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If you throw all the products we buy and the services we use in one basket, then add up the price tag, that's the Gross Domestic Product, which is the primary metric economists use to assess the economic health of a country or region.
The easy part of calculating GDP is the calculation itself: C+I+G+(X-M)=GDP. Got it? No? Well, add Consumption, Investment by companies, Government purchases, and then take the product of eXports (calling it 'E' would lack sexiness) minus iMports ('I' was taken). Viola! GDP.
Still don't get it? Well, knowing the components helps. Consumption is the biggest component, and it's a tally of the cost of all the goods and services we buy. Investment is what companies spend on the real assets they own, plus the value of the inventory that we haven't gobbled up through consumption. Government purchases are what the Feds pay money for (whether it be highways or fighter jets, though big social programs, like welfare, aren't counted). And then we calculate the difference between the goods and services we¿re sending to other countries and the stuff we're bringing in.
Good. That explains it, except there's a catch. Inflation has a habit of distorting the numbers, so economists talk about either Nominal GDP or Real GDP. In fact, Real GDP isn't necessarily "real" for most folks, since it takes any inflation out. Nominal GDP includes the effects of inflation. (There's something called the implicit price deflator which is a calculation using the two, but we'll spare you the details.)
So, now that we know GDP, why do we want to? Well, it's good to compare different markets. And watching the trend shows whether a given economy is growing (good), stagnating (not so good), or shrinking (very not so good). When GDP goes down two quarters in a row, we're officially in a recession.
For the record, GDP is released at the end of each month, with most reporting ¿preliminary¿ data for the previous month. But you won't get final GDP numbers for the fourth quarter of a year until the very end of the first quarter of the next year. After all, it's not an easy number to calculate.
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Monday, May 19, 2008
VIASPACE CEO Reports on Sharp Corporation Progress on Direct Methanol Fuel Cells
Comtex
PASADENA, Calif., May 19, 2008 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX/ ----VIASPACE Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: VSPC) CEO, Dr. Carl Kukkonen, reports that Sharp Corporation claims to have achieved the world's highest power density for a direct methanol fuel cell for mobile equipment. The press release on the Sharp website (http://sharp-world.com/corporate/news/080515.html) states, "This new technology enables efficient power generation from a small cell volume. Thus, the use of this technology can make it possible to develop fuel cells that have almost the same volume but a longer continuous-use lifespan than lithium-ion batteries, which are the main type currently in use. Sharp will promote further research and development for the practical application of fuel cells for mobile equipment such as PDAs, electronic dictionaries, and notebook computers." Dr. Kukkonen reported on Sony and Samsung progress on direct methanol fuel cells on May 15, 2008, and this update is from the 15th Fuel Cell Symposium in Tokyo where Sharp released the information. Sharp has emerged as another significant OEM player in the direct methanol fuel cell sector of the $55 Billion clean energy market.
VIASPACE subsidiary Direct Methanol Fuel Cell Corporation (DMFCC) manufactures disposable fuel cartridges for portable electronics applications. Fuel cells are the electrochemical engine that converts the fuel into electricity that powers the notebook computer or mobile phone. The fuel cartridges are the consumable part of the fuel cell business and represent recurring revenue. VIASPACE also manufactures fuel cell and battery test equipment, and sells high-quality and safe rechargeable lithium-based batteries.
About VIASPACE: Originally founded in 1998 with the objective of transforming proven space and defense technologies from NASA and the Department of Defense into hardware and software solutions that solve today's complex problems, VIASPACE benefits from important patent and software licenses from Caltech, which manages NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. For more information, please visit our website at http://www.VIASPACE.com, or contact for Investor Relations, Dr. Jan Vandersande, Director of Communications at 800-517-8050, or IR@VIASPACE.com.
This news release includes forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements relate to future events or our future performance and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, levels of activity, performance or achievements expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Such factors include the risks outlined in our periodic filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including our Annual Report on Form 10-KSB, for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2007, as well as general economic and business conditions, the ability to acquire and develop specific projects and technologies, the ability to fund operations, changes in consumer and business consumption habits, and other factors over which VIASPACE has little or no control.
SOURCE VIASPACE Inc.
http://www.VIASPACE.com
Copyright (C) 2008 PR Newswire. All rights reserved
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