Industry's Q4 business confidence improves

Indian industry's Business Confidence Index (BCI), as reported by industry chamber CII, has shown a slight improvement for the fourth quarter of 2014-15, ending on Tuesday, over the previous quarter.

After moderating somewhat in the third (October-December 2014) quarter at the level of 56.2, the BCI improved to 56.4 in the fourth quarter.

"The improvement in confidence level also assumes significance as the BCI was much lower at 49.9 in the same quarter last year," Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) said in a statement here on Tuesday.

The Expectation Index too saw a similar rise, moving from 57.6 in the third quarter to 57.8 in the current one.

Expectation of recovery in sales, coupled with sharp decline in input costs led to a higher proportion of 47.6 percent of respondents expecting an increase in profit-after-tax (PAT) in the fourth quarter, as compared to 33.6 percent in the previous quarter.

Fifty-five percent of the respondents expect gross domestic product (GDP) growth to be in the range of 6.5-7.5 percent in the current fiscal ending on Tuesday.

"This is directly in line with 7.4 per cent GDP growth in FY15 as per the revised estimates of the CSO (Central Statistics Office)," said CII.

On the risk factors to growth, the respondents cited the moderation in domestic growth, a slow revival of the global economy and high borrowing costs as the top three concerns for the economy.

The survey is based on responses received from over 150 industry members. Majority of respondents (48 percent) were from the large-scale sector, while medium and small companies comprised 17 percent and 35 percent respectively.