On June 5 the June Duke/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlook Survey (pdf) was released. It contains a variety of statistics regarding how CFOs view business and economic conditions.
In this CFO Survey, I found the following to be the most notable excerpts:
…optimism among CFOs about the U.S. economy is now above the long-run average for only the second time since 2007.
also:
CFO optimism about the U.S. economy has rebounded this quarter. The U.S. Business Optimism Index rebounded to 61 on a scale from 0 to 100, well above last quarter’s reading of 55 and also above the long-run average index value of 59. Latin American CFOs are the most optimistic in the world (66, down from 69 last quarter), followed by Asian business leaders (62). African (56) and European (53, same as last quarter) CFOs are less optimistic about the future.
Despite the jump in optimism about the overall economy, U.S. companies plan only moderate increases in business spending (planned increase of 6 percent over the next 12 months, up from 5 percent last quarter) and full-time domestic employment (up 1 percent, not enough to significantly affect the unemployment rate.)
The CFO survey contains the Optimism Index chart, showing U.S. Optimism (with regard to the economy) at 61, as seen below:
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It should be interesting to see how well the CFOs predict business and economic conditions going forward. I discussed various aspects of this, and the importance of these predictions, in the July 9, 2010 post titled “The Business Environment”.
(past posts on CEO and CFO Surveys can be found under the “CFO and CEO Confidence” tag)
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I post various economic forecasts because I believe they should be carefully monitored. However, as those familiar with this blog are aware, I do not necessarily agree with many of the consensus estimates and much of the commentary in these forecast surveys.
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The Special Note summarizes my overall thoughts about our economic situation
SPX at 1617.46 as this post is written