The Business Confidence Index (BCI) decreased by 1.0 points to 51.7 in March 2024, according to the Business Confidence Survey issued by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP).
According to the survey, this decrease is derived by both the Industry and the Services sectors. The Industry sector BCI decreased by 1.0 points to 50.3 while for the Services sector, it decreased by 1.1 points to 52.1.
Current Business Confidence
The Current Business Confidence Index (CBCI) decreased by 1.3 points to 47.7 in March 2024 over the previous wave. Both the Industry and the Services sectors are the contributors for the decrease. Industry sector CBCI decreased by 1.5 points to 46.1 in the current wave, while that for Services sector decreased by 1.2 points to 48.2.
The disaggregation of responses reveals a decrease in the positive views with neutral views remaining stable and negative views increasing in the current wave.
Overall percentage share of positive views (positive and very positive) decreased by 3.4 percent to 24.3 percent in the current wave. On the other hand, negative views (negative and very negative) increased by 3.5 percent to 33.9 percent in the current wave from 30.4 percent in the previous wave.
Expected Business Confidence
The Expected Business Confidence Index (EBCI) decreased by 0.8 points to 55.7 in March 2024. Both the Industry and Services sectors are the contributors for this change whose EBCI decreased by 0.6 and 0.9 points respectively in the current wave.
The disaggregation of responses shows a decrease in the positive views, while the negative and neutral views increased in the current wave.
Overall percentage share of positive views (positive and very positive) decreased by 2.8 percent to 37.5 percent. On the other hand, share of negative views increased by 1.5 percent to 17.8 percent and neutral views increased by 1.3 percent to 44.7 percent in March 2024.
Purchasing Managers Index (PMI)
The PMI increased slightly by 0.1 points to 49.7 in the current wave from the previous wave. It is worth mentioning here that the PMI was last seen in the positive zone in June 2022.
The PMI’s disaggregation shows improvement in indices of three out of its five components in March 2024. The highest increase of 1.4 points was observed in the firms’ business activities followed by total order booked (1.1 points) and average supplier delivery times (0.6 points). On the other hand, quantity of raw material purchases decreased by 1.7 points and total number of employees by 1.2 points in the current wave.
Inflation Expectations
The Inflation Expectations (IE) increased by 4.9 points from the previous wave and reached to 69.4 in March 2024. Both the Industry and the Services sectors contributed to the increase in overall IE.
Industry sector witnessed an increase of 4.3 points while the Services sector inflation expectations increased by 6.3 points in the current wave.
Employment
The Current Employment Index increased by 2.0 points to 50.9 in the current survey wave. This increase was contributed by the Services sector which increased by 3.0 points in March 2024 from the previous wave. On the other hand, Industry sector’s Current Employment Index decreased by 1.2 points to 48.3 in March 2024 over the previous wave.
The Expected Employment Index increased by 0.6 points to 55.5 in the current wave. The increase was derived by both the Industry and Services sectors which increased by 0.8 points and 0.5 points respectively.
Capacity Utilization
The Average Current Capacity Utilization (ACCU) of manufacturing sector (within the Industry sector) increased by 2.4 percent to 67.7 percent in March 2024 from the previous wave.
