December 5, 2007

Despite a relatively uncertain economic cycle, the leaders of America's top companies showed a slight uptick in their expectations for the economy over the next six months, according to Business Roundtable's fourth quarter 2007 CEO Economic Outlook Survey.
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The CEO Economic Outlook Index, which indicates how CEOs believe the economy will perform in the six months ahead, improved moderately, rising more than two points from last quarter's 77.4 to 79.5.
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This quarter's survey suggests that CEOs, as a whole, still see the economy as steady and that the vast majority expect their sales, capital spending and employment levels to either increase or remain steady in the first half of 2008," said Harold McGraw III, chairman of Business Roundtable and president and CEO ...

In stark contrast to recent findings in a survey of CEOs by the Business Roundtable, optimism among chief financial officers about the U.S. economy plunged to a record low this quarter, driven by growing concern about weak consumer demand, high fuel costs, rising labor costs and credit markets. This pessimism will slow growth in earnings, capital spending, and hiring.
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These are some of the conclusions of the year-end 2007 Duke University/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlook survey, which asked CFOs from a broad range of global public and private companies about their expectations for the economy.
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Summary of Findings:

• Optimism reached its lowest point since the optimism index was launched six years ago. Pessimists ...