Business confidence grows 2.2 points in March 2023

ICE consolidates the confidence indices of four sectors: Industry, Services, Commerce and Construction.

For economics and accounting professor Riezo Almeida, the industrial and service sectors had a significant improvement, mainly with the increase in external demand and the internal market. And Brazilian trade has improved indicators with the increase in the minimum wage.

“With the possible recovery of the big countries in the world, new demands are emerging for Brazilian products and services, that is, exports continue to rise, which is why this indicator has improved”, said the professor.

The rise in business confidence in March was crucial for improving expectations for the coming months. The Current Business Situation Index (ISA-E) rose 1.0 points to 90.9 points and the Expectations Index (IE-E) rose 5.1 points to 93.0 points, the highest level since October 2022 (95.9 pts.). With the result, IE-E outperforms ISA-E for the first time since March 2022.

From February to March, confidence in services (ICS) rose by 2.6 points, to 91.7 points, while that of commerce grew by 1.1 points, to 86.9 points. Industry confidence grew by 2.4 points to 94.4 points, while construction was stable at 94.4 points. Overall, confidence grew in 61% of the 49 ICEI segments.

Even with this increase, for Brazilian businessmen, inflation has still been a point of questioning in the provision of services. As is the case of businessman Hygons Hipólito. He says he has faced challenges due to the Brazilian economy.

“One of the challenges we are going through is in relation to price adjustments, because the country’s economic situation is not helping, inflation is pushing service prices up”, explained the businessman

In March, business confidence rose in 61% of the 49 segments comprising the ICE, a spread slightly lower than that observed in the previous month.