Its shares are now nearly 20 per cent off their 12-month high of $53.87, reached in October. Wesfarmers shares have also taken a hit of late, although the decline has been muted in comparison. Based on yesterday's closing price, the stock is trading at a 12 per cent discount to its 12-month high of $33.21 reached in March. The group's issued capital was fleshed out early last year by a mammoth $4.6 billion capital raising to shore up its balance sheet in the wake of its $19.3 billion takeover of Coles. Wesfarmers lost its position as WA's biggest company by value in 1990, when a surging share price propelled Ralph Sarich's Orbital Engine Company to No. 1 with a market value of $863 million. Wesfarmers ended the same year capitalised at just $489 million. It later regained the top position under the leadership of managing director Michael Chaney in the late 1990s. It has since played a game of leapfrog with Woodside, which overtook it in 2000 only to be usurped again briefly in 2002.