Business confidence jumps in August, BNZ survey shows

Business outlook for the year ahead improved in August, with a record net 42% of respondents to BNZ's monthly confidence survey saying they expected the economy to improve over the coming year. This was up from a net 15% positive in July. Of the respondents, 59% said they expected the economy to improve over the next year, 24% expected it to stay the same, and 17% expected it to get worse. This was compared to 42%, 31% and 27%, respectively, in July. Here is a link to the full survey, including comments from respondents. There were 657 repondents to this month's survey, which is conducted with BNZ 'Weekly Overview' readers.