Ondrej Holzman In January announcement of financial results among other things, we learned that Apple has $178 billion in cash, which is both huge and hard to imagine. We can demonstrate how huge a bundle of money Apple is sitting by comparing its fortune with the gross domestic products of all countries in the world.
Gross domestic product expresses the total monetary value of goods and services created in a certain territory during a given period and is used to determine the performance of the economy. This is, of course, not the same as Apple's $178 billion, but this comparison will serve well as an idea.
The 178 billion dollars catapults Apple ahead of countries such as Vietnam, Morocco or Ecuador, whose gross domestic product, according to the latest World Bank data for 2013 (PDF) lower. Out of a total of 214 listed economies, Apple would come in just ahead of Ukraine in 55th place, and above it would be New Zealand.
The Czech Republic is ranked 208th by the World Bank with a gross domestic product exceeding 50 billion dollars. If Apple were a country, it would be the 55th richest in the world.
At the same time, Apple a week ago became the first American company in history to reach a market value of 700 billion after the market closed. However, if we take inflation into account, Apple still hasn't reached Microsoft's peak in 1999. Back then, the Redmond company was worth $620 billion, which would mean over $870 billion in today's dollars.
However, times change very quickly in the technology world and currently Apple is twice as big as Microsoft (349 billion) and it is quite possible that it will attack its record.
Source: The Atlantic
Photos: enfad
It would be more appropriate to compare GDP, for example, with sales. It's not the same, but it's much closer than comparing it to financial reserves.
Exactly!!!