All-round improvement in business sentiments in Q2FY24: NCAER survey

06 Nov 2023 Evaluate

Economic think-tank - the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) in its latest survey has showed an all-round improvement in business sentiments in the second quarter of the current fiscal (Q2FY24). The Business Confidence Index (BCI) rose to 140.7 in the second quarter from 128 in the first quarter of the current fiscal. The BCI was also higher than 132.5 in the year-ago period. 

The NCAER-NSE BCI was driven by four components -- overall economic conditions will improve in the next six months, financial position of firms will improve in the next six months, present investment climate is positive, and present capacity utilisation is close to or above the optimal level. The 126th Round of NCAER Business Expectations Survey (BES) in September 2023 showed that the share of positive responses was higher for all four components of the BCI in 2023-24:Q2 compared to 2023-24:Q1, with support from the NSE. The survey is based on responses from 500 companies. 

The survey said ‘Business sentiments were relatively more buoyant about domestic markets than external markets. The share of firms expecting production, domestic sales and pre-tax profits to increase was more in the second quarter of 2023-24 compared to the first’. In contrast, a lower percentage of firms expected exports of their products and imports of raw materials to increase in the September quarter compared to the April-June period. Regarding expectations about future price trends, sentiments were muted for prices of inputs and outputs with a lower percentage of firms expecting prices to rise in the second quarter compared to the first.

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