America's Economic Future – A Discussion By Ted Kavadas
On March 30 the Business Roundtable’s CEO Economic Outlook Survey was released for the 1st quarter. The March Duke/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlook Survey was released on March 9. Both contain a variety of statistics regarding how executives view business and economic conditions. In the CEO survey, of particular interest is the CEO Economic Outlook …
On December 27, I wrote a post about the latest Business Roundtable’s CEO Economic Outlook Survey and the Duke/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlook Survey. Subsequent to that post, the Conference Board released its 4th Quarter CEO Confidence Survey. The overall measure of CEO Confidence was at 62, up from 50 in the third quarter. An …
On December 14 the Business Roundtable’s CEO Economic Outlook Survey was released for the 4th quarter. The December Duke/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlook Survey was also released on December 14. Both contain a variety of statistics regarding how executives view business and economic conditions. In the CEO survey, of particular interest is the CEO Economic …
On Tuesday the November PPI figures were released, and they continue their recent trend of being significantly higher than the CPI figures. Should this trend continue, it will of course likely have a significant impact on many companies’ profitability. I believe there are many reasons for why PPI growth is trending significantly higher than CPI. …
On October 1, I wrote a post about the Business Roundtable’s CEO Economic Outlook Survey and the Duke/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlook Survey. Subsequent to that post, the Conference Board released its 3rd Quarter CEO Confidence Survey. The overall measure of CEO Confidence was at 50, down from 62 in the second quarter. There are …
On September 28 the Business Roundtable’s CEO Economic Outlook Survey was released for Q3. The Duke/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlook Survey was released on September 15. Both surveys are well worth looking at, and in general highlight a weakening outlook among executives. In the CEO survey, of particular interest is the CEO Economic Outlook Index, …
(This is my second blog post that solely discusses pricing issues. My first was on April 23, 2010) Firms in general have enjoyed the economic “tailwind” of rising sales for decades. While this can be seen in a variety of measures, one of particular note is that of Retail Sales. As seen in the following …
Frequently, one hears of the high profits and large (from a historical perspective) cash positions of companies. While this may be true more or less, especially among larger companies, I believe that it depicts the current overall business environment in an overly positive light. As I have written of previously, there are significant problem areas …
Pricing is a very complex discipline even during periods of economic growth and stability. With the onset of increased economic uncertainty and volatility over the last few years, pricing’s complexity has significantly grown. Of course, it is impossible to characterize all firms as having the same pricing issues, as each industry and firm has a …
My analyses indicate that, unfortunately, businesses will continue to face very challenging conditions. Many already find themselves in rather perilous circumstances, as witnessed by the number and breadth (across industries) of companies experiencing double-digit revenue declines, not to mention innumerable other statistics. On a couple of occasions I have written about the conditions that businesses face during …