Firms’ confidence in economy high at 64.7 index points for September

Like Apapa, deplorable roads threaten business activities in Onne, Calabar Ports

The Nigerian businesses showed greater confidence in the macro economy with 64.7 index points for September 2019 according to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)’s Business Expectations Survey (BES) report released on Tuesday.

According to the CBN, the BES conducted from August 12-21, 2019 with a sample size of 1050 businesses nationwide. A response rate of 95.4 per cent was achieved, and the sample covered the services, industrial, wholesale/retail trade, and construction sectors.

The respondent firms were made up of small, medium and large corporations covering both import- and export-oriented businesses.

At 28.6 index points, respondents expressed optimism on the overall confidence index (CI) on the macro economy in the month of August 2019 compared to 28.1 points in July, 2019.

The optimism on the macro economy in the current month was driven by the opinion of respondents from services (15.4 points), industrial (10.1 points), wholesale/retail trade (2.4 points) and construction (0.7 points) sectors. For next month, the major drivers of the optimism were services (36.1points), industrial (20.7 points), wholesale/retail trade (6.0 points) and construction (1.9 points) sectors.

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The services sector is made up of financial intermediation, hotels, and restaurants, renting and business activities and community and social.

The report noted that the positive outlook by type of business in August 2019 was driven by businesses that are neither import- nor export-oriented (21.0 points), both import- and export-oriented (4.3 points), import-oriented (2.9 points), and those that are export-related (0.3 points).

The analysis of businesses with expansion plans by sector in the next month showed that the construction services sector indicates higher disposition to expansion with an index of (46.7 points), followed by services sector (30.3 points), industrial sector (17.6 points) while respondents in the wholesale/retail trade sector indicated no plans to expand their businesses (-1.8 points).

However, respondent firms identified insufficient power supply (65.9 points), high interest rate (56.5 points), financial problems (53.7 points), unfavourable economic climate (53.5 points), unclear economic laws (50.8 points), unfavourable political climate (47.0 points), insufficient demand (46.0 points), access to credit (45.6 points) and competition (43.0 points), respectively, as major factors constraining business activity in the current month.

Respondents anticipate better economic conditions as their index of economic growth rose in the short run with an index of 35.4, 47.9 and 58.5 points for the current month, next six months and next twelve months, respectively.

Hope Moses-Ashike

Hope Moses-Ashike is an Associate Editor, Banking and Finance, with more than a decade of experience reporting on Nigeria’s financial system and broader economy. She closely tracks market movements, monetary policy decisions, company disclosures, regulatory actions, economic indicators, and global developments, and interprets what they mean for businesses, investors, policymakers, and households. Her reporting helps readers understand complex issues such as inflation trends, foreign exchange market dynamics, interest rate decisions, bank performance, and investment risks. She also covers major international events and periodically travels to Washington, D.C., to report on the World Bank/IMF Spring and Annual Meetings. Her dedication to financial journalism has earned her multiple recognitions and invitations to high-level professional development programmes. She is an alumna of the International Visitors Leadership Programme (IVLP) in the United States and holds an Advanced Financial Journalism Certificate from the Press Association Training in London, UK. Her other notable achievements include completing the Lagos Business School CMC Programme, the Bloomberg Media Africa Initiative Programme, and a Master Class in Journalism at Rhodes University in South Africa.