The Equipment Leasing & Finance Foundation’s Monthly Confidence Index for the Equipment Finance Industry has been released, with 20 percent of executives saying they believe business conditions will improve over the next four months, up from 10 percent in February. In addition, 70 percent of respondents believe business conditions will remain the same over the next four months, a decrease from 83.3 percent the previous month. 10 percent also believe business conditions will worsen, up from 6.7 percent the previous month.
Of the respondents, 23.3 percent believe demand for leases and loans to fund capital expenditures will increase over the next four months.
When asked, 46.7 percent of the executives report they expect to hire more employees over the next four months, an increase from 26.7 percent in February. No change is expected from 46.7 percent, a decrease from 56.7 last month.
Nearly 36.7 percent of the leadership evaluate the current U.S. economy as “fair” and none evaluate it as “poor,” all unchanged for the second consecutive month.
6.7 percent of respondents believe that U.S. economic conditions will “get better” over the next six months, down from 13.3 percent in February. In March, 33.3 percent of respondents indicate they believe their company will increase spending on business development activities during the next six months.
Source: ELFF
