Simple Investment application

Question

I know this sounds easy but please help me get started since I'm not too bright..
I have to make an Investment application that calculates how many years it will take for a 2500$ investment to be worth atleast 5000$ if compounded annually at 7.5%.
What are the steps I should follow? What kind of loop do I use?

Answer 1

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package interest;
import java.text.DecimalFormat;
import javax.swing.JOptionPane;
import javax.swing.JTextArea;
public class Interest
      public static void main( String args[] )
           double amount, principal = 2500.0, rate = .075;
           DecimalFormat precisionTwo = new DecimalFormat( "0.00" );
           JTextArea outputTextArea = new JTextArea( 11, 20 );
           outputTextArea.append( "Year\tAmount on deposit\n" );
                 int year = 1;
           while (year > 0)
                amount = principal * Math.pow( 1.0 + rate, year );
                         year++;
                         if(amount > 5000){
                outputTextArea.append( year + "\t" +
                precisionTwo.format( amount ) + "\n" );
                         year = 0;
           JOptionPane.showMessageDialog( null, outputTextArea, "Compound Interest", JOptionPane.INFORMATION_MESSAGE );
           System.exit( 0 ); // terminate the application
}