To The Moon

LONDON, June 21 (Reuters) - Amazon and Apple are the world's most valuable brands but Chinese brands are rising up the leaders list and are more valuable than Europe's top brands, according to a global ranking by Kantar’s BrandZ.

Amazon, founded in 1994 by Jeff Bezos, remained the world's most valuable brand with an estimated value of $684 billion, followed by Apple, founded in 1976, at $612 billion and Google at $458 billion, Kantar said.

Tencent, China's biggest social media and video games company, was the People's Republic's top brand, in fifth place, while Alibaba was in seventh place.

"Chinese brands are steadily and slowly progressing, and have made significant headway as more companies leverage their own technological developments and demonstrate their abilities to align with the major trends shaping China and the global market," said Graham Staplehurst, global strategy director at Kantar BrandZ.

Five brands more than doubled their value, led by Chinese e-commerce giants Pinduoduo and Meituan, China's top liquor maker Moutai, China's TikTok and America's Tesla .

Tesla, founded in 2003, was the fastest growing brand and became the most valuable car brand, growing its value by 275% year-on-year to $42.6 billion, Kantar said.

Top Chinese brands consolidated their lead over top European brands: China accounted for 14% of the top 100 brands, up from 11% a decade ago, while European brands accounted for 8%, down from 20% a decade ago, Kantar said.

The top European brand was France's Louis Vuitton in 21st place, followed by Germany's SAP software group in 26th place. The only British brand on the list was Vodafone in 60th place.

U.S. brands were dominant: American brands grew fastest over the past year and American brands accounted for 74% of the top 100, Kantar said.

The world's top 100 brands were worth a combined $7.1 trillion, Kantar said.

Table source: Kantar BrandZ