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Google is having quite a day. The company has been initiated into the S&P 100, and its stock is very close to hitting the $500 mark (may, in fact, hit it before I finish this article). There is also news that Google is "winning" the "UK search battle," with a year-on-year share increase of nine percent.

Web User's Veronique De Freitas reported on the latest figures from Hitwise UK, writing, "Google accounted for 78 per cent of all UK searches last month, a nine percent increase over the previous year, while Yahoo took second place with just 7.7 per cent."

What little was left of the UK search market was generally spread between Microsoft and Ask. "Google, Yahoo, MSN and Ask collectively accounted for 96.6 per cent of all UK internet searches last month," the WebUser article continued.

Heather Hopkins, vice president of Hitwise's UK Research branch, commented on the findings. "Google and Yahoo! Search in particular are seeing strong growth in their share of the UK search market and their share of referrals to online retailers," she told Spannerworks. "Growth for these search engines seems to be organic, driven in part by toolbar usage but also growing familiarity with the Google and Yahoo! brands."

Aside from the occasional clash concerning human rights and privacy in China, it seems that Google can do no wrong. Its dominance in the American search market is, if not quite as amazing as its control in the UK, still impressive. WebProNews writer Joe Lewis even recently compared Google to the Roman Empire.

For the record, though, the company's stock still hasn't quite hit the magic number - right now, it's at 495.75. You can, if you want, check its current price here.

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Doug is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest eBusiness news.