 per cent from a year ago to US$1.6 billion.
- Alistair Gray
99. GSX Techedu
Sector: Education technology
HQ: Beijing, China
Market cap added: US$8.2 billion
Key stat: Revenues increased 382 per cent in the first quarter.
GSX Techedu is an education company offering online tutoring services in China. This year, at a time when schools in the country have been closed, its shares have risen 157 per cent on the New York stock exchange. It has recently come under attack from short-sellers, including Muddy Waters. The company has denied the allegations.
- Thomas Hale
100. Teladoc Health
Sector: TELEmedicine
HQ: New York, US
Market cap added: US$8.2 billion
Key stat: Paid membership in the US rose from 27 millio to 43 millio in the first quarter.
Teladoc, which offers online consultations with doctors, has soared by 130 per cent since the beginning of the year and posted first-quarter revenues up 41 per cent as people have sought to avoid hospitals and doctors' surgeries during lockdown.
- Hannah Murphy
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