Gross Fixed Capital Formation

Gross fixed capital formation (GFCF) is a macroeconomic concept used in official national accounts such as the UNSNA, NIPAs and the European System of Accounts (ESA). The concept dates back to the NBER studies of Simon Kuznets of capital formation in the 1930s, and standard measures for it were adopted in the 1950s. Statistically it measures the value of acquisitions of new or existing fixed assets by the business sector, governments and "pure" households (excluding their unincorporated enterprises) less disposals of fixed assets. GFCF is a component of the expenditure on GDP, and thus shows something about how much of the new value added in the economy is invested rather than consumed.

GFCF is called "gross" because the measure does not make any adjustments to deduct the consumption of fixed capital (depreciation of fixed assets) from the investment figures. For the analysis of the development of the productive capital stock, it is important to measure the value of the acquisitions less disposals of fixed assets beyond replacement for obsolescence of existing assets due to normal wear and tear. "Net fixed investment" excludes the depreciation of existing assets from the figures for new fixed investment, and is called net fixed capital formation.

GFCF is not a measure of total investment, because only the value of net additions to fixed assets is measured, and all kinds of financial assets are excluded, as well as stocks of inventories and other operating costs (the latter included in intermediate consumption). If, for example, one examines a company balance sheet, it is easy to see that fixed assets are only one component of the total annual capital outlay.

The most important exclusion from GFCF is land sales and purchases. The original reason, leaving aside complex valuation problems involved in estimating the value of land in a standard way, was that if a piece of land is sold, the total amount of land already in existence, is not regarded as being increased thereby; all that happens is that the ownership of the same land changes. Therefore, only the value of land improvement is included in the GFCF measure as a net addition to wealth. In special cases, such as land reclamation from the sea, a river or a lake (e.g. a polder), new land can indeed be created and sold where it did not exist before, adding to fixed assets. The GFCF measure always applies to the resident enterprises of a national territory, and thus if e.g. oil exploration occurs in the open seas, the associated new fixed investment is allocated to the national territory in which the relevant enterprises are resident.

Data is usually provided by statistical agencies annually and quarterly, but only within a certain time-lag. Fluctuations in this indicator are often considered to show something about future business activity, business confidence and the pattern of economic growth. In times of economic uncertainty or recession, typically business investment in fixed assets will be reduced, since it ties up additional capital for a longer interval of time, with a risk that it will not pay itself off (and fixed assets may therefore also be scrapped faster). Conversely, in times of robust economic growth, fixed investment will increase across the board, because the observed market expansion makes it likely that such investment will be profitable in the future.