Business
THE Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Friday in Lagos in its Monthly Business Expectations Survey (BES) Report revealed that operators were optimistic to experience growth in the macro economy in February at 62.1 index point compared with the 25.9 recorded in January.
The CBN report posted on its website on Thursday, said that business operators had noted their responses from the 2019 January BES report, released by the Statistics Department.
“At 25.9 index points, respondents expressed optimism on the overall Confidence Index (CI) on the macro economy in January 2019.
“The businesses outlook for February 2019 showed greater confidence on the macro economy with 62.1 index points,” the report said.
It said the optimism on the macro economy in the current month was driven by the opinion of respondents from services at 13.0 points, industrial at 10.9 points, and wholesale or retail trade at 1.5 points and construction sectors at 0.5 points.
The survey, however, said the major drivers of the optimism for next month were services at 35.0 points, industrial at 20.0 points, wholesale and retail trade at 5.4 points and construction sectors at 1.7 points.
It added that the positive outlook by type of business in January were driven by businesses that were neither import nor export-oriented standing at 17.6 points.
According to the report, both import and export-oriented are at 4.2 points, import-oriented at 3.5 points and those that are export-related at 0.6 points.
On business confidence on own operations by sector, the report said all sectors expressed optimism on own operations in January.
The report also said: “Respondents from the services sector expressed the greatest optimism on own operation with an index of 8.0 points.
“Comparatively, the construction sector expressed high optimism as the index rose from 0.0 point in the previous month to 0.6 points in the current month.”
According to the bank, majority of the respondent firms expect the Naira to appreciate in the current, next and the next 12 months respectively.
It said their confidence indices stood at 23.0, 31.9 and 44.6 points.
The survey added that respondent firms expect borrowing rates to rise in current, next and the next 12 months as the confidence indices stood at 20.0, 6.7 and 7.6 points respectively.
Also, respondents’ expectation of inflation rate in the next six months and 12 months in January stood at 11.7 and 11.6 percent respectively. (NAN)
– Feb. 8, 2019 @ 16:35 GMT |
Tags: @cenbank Business operators expect macroeconomic growth in February – Report
