The Business Confidence Index (BCI) improved by 1.8 points to 53.5 in April 2024, according to the Business Confidence Survey issued by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP).
According to the survey, this increase is driven by the Services sector. The Services sector BCI increased by 2.6 points to 54.7. On the other hand, the Industry sector BCI decreased slightly by 0.4 points to 49.9.
Current Business Confidence
The Current Business Confidence Index (CBCI) increased by 2.4 points to 50.1 in April 2024 over the previous wave. The Services sector contributed to this change with an increase of 3.4 points. On the other hand, the CBCI of the Industry sector decreased slightly by 0.6 points to 45.5.
The disaggregation of responses reveals a decrease in the negative views, while the positive and neutral views increased in the current wave. Overall share of negative views (negative and very negative) decreased by 3.5 percent to 30.4 percent in the current wave. On the other hand, positive (positive and very positive) views increased by 2.7 percent to 27.0 percent in the current wave.
Expected Business Confidence
The Expected Business Confidence Index (EBCI) increased by 1.2 points to 56.9 in April 2024. The Services sector contributed for this change whose EBCI increased by 1.7 points to 57.8. On the other hand, Industry sector EBCI decreased slightly by 0.2 points to 54.3.
The disaggregation of responses shows an increase in the positive views, while the negative and neutral views decreased in the current wave. Overall share of positive views (positive and very positive) increased by 3.0 percent to 40.5 percent. On the other hand, share of negative views decreased by 1.2 percent to 16.6 percent and the neutral views decreased by 1.8 percent to 42.9 percent in April 2024.
Purchasing Managers Index (PMI)
The PMI increased slightly by 0.2 points to 49.9 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 slight decrease in the indices of three out of five of its components. A decrease of 0.2 points was observed in the total order booked and total number of employees followed by quantity of raw material purchases which decreased by 0.1 points. The firms’ business activities remained same at 48.4. On the other hand, average supplier delivery times improved by 1.7 points in April 2024.
Inflation Expectations
The Inflation Expectations (IE) of businesses decreased by 3.3 points and reached to 66.1 in April 2024. Both the Industry and the Services sectors contributed to the decrease in overall IE. The Inflation Expectations of the Industry sector decreased by 4.7 points and that of the Services sector by 1.1 points
Employment
The Current Employment Index decreased by 0.8 points to 50.1 in the current survey wave. This decrease was contributed by both the Industry and the Services sector which decreased by 0.1 and 0.9 points respectively in April 2024 from the previous wave.
The overall Expected Employment Index increased slightly by 0.4 points to 55.9 in April 2024. This change was driven by the Services sector which increased by 0.7 points. On the other hand, the index for the Industry sector decreased slightly by 0.3 points in April 2024.
Capacity Utilization
The Average Current Capacity Utilization (ACCU) of the manufacturing sector (within the Industry sector) decreased by 4.1 percent to 63.6 percent in April 2024.
