Glossary:Asset

From Statistics Explained

Assets are economic resources that have some value or usefulness (usually convertible in cash) and that are owned by enterprises or individuals, for example a piece of machinery or a house. According to the International Accounting Standards Board, assets are a result of past events and are expected to provide future economic benefits.

In the context of National accounts, economic assets can be defined as entities functioning as stores of value and over which ownership rights are enforced by institutional units, individually or collectively, and from which economic benefits may be derived by their owners by holding them, or using them, over a period of time (the economic benefits consist of primary incomes derived from the use of the asset and the value, including possible holding gains/losses, that could be realized by disposing of the asset or terminating it).

Further information

• Annual national accounts (ESMS metadata file)
• Annual sector accounts (ESMS metadata file)
• Quarterly national accounts (ESMS metadata file)
• Quarterly sector accounts (ESMS metadata file)
• Supply, use and Input-output tables (ESMS metadata file)
• European system of accounts ESA 1995
• Handbook on quarterly national accounts
• Handbook on price and volume measures in national accounts
• Eurostat-OECD methodological manual on purchasing power parities

Statistical data

• Structural business statistics overview
• National accounts - an overview

Source

• International Accounting Standards Board (IASB)
• OECD - Glossary of Statistical Terms